Reply to 8 year old sleepover party - 3 girls excluded. WWYD?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]as a geeky girl... actually being invited and then ostracized at the party itself is often worse...  And for those trying to say mean girls get their come-uppance later -- often they don't.  Many are doing just fine.  Some girls will always be more 'popular' than others at school & there will be friend groups or cliques.  I would just reinforce that some friends are closer than others and many people can only invite 10 or whatever people to the party - people can be friends in different ways and don't always go to each other's parties (who knows in middle school when friend groups jumble again, the 3 kids you are hanging with now, one may end up a queen bee, one a wannbe and one a book worm with only one bestie).  Make plans that night but completely decontextualize your plans from the party and don't bring it up again unless your daughter dwells on it (ie. don't feed it but sounds like you already may have!) [/quote]

This makes good sense. I am confused by some of the comments, however. On the one hand, kids should be a is to invite whoever they want to their party-- on the other, several people have suggested that OP's daughter is not "popular" and this is why she was left out. It seems if it's looked at through a popularity lens, that it's not exactly a benign choice to exclude some kids...this is my son's experience in fourth grade. There are some kids who will never be left out because they are popular and there are some kids (like my son) who will not be invited because he is unpopular (he has special needs). I guess many parents are okay with this dynamic--but let's be honest about it. There are some kids who will be invited every time, and there are some kids who will fall into the minority of never (or rarely) being invited. Parents do not discourage this dynamic because they don't see (or appear in some instances to care) about the thin line between choice and exclusion.[/quote]

This is all age dependent. At 8, my child knows who they are friends with and who they are not. I ABSOLUTELY make sure my kids know to be inclusive and to be kind to everyone in their class. I have taught my kids if someone is playing alone or looks lonely, to go up and offer to play or invite them to join. However, "everyone in" just doesn't work past a certain age. I'm not saying I would personally be okay with inviting all but 3 girls in the class, but nor would I be extending a sleepover invitation to every girl in that class regardless of whether she and my daughter are actually friends or not. Who even wants to go to sleepover at someones house when they don't know or play with that person? I wouldn't have!

At 8, kids are definitely veering into the territory of having defined friends groups. That's fine and normal. Between the extremes of the very popular kids and the mega unpopular ones lies the vast majority of average kids who have their own set of friends that they hang out with regularly. They don't get invited to every single party, but they get invited to the ones their friends have, and that's what matters. Making sure your kids know that that level of friendship is good is what's important. I would never encourage my kids to maliciously leave someone out, but past a certain age, I'm sorry, I'm not having ALL 12 girls in the class for a sleepover, nor do I expect that from the other parents. Which means sometimes my kid is left out, and if you're doing your job, she knows that everyone is left out sometimes and it doesn't determine their worth or value and it's not just not that big a deal.[/quote]

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