We have a class of 90 and are inviting everyone to my DS's bar mitzvah. He would be inviting at least half and that would be unfair.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not sure which is the right forum for this so move it if necessary. How have people dealt with inviting all the kids in the class vs only some kids to their major events? I can't imagine inviting 90 kids right off the top to a party and my D.C. Isn't friends with them all, of course, but also don't want people to feel left out. Advice welcome. And if anyone has discovered a good forum for discussing bar/bat mitzvah issues, I'd love to be directed to it. Thanks!

A good rule of thumb is if your are going to invite more than 1/3 to 1/2 of the class, invite everyone. In DD's case, we invited about 15 people from school. There were 600 in the 7th grade.

OP, the good rule of thumb is to not listen to others rules of thumb and just have your DC invite who they want to invite whether it is 10 or 40. Stop the PC bullshit of hurting people's feelings. Why should only a handful or everyone including basic strangers, mean kids, or people that hate your child be invited. Who do they want to celebrate with? Write it down. THE END. And don't you start with, oh but I am friends with your soccer friend's mom so maybe we should invite him too.

A good rule of thumb is to be sensitive to others. You are not. Clearly.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not sure which is the right forum for this so move it if necessary. How have people dealt with inviting all the kids in the class vs only some kids to their major events? I can't imagine inviting 90 kids right off the top to a party and my D.C. Isn't friends with them all, of course, but also don't want people to feel left out. Advice welcome. And if anyone has discovered a good forum for discussing bar/bat mitzvah issues, I'd love to be directed to it. Thanks!

A good rule of thumb is if your are going to invite more than 1/3 to 1/2 of the class, invite everyone. In DD's case, we invited about 15 people from school. There were 600 in the 7th grade.

OP, the good rule of thumb is to not listen to others rules of thumb and just have your DC invite who they want to invite whether it is 10 or 40. Stop the PC bullshit of hurting people's feelings. Why should only a handful or everyone including basic strangers, mean kids, or people that hate your child be invited. Who do they want to celebrate with? Write it down. THE END. And don't you start with, oh but I am friends with your soccer friend's mom so maybe we should invite him too.

I disagree with so much of this. By first grade my kids are inviting THEIR FRIENDS. Never the whole class, never "just the girls/boys". Whoever their friends are, that's who they invite. Period. I give them a total number, and they present me with a list. So the idea of inviting the whole class at 7th or 8th grade seems completely ridiculous.

Also, wearing a t-shirt you got at a bar/bat mitzvah is not being a bully. It's wearing a t-shirt. If a 7th or 8th grader can't recognize "I wasn't invited because she and I aren't friends" then that kid has a victim complex and low self-esteem that should be dealt with by their parents.

My kids invited between 45-65 kids. They have friends from camp, school, hebrew school, after-school classes, etc. By 7thy or 8th grade you're changing classes for each subject anyway, so which "class" are you thinking of when you talk about inviting "the whole class"?

This whole thing is ridiculous. Let the kids invite who they want.

I'm the PP who mentioned t-shirts. Yes, I hate it. But I recall only one of many mitzvahs where dd didn't receive one. (There, she received a coffee cup, which seemed like a much better idea.) Maybe it's not the trend everywhere, but it's rampant where we live in Montgomery County.

OP-- if you end up not inviting the whole grade, don't hand out t-shirts!

Anonymous wrote:I hadn't heard, but like the less-than-half-the-class idea as a rule of thumb.

I also like defined groups so that it is easy for kids to understand why their friend was invited and they were not. (They ALL know about ALL of the bar/bat mitzvahs because a) of instagram; and b) at our school, at least, all guests receive a t-shirt/sweatshirt which they ALL wear the monday after the party.

I know a few people who used the decision rule that the kid invited ALL of the kids who were in EACH of their 7 periods in school. So it ended up to be a huge group, but wasn't 100% of the class. (There were about 350 kids in the 7th grade at our school.)

