11yr old DD & boy from school

[mumontherun14]

My DD is young in her year and always played with both the the girls & boys in her class.

She's now in the final year of primary school before high school. Over the past few weeks one of the boys in her class has been FaceTimeing her for an hour or so each evening. It's innocent enough I pop in and out of her room and chat to him as I am pottering about tidying up etc and it's all daft chat showing him her dog and stuff like that.

I don't know him really well but he seems nice enough and he's been in her class for 7 yrs. I think she likes him as every time her older brother jokes with her about it she goes all giggly etc. Tonight she asked me if she could meet up with him and another girl and boy from her class down the local town at 3pm for a few hours to go round the shops.

My question is - is she too young for this ? She only gets to FaceTime him once her homework is all done and she goes horseriding 4 times a week so is busy with that most of the time. She has good friends at school and the horseriding but none of them seem to be hanging out with the boys at weekends x

[DearMrDilkington]

I think it's sweet.

[OldGuard]

I’m pretty conservative so I would say 11 is too young for one/one relationship ... however I would absolutely be supporting having good friends regardless of gender and encouraging the group of friends in general and discouraging talk of “boyfriend girlfriend” - at this age they don’t really understand and tend to project what they think a relationship should be based on what they’ve seen in movies or in tv -definitely encourage talking about how important it is to be friends and getting to know folks as people without labels like “boyfriend” etc and have discussions around what makes a good friend and what qualities we admire in others and how we ourselves can be a good friend to other folks

[mumontherun14]

Thanks for the reply. I remember myself being that age and liking a boy on the school bus. I think it'll be fine if they go round the shops. Uncharted territory this -my DS is 13 and at this age he did like a girl in his class and gave her a necklace at the school dance but he's never had a girlfriend yet x

[mumontherun14]

Thanks oldguard I'll def do the good friends chat x