To consider moving schools as I don't like dd friends?

[U23rn4m3]

My dd is friends with some girls. They are all aged 10. I've recently found out these girls are on tik tok and instagram and have learnt about very mature things. They have been discussing these things with my dd and have made her feel uncomfortable. I have spoken to all the friends parents who basically think it's funny and not that bothered.
I'm considering moving dd to a different school over this.

Am I being over dramatic? Or is there another way I should be dealing with this?

My dd still has ptsd several years from some of the weird and violent anime porn that her 10 year old group of friends kept showed her on supposedly innocent sleepovers. They basically sexually harassed her.
Is it as bad as this? If so, you need to start educating her about having healthy relationships with other kids and looking at the issues that have come up. She shouldn't be seeing these girls outside of school.
Rather than move school you have to take control of the situation and be firm about who she spends time with.

I remember my mother having the same hysteria over Judy Blooms Are You There God It's Me Margaret. Apparently it was much too mature and filthy for me to know periods existed at 10.

By 10 you should definitely have proactively covered sex, consent and privacy with her, for her own protection, which would lead into the topics and school playground talk you mentioned. You cannot protect them from information, you can only explain and educate them age appropriately.

I can remember at that age (even 45 years ago!) things being talked about in the playground that I just didn't understand and there was no way I could ask my mum about them!

If porn or graphic videos are being shared insist the school deal with it. Moving school will not help.

Exactly this - my son also came home crying one day because of some violent porn his friends were showing him that had men nailing their penises to things. I suspect most parents are blissfully unaware that their kids are being exposed to this shit because even if you monitor the internet at home there's always someone else who lets their darling kids do whatever.

It's really tough OP. The comments about Enid Blyton etc just show how people diminish and minimise the worry parents have when they are dealing with the damage done to kids when their peers have no limits.

Just keep talking to your kid and assume the authority so she knows you are the voice to listen to and not her simping TikTok pornsick friends.

.... (why did that not post the last boy?)
YOU need to become the voice of authority on this and not her simping porn sick "friends".
At 10 you still have sway.

Right, but what were they actually talking about?

My 10yo girl, when she was in Y5, knew what rape was. I think it might even be mentioned in Sex Ed. You know it happens to 10 year olds?

Sex in general - again, it’s on the curriculum. Age 8-10 is a great age for parents to talk about it, you get in when they’re not too embarrassed or giggly or horsing around or grossed out to listen, and importantly - ask their own questions.

Assault - it’s a fact of life, and an educated child is a safer one. You know that within their class, some child has quite possibly already been assaulted? My daughter and I have discussed risks and consent from this age and younger.

Prostitution? I remember explaining it to mine around this age as it’s when she watched Les Mis. It’s a good opportunity to talk about the lack of choices some women have, the danger of sex work, the over representation of previously sexually abused children and care leavers in the industry.

All of this was part of my Y5/Y6 chats with my daughter (now Y9) and I think she was better educated and safer for it. Also a lot of talk in last couple of years about pornography.

Honestly - you don’t need to move your child, you need to step up and parent your child.

*bit not boy. Omg this new interface!

I think I'd be more worried about the tone if how those things were being discussed than than my 10yo knew facts about the world. We have definitely discussed rape and consent around sex, I don't think 10 is unusually young to discuss that.

I'm inclined to thing that learning about concentration camps and the holocaust (which she is also covering) is more distressing than a factual discussion of rape and prostitution.

Try to get in touch specifically with the DSL/P at the school. Their name should be in their Safeguarding Policy on the school’s website. They will have extensive safeguarding training, including assessing whether these conversations are age appropriate or not, and what interventions and education can be put into place to address things.

I would say something to the school, depending on what they're accessing and sharing, it could be a safeguarding issue.
But unless you have other problems with the school I wouldn't move her. You're always going to find parents that you don't agree with in my experience.

You will find children like this in any school and being 10 I assume your DD will be at secondary school either in September or next year where she will hear all sorts. You can’t control what other children say, all you can do is discuss things with your DD and explain why certain things are inappropriate at her age.

You don’t say what they’re accessing. Accessing tik toks doesn’t sound safe and is likely a safeguarding issue. Learning in a secure environment, yes. I agree with you about prostitution. I would talk to the school and disclose what your dd has seen and heard.

Surely that should be with reason and within boundaries?

You don’t really think a 10 year old is capable of making right choices at that age?

