To not allow my 11 yo DD to stay at Mixed sleepover

[GreenJanine]

Year 6, best friend, but boys and girls invited they are only 11 and all sleeping in a tent overnight.

Others are allowed but AIBU?

You can’t generalise can you? In my dc’s year 6, the boys and girls are all shapes and sizes and obviously at different stages of puberty.

There is a lot of peer pressure amongst children at that age. I would not be happy.

By the time I was 11 I had brought alcohol to school to drink with friends, smoked cigarettes at school and classmates were snogging on school trips.
That was quite a few years ago and funnily enough none of it traumatized me for life!

Agree with this^^.

Sleepovers do seem a total mine field. I was picked on really badly at a few and it spilled over into school (all girls school and all girls at sleepovers fwiw). I’m obviously not going to stop my dcs going on sleepovers if they really want to. But I probably wouldn’t encourage it. Or else I’ll host them all and be really ott on the monitoring!

I still wouldn’t be happy with a mixed sleepover at this age. For me it’s probably the worst age, when some of them might be interested in sex and the others are totally oblivious. They won’t really know what they’re doing.

I used to have a male friend at sleepovers when we were all 15 / 16 and, actually, that was better imo, as we were more aware and quite assertive. He was lovely and never would have groped anyone or anything. But if he had, I imagine a loud “what the actual fuck are you doing?” would have woken the whole room.

Boys in my dd's Y6 group have ready access to Game of Thrones and Grand Theft Auto. Maybe some girls too.
I doubt they really understand it but such adult stuff but it has been normalised in their lives. Hanging out at school is one thing, spending the night in a tent is another.

My child’s school have a residential camping trip once a year from year 2 to year 6. Beavers is also mixed, now, and they go camping a few times a year. There are under 12s discos in the area and even in the Catholic Grammar schools, they mix the children in evening activities.
Would you not allow you child to attend any of these things? From my experience, an 11 year old is just as likely to ‘snog’ behind the bike sheds as in a tent.
There’s no getting away from the fact that most 11 year old boys are pre pubescent and down right silly (when excited) and the last thing your daughter is going to want to do is kiss any of them

doomraider

Yes 6 kids? What’s your problem? Please do share.

Kaytee, yes I can. Which is why I mentioned what sort of school mine go to in the first place, meaning maybe I was being naive.

I just asked my son about this. He was very excited about the idea of a sleepover in the garden. He said if he had a girl at his sleepover and she slept separately she would be lonely, and that she would want to watch TV and chat with them. And he is now thinking of ways to sneak booze out of the house (such as “you could put bottles down the legs of your trousers”. He has not thought of putting it in a bag, which makes me slightly worried for his SATs results).

When I was 11 I wouldn’t have wanted to have been anywhere near a boy, I have to be honest.

Happy for my dd to go to school discos and she had already been on a mixed residential which was supervised by adults. Boys slept in dorm on one corridor, girls on another. Teachers bedrooms between the two.
Overnight in a tent with boys and girls unsupervised is a completely different thing. If you don't see that, you're a bit naive.

Clearly the ‘what wills’are huge from them all eating pizza and pop to a bit of cider and a snog to alcoholic poisoning and sex.
All of those can happen at 11 you know

They could, and could also happen at the local park, or in school, if the DCs involved are naughty and determined. It's unlikely though, for most kids, and it seems a shame to judge your child always by the worst behaviour possible at their age.
My DC went to a mixed sleepover at 11 and....they behaved like kids, had fun, ate a few sweets and came home safely.

The parents running this probably also don't want a den of vice at their house, and may even supervise! - I'm guessing you don't know them at all, or what DCs are going?

Supervised residential camping trips and evening activities and discos with adults obviously present have absolutkry nothing to do with 11 year old boys and girls camping all night without supervision the garden.

Seriously you can’t see the difference?

Beavers camping trips and catholic discos are completely different.

Nope. Too many variables to consider - look how mixed the responses are on this thread.
Plus, I remember what I was like at that age and drinking/snogging was rife and looking back we really weren't mature enough to deal with it. 11 was a bit of a tipping point tbh.

Agree you shouldn’t judge your children by the worst behaviour possible but equally you can’t assune that all other children are as innocent or immature as yours or indeed that yours are equally not easily led or influences.

11 is a tricky age for lots of kids. They are very vulnerable and I just don’t see the point in putting them into a potentially problematic situation when you really don’t need to.

15/16 totally different. You have to start to let go and allow them to make their own decisions. 11 no they need proper supervision and protection.

but obviously we all parent differently and all opinions are valid.

Well at 11 I was having sleepovers with my female best friend and we were kissing and touching each other so entirely possible. Because we were both female no one even questioned us sleeping in a bed together

Why are they different. There are adults supervising. Surely, there will be adults supervising at this sleep over?
If there are no adults present overnight and they have an 11 year old child, this is a social services issue and the camping is irrelevant...
I think the issue here is that the op doesn’t know the parents and children well enough

I remember hearing about kids that age having sex at school, so yeah, it happens.

11 is a bit of a tipping point where they start to become curious and full of hormones. Tbh I wouldn't allow it, too much could potentially go wrong.

I have hosted mixed sleepovers both in tents and at home. All the way from yr 3 to yr 13.
Agree with PP. You keep talking and you keep listening . That way when anything is going awry they have COMPLETE faith in coming to you.

Of course you can say no but that's more to do with your worries than actual reality.
If you have 11 yr olds who are going to sneak alcohol (I depends the type of families they are from but it didn't cross my lots mind until 13 at the earliest) then they will do it in the day time too.
It may be easier if like mine they go to a co-ed school and have very firm mixed sex friendship group where snogging your 'mate' has a strong Ewwwww factor. My youngest DD has a mixed group of 11 friends the same kids as from about yr9 onwards. Nearly all now have bfs/gfs but not from within the group.

had a chat with friends recently about things we all experiences growing up, and getting touched up by boys from around 9 upwards was a common theme to us all. we all went to nice school and good area etc.. and while it wouldn't have been done with any harm intended, it has no doubt had an effect on some of them

I think if you look at it rationally there are far more issues with sleepovers in general (mobile phones, bullying, differences in maturity, lack of privacy, lax parental supervision, different house rules) than for mixed ones specifically, which is really just the very small risk of "hanky panky", as the OP puts it, but of course even that isn't exclusive to mixed sex groups is it?

I trust my dd and a couple of her friends. I know some of the parents would supervise properly but not all of them. I definitely don't know all the children .
I know stupid stuff can go on at school but my dd can come home and she can get away from it. Trapped in a tent in someone's garden? No.

Nope from me. I remember a couple of very sexually inquisitive girls at school, aged 11. Got themselves very bad reputations and one was pregnant at 14. Mixed sleepovers, asking for trouble in my opinion.

My 11 year old dgs wouldn’t touch a girl with barge pole! He wouldn’t be keen on a mixed sleepover though. Boys of 11 are usually less mature than girls of the same age.

“Got themselves very bad reputations”? Fuck off with that misogyny.

I didn't get a wink of sleep at a mixed sleep over at that age. Turns out the girls had only invited me because one of the boys wanted me there. Scary night. My dd is about to turn 13 and here it would be a no. I don't think you are being unreasonable.

But I'm probably an overprotective parent and generally averse to sleep overs anyway so take that with a grain of salt.

I like the goady what do you think might happen's?