My Y8 DS playing with Y7 kids

[talllikejerryhall]

Last year my son started secondary school, and the results were mixed, with some kids in his class picking on him, leading us to decision to change his form class.

Now he's started Y8 and he's told me how he's missed his lunch twice because he was playing with Y7 kids.

I am worried about this as he had problems establishing a friendship group last year, and I don't want him labelled as the kid has no friends in his year so has to hang out with the younger ones. But I don't know if I am being overly harsh on thinking this.

He is less mature than most 12 year olds and he is super tall, so it's a tricky combination of looking older and acting younger, which draws negative attention to him.

AIBU to tell him not to hang out with Y7s, and stick to his year group?

I just want him to have a nice year and make some good friends, but don't know what I can do to help this, or whether I just need to butt out and let him figure it out?

I would butt out but I don't have any experience of y7/8 children

I would butt as long as he is happy it does not matter of he plays with Y7 kids. As long as they are a nice bunch of course.

Butt out. If he has someone to play with that's better than sitting on his tod alone and humiliated.

So what?? He has a friend. Leave him alone. I bet all your friends aren't the same age as you.

Butt out. It's his day he needs to get through.

My friends all vary between 5-10 years older and younger than me. If he's happy, let him be!

Butt out! Let him find his own friends stop helicopter parenting.

Yeah, butt out :-) Specially if they're already all friends from primary school, or from living nearby.

It's not a big age difference. They may well all be good, positive friends for a long time to come.

Why's he missing lunch?

I can't see the harm. my daughter did pretty much the exact opposite last year and has found her tribe (eventually) she has been so antisocial over the years and has finally found people like her. They (were) in yr 8 and she was in yr 7.

It's fine! At my school kids from all year groups play/socialise together.

YABU. You want him to make friends. He is. Be happy for him.

Ok, ok, I'm getting the message!

Just worried that he would somehow get stock from kids in his year, but if it's not a big deal, I'll just leave him to it and get involved when he asked me to...

In year8 he's far more likely to be teased over his mum getting involved in his friendships than by being friends with children in a younger year.

I think it's ok if he's genuinely keen on their company. However, I understand your concern because there are definitely hierarchies at school, whether it's to do with sportiness, looks, intellect, age...he may be teased. However, how he handles the teasing is what counts. He needs to be his own person, confident in his choices.

The school has a system where years queue at different times, which is why he's missed lunch as he was playing with Y7.

I am not standing at school gates shouting through bars who he should hang out with, just privately concerned when he told me he was playing with the year below as I didn't want it to exacerbate the situation he had with mean kids last year.

But happy to butt out as the communal view is that this isn't something for me to worry about!

Year 7 children may only be one or two months younger in age from a year 8.

My inner pedant compels me to point out there may only be one day difference in age ( or techinically 1 second)

I wouldn't see it as a problem.
My DD has just left school and has left behind the friendship group she had in the year below. Making friends is more about common interests than the age you are.

My son started hanging around with the younger children and staying inside to play chess. All nice enough one might think but it turned out that he was being badly bullied and what he really wanted to be doing was playing football outside with the boys in his year but the bullies wouldn't 'allow' him to.

I think you should probably just let him find friends where he can - the experience of playing with these slightly younger children might help boost his confidence and make it easier for him to make friends with some of the children in his yeargroup.

I would tell him he's not to miss his lunch though.

x-posted with Fleecyjumper - I agree it is worth trying to probe a bit and see if there is an underlying reason why he is avoiding his yeargroup.

But it maybe as you say he is a little less mature at the moment than some of the kids his age and simply has more in common with the younger ones. That's fine and will level out as all they grow up a bit

I think its completely normal to mix with kids from different years and classes. He probably knows some of them from primary. If hes been feeling a bit isolated then its probably really nice for him to have a few more kids to play with that he knows

I've always got on with people of a wide range of ages, both younger and older. In some ways there's less pressure to fit in and match up than there is with your own age group.

I changed school at the end of y2 and it was slow work settling in during y3. On moving up to juniors in y4, I befriended some y7s and enjoyed chatting with them. My teacher took the hump with this and tried enforcing separation and it caused me more bother having that enforced on me than letting it naturally fizzle as they moved up to secondary. I also had friends with some of the older infants at the first school I went to.

If everyone is mutually happy, leave them be. Blurring of age groups can occur because of siblings and extracurricular activities anyway. As adults we don't tie ourselves in to friendships based on a narrow range of birth dates.