Discussion Board: Primary Schoolers

My daughter is being excluded from her former little bunch of friends. They are not openly mean to her, but the playdates are disappearing, the party sleepovers do not include her. I recently had reports from other mums, (not mums of the girls involved), that my daughter has been seen in tears in the playground in the mornings before school, taunted by her so called friends. My daughter says she "does not remember " these instances. I have arranged to meet the class teacher to discuss this, next term. What else do I do? I suspect the parents of these children would not take it as seriously as I am, should I approach them? I know children change friendships, but my daughter still wants to be friends with this group, not simply be dropped. She is not an outgoing social child who makes friends easily.

Hi, we are sortof having a similar problem with our 10 year old son. Hes a lovely boy, friendly, helpful etc. But he was bullied when he first started school and its stuck with him. I got involved and although it did good, it also did some harm. The kids all know that I will stick up for him. The bunch of bullies mostly leaves him alone now. Which is good. But they used to be his friends too. He wanted so much to belong, it was heartbreaking to watch.

I sortof got in the middle and made frineds with another quiet boys mum so that my son and her son could get to know each other, they are firm friends now.

I am very watchful of who my boys hang out with. I have a total ban on a couple of boys at school as they are real bad news.

When yout daughter says she does not remember, she is probably too embarassed to remember, or she may mentally turn off and not recall it. My son has the ocasional space of no recollection of an event. Its usually associated with times of high emotion and stress.

Girls are not very nice to ones that are a little different, or quieter. I went though what your girl is going through, its very hard at the time, but it does teach you the value of true friendship. When girls get into groups they tend to want to impress the others. I know that one of my very best friends would have nothing to do with me at school when we got to highschool, but everyday after school we would talk on the phone for hours, or spend every afternoon and weekend together doing stuff. I know its hard. Have you been able to identify the ring leader of the group? perhaps she does not like your daughter and is encouraging the others not to have anything to do with her? This happened to my son, so I just started letting him invite the otehrs around one at a time and they had heaps of fun.

I wish you much luck. This is a very heart breaking situation as your child will be very sad and probably loosing self confidence, but hang in there! If you want someone to talk to, my contact number is 027 6754238

thanks for your feed back Rocketpower. I did not mention eariler, but my daughter is moderate Aspergers (high functioning autism, her social skills are not as developed, but scholastically she is 2yrs ahead in most subjects). What this really manifests itself as is she is quirky, not picking up the obvious social cues, sometimes running to keep up, literally. She is different enough that it is beginning to show, and the less tolerant of her class peers are picking up on it now. Less accepting. Yes, I think I know who the main perpetrators are - one on one they are fine. But add in the extra girls and the dynamics of the group change. (As with most targetting/bullies). My daughter is not as witty, situation aware, or physically as able as they are, and does not get the same extra curricular opportunities they do. The outside school activities are one of the main excluders at the moment, too. No, I can't/won't compete with their interests - financially it is not possible for us. The school will meet with us next term, perhaps with a teachers aide, although to be honest being singled out for an RLTB won't help either. She just needs some confidence back so she can stand and make friends again. She believes what they say to her, if they happen to include her. Her teacher agrees that she is constantly saying she is stupid, ugly, fat etc. Gosh, these are 8 yr olds we are dealing with - not 15! I want to talk to the parents but am unsure. Surely they must have noticed something? Yes, it is hard to sit and watch.

Yes, there are so many incidences of this kind of bullying. Its sad to think of just how unaccepting some adults and children are of different people.

My boys notice differences in people that are not what is termed to be normal. But then I have tried my hardest to raise my boys to be tollerant of all kinds of people, no matter how normal or ad-normal they may be.

I found it hard when I was younger, and I didn't want my boys to be the ones making it hard for other children.

I am not exactly normal, for a start I have my Dad's weird sense of humor, always have had... :-)

But seriously, I am deaf in my left ear. So kids would treat me as normal kids get gtreated until they found out, then I was teased, left out, hit, kicked, verbally abused.. the list goes on. When I started highschool, none of my class mates knew, I was accepted by everyone and had tonnes of friends. It was absolutely wonderful. Then we had a class meeting and someone asked why I had ignored them the day before, I said I had not heard them. Thats when a girl I grew up with piped up and said "Oh, thats right, shes deaf" and from then on I was shunned by everyone. People would not talk to me incase they caught it. I can remember crying for hours and hours about it. I can remember wishing that I had a physically obvious disability so that poeple would just stay away and not be friendly then shun me. They didn't know how much it hurt. I was treated like a lepper. Noone came too close incase they caught it. For crying out loud, its a genetic disability!!!

But anyway, thats why I have made sure that my boys understand that different is good. They are tollerant of pretty much anyone, no matter what they look like or where they come from, how they sound.. And my boys have made some truely wonderful friends adn had some amazing experiences. Our next door neighbour on one side ahs a 13 yo boy who is mildly dislexic. He is a wonderful boy, sounds very much like how you describe your daughter to be. My boys love to spend time with him, he adores our 7mth old. Because hes different noone has ever let him hold a baby. I know him and I trust him, hes great with our baby, he simply glows with excitement when he holds Dimitrious. Our other next door neighbours are Tibetan. My 5yo is best mates with their oldest boy. Their 2 boys and my oldest 2 play together all the time. My boys have learnt all about Tibet and have gotten to know all about whats going on in CHina and Tibet and have seen how its affecting real people. A unique experience and insite for my boys.

I encourage my boys to talk to all kinds of people. At school my 10yo befriends all the new and different people. Its all the "normal" ones that have a problem with him.

It would be great if you guys lived up here, your daughter could meet my boys, I am sure that they would get along great.

Hi,

I read your question with interest because my 6yr old boy is having similar problems at school. He is just a normal functioning but sensitive boy. Often I wonder if it is because he is an only child and doesn't necessarily 'know' how to play with others properly or whether it is just a normal part of school years.

Obviously your situation is different with your daughter having aspergers. My boy has had a delightful little girl in his class who also has high functioning Aspergers. He has also had a girl with hearing difficulties and who wears a hearing aid. He has grown up with an Intellectually disabled aunty who he adores so I have tried to get him to see the good in everyone and to treat everyone as he would like to be treated.

I was just reading the Parents Inc site, looking for some help with my boys anxiety and noticed they have a course running next Monday titled:

Helping Your Children Make Friends.

I don't know if you are in Auckland but this might be something that you may find useful. They are at 300 Great South Road, Ellerslie and the session is 1:15 to 2:30, Monday 5 May, $10.

I hope this is helpful for you.
Regards
Marshe

I really do feel for you - I still remember as a child that the most important thing in the whole world was belonging. :(

I don't have the same problem with my kids.. my 7 year old boy is quite popular and well liked by everyone and my special needs daughter of 9 also has a good crowd of friends and support at school. I do remember.. this doesn't last forever and one day they too will come across their sets of bullies and exclusion. What saddens me most is how young your children are and they're coping with this? I was still playing elastics and skipping at their ages, with anyone that happened to be around. Children nowadays are so cruel.. that seminar sounds great marshe.

Good luck to you all,
Franchesca

Kids these days are very cruel indeed. It just goes to show what our modern lifestyles are creating.

Being an only child can create difficulties when they get to school. My oldest boy had only been a big brother for 3 weeks when he started school, so he was learning to deal with loads of things at that time. But he has coped ok.

I think that all the people that say they cant remember what its like to be a kid just dont want to remember.

I wonder what happened to them to make them want to forget such a wonderful time of life.

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