Reply to including/excluding kids from DS's birthday

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I'm of the mindset that your kid should invite smaller, or invite all the kids.  The reason why is there are so many uncontrollable social ripple effects to this, some which may involve the parents of the kids.  (It's also just the nice, inclusive thing to do--the big-hearted generous thing to do.)

Those kids will most likely self-select out of the situation anyways.

But even if they don't, I think there is one factor that parents often don't take into consideration, and that is their own kids' daily contact with the individuals.  It's like work, you are dealing with that person every damn day.  So rather than looking at it short-term ("I deal with that person every day, I don't want to have to deal with them on the weekend, too") inviting them is an investment in making that future daily situation at best the same, or possibly better.  Most importantly, it's an investment in making sure the future daily situation doesn't get worse.  I look at it as controlling for as much as you can.[/quote]

I like that way of thinking about it.  It's not just about the birthday party--your son is in class with these kids every day.  The only way I'd be okay with excluding one or two kids is if they were physically violent or bullying my kid.  But these boys sound like pretty run-of-the-mill tweens.

Maybe ask your son what he would say to the boys if they ask why they aren't invited?  And while I agree that kids should generally be able to choose their guests, they are still kids, and they are still learning social skills, so I always retain veto power.  [/quote]

I agree with both posts above. Some of the "let him decide and let him deal with any consequences at school" folks seem to have missed the fact that he is in a small school and has to see these same 15 kids every day. It's not like he's inviting 10 out of 30 in one class, or 10 out of a grade of 300 as at our school.

I would make this about the activitiy and the cost involved. Having 10 boys doing go-karts sounds like a massive pain, frankly, and what are the fees for an activitiy like that for 10 kids? I'd say, fewer kids means a cooler activity, so you can invite three to five other boys and that's it. That makes a total of four to six including your son. The smaller number can mean you afford MORE go-kart time (rather than a shorter time for more kids); you can have better food (maybe instead of pizza at the go-kart place in some party room, instead they'd be able to go out to a restaurant that also has games like the chain Dave and Buster's if you have them near you); and so on.

I don't see having birthday  parties that large, for either gender, in schools/classes of any size, past about the age of eight or nine. Once kids are older they tend to want to hang with fewer but closer friends and do more interesting things. Make it about the activity and NOT about "social consequences." [/quote]

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