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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to want my DCs to be the super popular, "alpha" children at school

489 replies

dirtyface · 27/08/2013 16:55

partly inspired by the thread about do you buy your kids certain stuff so they can fit in (but not a thread about a thread i promise)

...it just got me thinking. i REALLY want my dcs to not just "fit in" (although i will be happy with that of course) but to be actively, super popular

they are only 4 (dd) and 7 (ds) at the moment so in year 1 and year 4 so just starting out really

but i think it starts young. tbh i can already see in DS's class who the in crowd are :o and luckily ds is friends with some of them but seems a bit on the periphery iyswim. popularity at junior school breeds confidence and a "popular reputation" and a casual expectation that people will like them which becomes a self fulfilling prophecy i think teachers tend to prefer the popular ones as well IME

it then IMO tends leads to success as an adult even if they dont do particularly well at school. for example, DH was very popular at school and although he left before even taking his GCSE's he has done very well at work, and always tends to be very popular where he has worked and ends up getting promoted a lot

so, those of you who have very popular DCs, whats their secret? and am a bit Blush asking this, but is it / has it been anything you do as a mum / parent to help them along a bit?

OP posts:
Beaverfeaver · 27/08/2013 20:12

I think I would have done better at school if I was more nerdy.
I would have studies harder and gone to university, rather than spending my free time having parties etc

MarshaBrady · 27/08/2013 20:13

I depends on the school culture. It changed about half way through secondary from sport being valued to sport and study and anything else (drama etc).

So popularity could mean success or not. Pretty mixed results.

Some people definitely blossomed later at university or work rather than school for sure.

Beaverfeaver · 27/08/2013 20:13

To add though:

I am a successful 27 year old with a successful husband and we have owned our own house since we were 30 years old.

I wouldn't be where I am now if I had gone to university.

wordfactory · 27/08/2013 20:14

What never fails to astound me on MN is how people love to knock down anyone who might be having a good time or a good life or be successful...

And when it comes to children they virtually queue up to find fault. Kids who are good at sport are pushy, kids who are academic are stressed, kids who are popular are bullies...

And absolutely non eof them are happy which is all any MN mother wants for her DC dontcha know Wink...

Beaverfeaver · 27/08/2013 20:14

Not 30 years old! 20 years old! Damn iphone

Takver · 27/08/2013 20:14

Am I the only person who can't think of there being obvious 'popular girls' at school? Some people had a good friendship group, others (including me for the first 3 years of secondary) didn't, and struggled. But I don't think that there was anyone who was a 'queen bee' in the way that some describe.

I hope that dd will make some good friends and feel happy at secondary school, I don't think anyone can really ask for more.

Coconutty · 27/08/2013 20:18

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Beaverfeaver · 27/08/2013 20:20

You don't have to be horrible to be popular.

And I don't think anyone on this thread wants their children growing up and becoming popular from being mean.

Am I totally mistaken?

thebody · 27/08/2013 20:21

absolutely cocunutty. totally agree.

PigOnStilts · 27/08/2013 20:21

It's not hard. Popular kids are early social developers and confident compared to their peers. This is learned from observing parents interactions and their upbringing and I'd like my son to be liked be as it's a lot easier, but to be honest my husband and I are offbeat kind of people and were v shy kids. I think that would be a fine cycle to repeat as we are all rather lovely.

PaperSeagull · 27/08/2013 20:32

Why would anyone want his/her child to be an "alpha" in the in-crowd? Surely that implies a sense of superiority and exclusion of others?

Lweji · 27/08/2013 20:37

I am a successful 27 year old with a successful husband and we have owned our own house since we were 30 years old.

So, you invented time travel? Wink

Lweji · 27/08/2013 20:38

Ups, sorry, just noticed the correction. :)

Beaverfeaver · 27/08/2013 20:39

I would be far more successful if I had inveted time travel.

If only.....

PeppermintPasty · 27/08/2013 20:44

I've only skimmed the thread as aspects of this topic make me feel a bit uncomfortable. When I was at school I didn't think I was particularly popular. I was very very worried about popularity.
In my adult years I have come to understand that my mother was EA to me, a narc if you will. In a lot of ways I didn't and couldn't understand normal social relations. My mother put a lot of pressure on me (I now see), to be the Girl Who Always Comes First. As a result I foisted myself on people, I was loud, overly "witty", and I've no doubt I bullied some people I perceived as weaker than me.
I felt a lot of anxiety and regret about this over the years. Ironically, getting in touch with schoolfriends on FB has relieved me-I find that I did have good friends who liked/loved me, in spite of all this.
My mother assumed that I would naturally be the most popular blah blah, whilst knocking me down at home.
This is a drastically shortened version (ha), but be bloody careful not to make it all about you, parents.
I'd much rather have my mother's love freely given, than realise with a dawning horror that she just cares about how she and her family look to the outside world.

BrokenSunglasses · 27/08/2013 20:48

In my school the popular girls (all girls school) weren't the same as the 'in crowd'.

The popular ones were the ones that were liked by the in crowd and everyone else, but they weren't a regular part of the in crowd. The ones who were 'in' were extremely popular with themselves, and they seemed to think that everyone wanted to be like them with the boyfriends and the nights out, but they probably didn't. I was part of the in crowd, and it was stressful!

