To think it's not on to invite everyone in the class apart from two children?

[3b1g]

DS2 is in Y6. A girl in his class has invited about forty children to a disco for her eleventh birthday. This includes everyone in the class apart from two children, and another twelve or so from the other two classes. DS2 is one of the two she hasn't invited, and he is perplexed and disappointed. I understand that he isn't everyone's cup of tea (he has Asperger's and is a bit socially immature) and I suppose that as it's her party then she has a right to invite whomever she wants, but I wouldn't let one of my children do this.

There are 27 in the class, so she has invited 25 (plus another 15 or so from the other two classes). DS1 is thankfully non-agressive but can be annoying and say odd things. He also 'lectures' people about subjects that interest him and is a bit of a pedant, but at a disco you'd think the music would be too loud for this to be a problem. Of course the birthday girl has a right to invite (or exclude) whichever children she wishes, but I think it shows a lack of empathy towards the two children who aren't invited.

I think these all class parties should be banned!

I´m sure some will disagree-but generally, does a child really like all the kids in their class that much?

Or is it mostly showing off by parents?

I would not have let my children leave just two out. I reckon if you invite over half the class you should probably invite them all.

It's obviously completely crap behaviour - how rude !

This just happened with a party in my son's class, where nearly everyone from the year was invited but a handful not. I know two of the children not invited have special needs. I really don't know what the Mother of the party child is thinking. Surely that is just the time to talk about how everyone is different and we need to be kind and try hard not to hurt anyone's feelings.

And basically either invite a few close friends or everyone.

OP, do you happen to know how the parents of the other excluded child feel? Why not join forces and arrange for both your children to do something that day? You never know, your child may just make a new friend.

Also this why we don't have parties for my kids. My dd was left out of a party that the majority of the class were invited to. Luckily she was none the wiser. It was the other parents making a big deal out of it.

I just want to say I feel for you OP. Similar thing happened to DS1 when he was 12. Two mums hired big function suite and invited 2 entire classes except DS1 and 2 others. To this day I have no idea why he wasn't invited. At the time he was quiet and shy but nothing that would have made him an unwelcome guest.

I felt awful and was tempted to say something to one of the mums but didn't .
Fast forward to now DS is 20 and popular,confident and outgoing so obviously not scarred by the experience( unlike me!)

I didn't do the whole class parties with DS2 but if I had I would never have excluded a small number of children.

Your son sounds like a lovely boy who will come into his own in later life.

YANBU. My dd had her first party this year and I gave her 20 as a cut off point (she wanted to invite the whole year of 45 kids but I couldn't afford that many and didn't have space in the garden).

She was happy with that and gave names of her friends and all was well. Until we gave the invites out (I wanted the teacher to put them in their folders so no one was upset but she wouldn't- I hated all that invite thing as a kid as I was rarely invited to anything and always felt terrible), and she realised on asking me for one for another girl that we didn't have one for her. I quickly died of embarrassment went home and wrote one extra out. I had the issue though that she'd only been at the school a couple of months, now I know all of the them so it wouldn't happen!

To exclude only two from the class is disgusting and feels like bullying. I would have to have an impromptu leaving party and invite the whole class bar this little cow, and wait until her parents say something about it to you to let rip! Mind you, I always wanted my Mum to do that to all the girls who excluded me but she wouldn't!

You're asking an online community that brought us the Moldies fred?

Fallacio I understand where you are comming from, not all children who bully have sn, some just do for a variety of psychsocial reasons. Even then I would not have a class party just about 15/20 from a year of 60 kids, so it's not 1 or 2 nt invited

How awful.
Hopefully you will get some other parents comment to you on the bad behaviour of the party girl's parent/s.

Where are you OP? If you are anywhere local to me we should take your boy and my boys (similar age to your ds) out to do something fun better than a crappy disco and stick two fingers up to the birthday party!

I would have thought in that situation it's probably thoughtlessness rather than deliberate nastiness.
The parents have said 40 invites, so she's listed those she gets on with, and probably hasn't occurred to her (or her parents) that there's only 2 from her own form not going.

When I was 7 I listed the girls I wanted to invite to my party. I worked it out by inviting all the girls in each group I was in. So first I listed the group I played with in the playground. then I put those who were on the same table for maths, then the same table for english, then our "usual" table, Tables were in groups of 5-6 children.
When I'd finished, dm said that was fine, but was it all the girls. I replied totally believing it, that there were 3 or 4 I hadn't invited (plus all the boys). Dm asked who, and when I actually worked it out, it was just one girl. Not that she was nasty, or I didn't like her, simply that she was the only girl in the class I didn't have any dealings with.
Because she was the only girl missing dm added her to the list, but if dm hadn't thought about it, she would have been the only girl not invited, not through nastiness, but just thoughtlessness.

