To ask if school mum cliques upset you, or how do you deal with cliques?

Women are allowed to chose who we want to be friends with, and do not, in fact, have to chat to everyone.

Ds Primary school was the most toxic place I have been including my own school days, it was my happiest day ever the day he left for secondary school. Thankfully all the other children were going to another school.

Maybe some of the mums already know each other, eg from pre-school or if their reception aged DC have older siblings at the same school?

It does sometimes feel like everyone knows everyone. But I find that most people are friendly if you start chatting to them.

I feel the same way. I couldn't care less. I go in, chat to whoever's around that I might know, go home and don't think twice about any of it.

People who think you’re a clique tend to be envious of your friendship and feel excluded or uou behave in the stereotypical mean girls mould.

in Reality a clique is a close knit group who don’t let others join.

For the majority I personally think for those complaining ir comes from a sad place of envy and isolation, loneliness, and for the friendship group, it’s lack of thought. They don’t understand someone is watching them enviously and feeling upset that they aren’t included or even they want to be included.

. They don’t think it’s their job to stand their smiling and welcoming everyone and are just getting on with their day, chatting to their friends. Which is totally normal. But there will always be someone socially anxious, desperate for friends, unable to approach. And some understand there is nothing malicious, it’s just people being friendly and others are bitter and blame it on the group.

in reality unless you’re volunteering no one walks around smiling at everyone and saying hello like you’re some form of playground hostess.

What makes them cliques rather than groups of friends, in your eyes? It's perfectly natural that certain people will gravitate towards each other and make friends. Why would that be upsetting? It's not as if the whole parent body is going to form some massive communal friendship group!

I am fed up with the accusations of cliques. I hate cliques. I think it is part of our duty to the community to be open and speak to lots of parents. There are so many people that I have said hello to, smiled at every morning, but who never make an effort to ask me a question or volunteer any information. No wonder I'd rather just speak to people who seem pleased to see me.

I often wonder if other mums think my friendship group I’ve made through our kids think we are a clique. We are just that, a group of friends who also help each other out with childcare and lifts etc wherever we can lighten the load.

It can feel like ‘cliques’ but I do think they’re just friendship groups forming, some people are just more pro-active in this than others or already know each other prior to school starting. My DD started mid way through the year so groups had been well and truly established. I remember (embarrassingly) feeling quite jealous of some of the groups.

If you do feel upset about it I recommend trying to chat with 1 or 2 parents (the friendliest?.) This is what I did… I now know most parents to stay and chat to and have a few closer ones which I guess you could say are ‘my clique.’ Now!

It doesn't bother me in the slightest. I make small talk with some people but I have my own friends and can barely find time to see them as it is. Without sounding like a dick I'm just not interested in making new ones but I'm a friendly person so I'm quite happy to make chit chat but that's about the height of it.

Drop your kids off, pick them up and don't worry about what other people are doing.

There is a clique in my sons nursery right now where there's play dates and group chats involved and names of kids who couldn't make it and how sad they couldn't come etc and not to mention my ds's name not being mentioned at all despite a small class. But at the end of the day, ds goes to socialise there and learn and outside of nursery we have a whole life of friends and family who have children similar age to ds. Ds won't miss anything from being left out of cliquey mothers play dates where he sees those kids in nursery anyway and plays with them. We attend nicer play dates. I believe we should spice it up a bit and not be tied to one social circle.

Hate all this

It can be different depending even on years, I've got 3 children all at primary and with the older 2 I have built relationships with other parents. Some are closer to each other but most are welcoming and friendly. 1 of my children's years has quite cliquey groups though, one set all work in a similar industry and the other set have similar 'bantery' personalities. Nobody in that year says hello to me at pick-up. Now I don't mind that so much as I always have someone to chat to if I want to from the other years but we went to a birthday party the other week and both cliques were sat at one table, I tried to say hello/ask about a spare seat and they ALL ignored me. I ended up sitting on my own and at the end they all just got up and left without saying goodbye. It was actually really upsetting and I'm dreading the few parties for that year that are coming up.

So it's not always just a case of ignoring people at the gate, especially in the younger years you can be thrown in with the other parents and it can be difficult if they are cliquey.

They don't upset me. I only do one normal pick up per week though as other days kids are in ASC or OH picking them up. I don't do any drop offs.

I do notice them, but more as an interested observer...like I'm on safari or at the zoo 😄

I don't have any school mums who I would calk proper friends, although I like them all fine and can chat to any of them if needed. I treat them a bit like colleagues. Actually, I am probably closer to my colleagues as I see them more often

Cliques or friends? I had my group, we may have met at the school playground or coffee morning, but we had stuff in common and started meeting up outside of that. So naturally when it was a school thing we would sit together. We weren't exclusive- but you don't have to be friends with everyone.

Well there was a ‘clique’ in my DC’s school year ruled by a horrible queen bee type who was constantly talking loudly about her wild and drunk ‘mum’ parties within clear earshot of the uninvited… but then she moved away and it’s all so much calmer and easier now

What's the difference between people on the school run and people at work, they're all just people trying to get on with life, just chat to them if you fancy not sure why mums are my different

I've be accused of having a clique but that's because my child and my best friends child are the same age and in the same class we speak to everyone but because we share school runs we were told that it was just us and we didn't let anyone in !, once they had realised we knew each other for 20years they relaxed a bit our class all get on and we all have fun together and chat at party's etc, there's only 1 out of 30 parents that doesn't get involved in anything

The OP is new to the school. I am assuming is northern hemisphere-based, so the school year has just started.

She can have no idea if it’s ‘cliques’ that are forming, or if it’s just people chatting and getting to know each other, and therefore ‘friendships’ are forming.

If she reframes it in her head as friendships, rather than cliques, she might have a better time.

Just keep being friendly and chatty. Invite the friends of your DC for play dates and go from there. It really, really doesn’t happen overnight.

No matter what people are saying we all know there are plenty of cliques and not just ‘friendship groups’. I was glad mine were in breakfast and Afterschool clubs 4 days as I hated the cliques at our school

I've been a

Agree thay they are probably just friendship groups, what makes them a clique?

My DC has just started Reception. There's a group of mums whose DC went to the preschool so know each other. There also a group of military wives who know each other. Then there's the rest of is stragglers.

My DC is the one in the class with quite obvious SEN and the other mums are already going me a wide berth tbh.

I agree.
I was fortunate not to come across this type of person but I had friends with children at other schools who had a miserable time.

Maybe try chatting to another mum stood on their own?

Smile at everyone and start conversations - ask a question about school, comment on the weather, pay a compliment about their child, ask how they're getting on.

Or you could try joining the PTA - lots of friends to be made there.

Why are people dismissing OP? There are some places which can be quite cliquey. Some mums never say hello back and only speak to specific people - it’s not usually personal. It does happen. If it does she should ignore as you would outside school. Most people will be normal however.