I'd much rather my child was well liked, but not one of the cool kids.

Thaumatrope · 27/08/2013 20:54

I went to a small school and the most popular kids were either semi-good-looking and good at football (the boys) or out-and-out nasty (the girls).
I felt the bar for popularity was set pretty low Grin so nah, not interested in that for my dc, although of course somewhere in the middle would be easiest I feel.

insummeritrains · 27/08/2013 20:54

Amazingbouncingferrret I was describing my own experience of those I knew who were deemed 'popular'. I said that they didn't do particularly well in their careers - I didn't elaborate.

You say you worked for the same company for 10 years - I would deem that to be a successful career.

Please don't project your own insecurities on to my words and opinion.

mrsrhodgilbert · 27/08/2013 20:54

There is a huge difference between being genuinely popular because of positive personality traits and wanting to be part of a clique which considers itself to be superior.

I would prefer my children to be the former and I believe they are. The second group most definitely exists though. If you have never known a queen bee you are lucky.

It sounds like some of us have experienced the repercussions of run ins with the clique type alpha group, either personally or through our children.

Surely better to be genuinely liked and popular because you deserve it, not expect and demand it.

SlowlorisIncognito · 27/08/2013 20:55

I think the geeky/nerdy social groups can have their own problems. As they are used to being excluded, they can go too far the other way, and never want to exclude anyone for anything- including really bad behaviour. This causes its own problems in my experience. When she was at uni, one of my friends ended up in a really difficult social situation due to being trapped in a social group with her ex who had been sexually abusive as "the group felt uncomfortable excluding him".

When I was at secondary school, I was in the "alternative" (gothy/punky) sort of group, but I was popular within this group. Maybe my high school was just cliquey, but none of the groups really interacted with each other, but each group had their own popular members, and there were unfortunately a few people who didn't really belong to a group. I think having a teenage experience which gives you confidence (however that comes about) is really important for later life.

None of the popular people at my school died, got heavily into drugs or got pregnant really young. The teenage pregnancies came out of a certain group of girls who were among the less well off at the school and were probably on the fringes of their social groups.

I do think some of the things said on this thread about young teenagers are unneccessarily cruel.

Teenage girls fall out and fight, and it's not always obvious to outsiders why or what's going on (I'm not talking about bullying situations, though). During my teenage years, there was a stage where we all completely excluded a girl- this seems overly cruel, but she lied to us about having cancer (she was a compulsive liar) and stole from a few other girls. We did eventually make up, but from the outside looking in, I know it could have looked like we were just being cruel. No adults really got involved, so I don't know how it looked to them. Looking back, I think she probably had some kind of mental health issues, but at 14-15, we didn't have the tools to deal with that.

I guess I'm trying to say it's easy to jump to conclusions about "popular girls" but if you don't have the full facts (and chances are you don't), I don't think it's your place to judge.

RoadToTuapeka · 27/08/2013 20:57

I am glad my parents weren't like you. What if the children just aren't uber popular? Will they know that you are desperately disappointed in them for not being the alphas you expected and wanted?

Caff2 · 27/08/2013 21:00

Well, I'm glad my son is popular. On mumsnet, it seems that sometimes being the highly academic outsider is the only kind of "good" to be. Lots of this thread, though not all of it, says this. Do I wish ds1 was top academically?

Hell yeah, I think it would be a real worry off my mind. But since he's not, thank God he's friendly, good looking, sociable and, yes, one of the popular kids. At least he's not nerdy AND struggling at school. That would be a double whammy, and his confidence from being the "thickest" in his peer group (his words) is bad enough, despite the veneer of self confidence and charm.

He's not a bully, he has lots and lots of friends, he probably will end up in a manual job locally, I really hope there are still openings for trades when he leaves school in three years time and he can go to college and get an apprenticeship to succeed in life. What I can tell you he won't be doing is "blossoming" into being a surgeon.

Abra1d · 27/08/2013 21:03

Popular is different from 'alpha', which has rather nasty, superior connotations. You can be popular for being kind and friendly, for instance.

Caff2 · 27/08/2013 21:08

I think my son might be popular and alpha, as he is invited to everything, people actively try and hang around with him, the phone never stops. He will be much less "alpha" when he's a grown up because statistically, his ,ore academically able peers will outstrip him career wise. I hope he will be like my brother in law -hugely popular, charming, not much cop academically although "clever" as in witty and charming, and earning three times what my partner and I do as a plumber. (We were both academic, top sets, in my case at a selective school, and he owns three flats and we rent one house :) )

TheOriginalSteamingNit · 27/08/2013 21:09

Got to the end and found abra1d was there with pretty much the post I wanted to make!

Nothing at all wrong with being popular or well-liked: these are good things, and I very much doubt everyone who was popular at school was a twat or ended up a loser....

I'm less sure about the notion of alpha-ness, which does seem to me to connote something a bit more 'in crowd' and isn't necessarily so nice.

I think it's better to think about popularity in terms of being well liked, and therefore to try and bring up likeable children.

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