That depends.

At our FCPS middle school the Jewish population is smaller and most kids have never been to a bar mitzvah, so "everyone" might not be in the loop on all the bar mitzvahs. There are also around 500 kids per grade and everyone runs with different crowds.

Are you at public school? Invite your kid's friends (assuming the "friends" are not all but 20-30 kids).

Kids switch classes in public middle school, so inviting just friends is no big deal.

Yeah, the t-shirt thing is a bit obnoxious.

The T shirt thing is obnoxious. There is no way I would let my kid do that, and I say that as someone who has no problem inviting part of a class.

My kid also wouldn't be wearing it to school the next day. He isn't a bully.

I hadn't heard, but like the less-than-half-the-class idea as a rule of thumb.

I also like defined groups so that it is easy for kids to understand why their friend was invited and they were not. (They ALL know about ALL of the bar/bat mitzvahs because a) of instagram; and b) at our school, at least, all guests receive a t-shirt/sweatshirt which they ALL wear the monday after the party.

I know a few people who used the decision rule that the kid invited ALL of the kids who were in EACH of their 7 periods in school. So it ended up to be a huge group, but wasn't 100% of the class. (There were about 350 kids in the 7th grade at our school.)

Anonymous wrote:I'm not sure which is the right forum for this so move it if necessary. How have people dealt with inviting all the kids in the class vs only some kids to their major events? I can't imagine inviting 90 kids right off the top to a party and my D.C. Isn't friends with them all, of course, but also don't want people to feel left out. Advice welcome. And if anyone has discovered a good forum for discussing bar/bat mitzvah issues, I'd love to be directed to it. Thanks!

I think that rule stops applying when kids start changing classes. So, unless you're in a tiny school where the whole 7th grade (or whichever grade your kid is in) moves from subject to subject together, I don't think it's an obligation to invite the whole grade. If you've got 90 kids in your grade then hopefully that isn't happening.

I have heard that it's the norm to invite your whole Hebrew school class, but I don't know much about Hebrew school.

My kid got invitations to Bar Mitzvahs where he didn't know the kid at all. For one, there was a picture on the invitation and he said "Huh, I didn't know his name was Noah." For another, he went and came home and reported "I figured it out which Sam it was. It was the one who sits on the other side of the room from me math". He went, he had fun, but he certainly wouldn't have felt excluded if Noah or Sam had left him off the list.

Anonymous wrote:I heard of people inviting the entire class (20-25 kids) but not every kid in the same grade at the school. I'm confused. Does your child have 90 kids in their class????

This. The rule I learned was that you invite less than half of the class, or you invite all the girls/all the boys, or you invite the whole class. But I've never heard that you should invite the whole grade, where there are multiple classes in the grade. No one will feel left out because they didn't get invited to the bar mitzvah of a kid they barely know.

I heard of people inviting the entire class (20-25 kids) but not every kid in the same grade at the school. I'm confused. Does your child have 90 kids in their class????

Anonymous wrote:I'm not sure which is the right forum for this so move it if necessary. How have people dealt with inviting all the kids in the class vs only some kids to their major events? I can't imagine inviting 90 kids right off the top to a party and my D.C. Isn't friends with them all, of course, but also don't want people to feel left out. Advice welcome. And if anyone has discovered a good forum for discussing bar/bat mitzvah issues, I'd love to be directed to it. Thanks!

A good rule of thumb is if your are going to invite more than 1/3 to 1/2 of the class, invite everyone. In DD's case, we invited about 15 people from school. There were 600 in the 7th grade.

I'm not sure which is the right forum for this so move it if necessary. How have people dealt with inviting all the kids in the class vs only some kids to their major events? I can't imagine inviting 90 kids right off the top to a party and my D.C. Isn't friends with them all, of course, but also don't want people to feel left out. Advice welcome. And if anyone has discovered a good forum for discussing bar/bat mitzvah issues, I'd love to be directed to it. Thanks!