Sounds just like the same kind of thing posted by my 10 year olds friends on WhatsApp. I check her phone regularly (suspect I’m one of few parents who do judging by her friends posts).

Ive had some honest chats with her, and we talk about what’s being posted, and how to avoid the bad stuff, or understand it and ignore, or whatever makes sense in a particular situation.

A metaphor I like is that as a parent it’s not your job to remove all challenges and hurdles from your kids life, it’s your job to prepare and help them deal with the obstacles.

I think that you have to start talking to your kids about these topics much younger than you might think. If you don't, someone else will

Beyond ridiculous overreaction!

How on earth are you going to cope with the teen years op.

You educate your child to protect her, tiktok is everywhere and will be for foreseeable. I am not even sure the post can be real!

I'm not sure moving schools would solve anything, children at this age will start to discuss these things. It's up to you to keep installing your beliefs to her. My ds moved to high school at just turned 11 so not mush older than your child, at 14 he still chooses to mix with his old friends from primary who didn't go to his secondary so I don't think moving schools would actually stop the friendships anyway.

You should have started educating her years ago, she is prepared.

Given that she's 10, I wouldnt bother moving her. She's a year from secondary where sadly this is common place.
Discussions to be had.

YABU there are kids and parents like that everywhere. She’ll be at secondary school soon where it will be even worse. You can’t shelter her from it all.

Year 6 is a very disruptive time to move a child. It’s really hard for them to slot into a class of kids who have grown up together. I wouldn’t if I could avoid it.
I don’t think prostitution is too mature for a 10y to know about. We definitely knew that at 10, back in the 80s before there was any TikTok.

Even without TikTok and Instagram, I remember talking about 'mature' things with my friends at school at that age. I remember one of my friends mentioning a blow job, and then everybody asking about them/discussing what they were (probably incorrectly...)
We all turned out ok 🤷🏻‍♀️

I think you are being very naive about what young people are exposed to and overreacting to this problem.

Those are all really uncomfortable subjects but it’s totally possible to talk to your daughter about them in a proportionate manner, appropriate to her age. You can then use this as an opportunity to explain boundaries and inform her that there’s a lot more information out there that shes not yet mature enough to process and how to exercise those boundaries. Also you can now encourage her to form a view on things like respect for bodies, exploitation of women, womens rights….so that when she comes across stuff online she’s better equipped and not seduced by fantasy images, if that’s all she knows.

Moving schools will not work as there will be an exact snake set of kids/parents at every school.

You really have to talk to children before they need to know things.

I think OP would go up in smoke at what I did a couple of weeks ago with my 13yo: I had a conversation with her about auto-erotic asphyxiation - “choking”.

She hasn’t (I think) even kissed someone yet. She’s educated and aware about sex generally. Choking? She was all WTF?!!! Hadn’t heard of it. And certainly didn’t know about its normalisation in porn AND just how much porn children are exposed to.

So what’s better?

That some kid tells her in a year’s time that it’s supposed to be really good, everyone does it, they’ve seen it done online, let’s try it… and it goes tragically wrong? Or less dramatically, it doesn’t go wrong, but she felt pressured to do it.

Or, that she remembers our chat about sex being great and exciting and sometimes new stuff… but (a) some things are actually really fucking dangerous (b) some people’s idea of what is mainstream really fucking isn’t! (b) even if 99% of people love it, you can say no (d) a lot of porn is violent towards women and focused on male pleasure - etc etc

And if some parent isn’t doing their job, and turns their nose up at me for educating and safeguarding my child, then I’m just glad that my child might be able to step in one day and say to their child, “hmmm - you know not every does that, and it’s OK to say no.”

I would limit her opportunities to play with other children who you don't think are good for her outside of school, but I wouldn't move schools.

Dd9 had a friend like this. Incidentally, we did move schools, but not because of the friend obviously, but because we moved about an hour away. She was 7/8, had an iphone, into very adult things that she should not have known about at that age. Even our neighbours who met her (who don't have dc), were a bit like, what?! that's not appropriate. Unfortunately, she comes from a tricky family background and does not live with either of her parents (her mum died and her dad has 'gone abroad to live' and has no contact with her - I don't know if that is the full story, but you can imagine she may have seen some heavy stuff). She now lives with grandparents.

I just put a stop to playdates as I didn't feel like the relationship was a healthy one for dd. And we talked about stuff that came up from school. I think that is the best you can do. As teens, I think it's only going to get harder.