But that's just why Mum's should get involved DeWe !

Sorry to disagree but I think you're all being a bit precious. And maybe not in this case, but OFTEN it is the parent that's more upset than the child. I don't think this attitude does the child any favours. They need to know that some parties you are invited to and some not. And some children have a bigger circle of friends than others. There are always going to occasions where, for one reason or another, people are left out of social gatherings. But that's life.

And I speak of a child who isn't that popular and doesn't get many invites. But I would want her to be invited for the right reasons - that she liked and is friends with the birthday child, not out of pity.

Juggling we don't know that the mum hasn't got involved.
Said "did you invite all your class?" and the child responded in all genuine innocence "I've not invited 5 or 6, but I've invited some from the other classes." or possible "yes, I've invited them all."

If she was just inviting her class then by counting numbers it would be immediately obvious only a couple had been left out, but as there are other children involved it makes it much harder.

My dd1 was in a 5 form entry primary. She could have told you at any stage after the first term the names of every child in the year and which form they were in, who had just left and who had newly joined. Dd2 and ds can't even name those in their form accurately.
If there's no class list with all children on (and the lists we get often have 3-4 children requesting not to be on) then the dm can't check.

I was just thinking that your DM asked you a few good questions and sorted it for your party DeWe, that was all.

YANBU, its really mean.

my mother would have never allowed it without good reason.

I spoke to the mum of the other uninvited child and he is happy about the situation as he can't stand the birthday girl. Having checked the time of the party, DS1 is at music school for the first half anyway and then I'm arranging to take him out for a meal on his own (a rare treat for the second child of four). Tbh I think I'm more put out than he is, so I'm just going to get over myself and move on, but I will also continue to strongly discourage any of my children from ever making anyone feel like this. Thank you all for your replies.

Sorry, in comment above, I meant DS2 not DS1.

And yes, I do sometimes call them by the wrong name in real life, too.

3b1g I really annoy my DDs by calling them the wrong name, (same for DS and DH actually). A friend sometimes calls hers by the cats name, so when they moan I remind them I haven't done that.

To those who think its a bit precious, maybe it is, but it is also hard when your child who hasn't moaned all year points out how in year 2 they got invited to 0 parties, even those of the kids they invited to theirs. Leaving one or two out of a class does seem mean. Some people like whole class at 5, but I don't personally. But my kids tend to have quite small parties. The kid left out may not even be badly behaved/awkward but their face doesn't quite fit.

Its one of those things which get better when they get to be teens. As A) I'd prefer they didn't go to most parties; B) they often do fun things instead, like 4 girls at a local theme park for the day (cheaper with Tesco vouchers and I just had to taxi, and no tidying up afterwards).

YANBU, that kind of behaviour is really cruel and unfair.

I don't wish large parties were banned (as someone said upthread) though because they are great for the children who are inoffesnive but tend not to be anybody's favourite.

They are also good for teaching children about tolerance and empathy. A little girl in my class a couple of years ago invited the whole class bar one boy to her 10th birthday party. The boy has no diagnosable SEN and was not disruptive, he was just 'different'.

I spoke to the girl's parents (yeah, I know, not my business but I did it anyway ) and the girl arrived the next day with an extra invite. The boy was so excited and kept saying thank you over and over. The girl burst into tears and when I asked her why she was crying she said it was because the boy was so happy. I said that that was a good thing and she said, 'yes but that means he must have been so sad yesterday and it was because of me' or something like that.

Perfect lesson in empathy imo, hopefully she is kinder now.

I understand how you feel. I had two children with autism and they were always excluded from birthday parties too - very often being the only ones in their classes to be left out. However I think it was always me that felt bad about it rather than them (that of course being another treat of autism).

As autism can involve problems communicating and 'fitting in', it was rather sad as they never had the opportunity to learn how to behave at a birthday party, hence making their difficulties even worse. Now as adults they are always overly grateful and excited should they ever go to anybodies house, I think because it is so unusual a thing for them.

I never had the courage to approach any of the parents though as sad though it was for my child, I guess it was up to them who was invited, or not.

Hope he has a good day with you instead!!

manic that was a lovely story. You were very brave though - that could have bitten you on the arse.