To ask if school mum cliques upset you, or how do you deal with cliques?

[facefit]

I'm new to school, my child is in reception. I've noticed that there are cliques forming.

How do you deal with it? Or just completely ignore?

It is fine for people to be friends and talk to each other. If you see a friend at the school gates then obviously you're going to go and talk to them. Or is there something more unpleasant going on?

I'm not sure what you're asking - it sounds like you are seeing groups of people talking to each other and it worries you?

I think you need to take a look at your anxiety and where the worry is coming from.

They are strangers at school gates. Why the eagerness to be part of the ‘crew’. Surely, as an adult, you have your own life. This is kind of thing kids worry about at school.

I would smile and say hello to other parents in your child's class. Ask how their child is settling in, if they are enjoying it etc. Before you know it, you will be in your own little friendship group. I've got a lot out of meeting other parents. It helps to find other people share the same issues as you.

I have never been able to mix in with the parents at school. Partly because I'm terrible at small talk (and find it boring) and partly because I'm usually in a rush. This is despite being friends with a group of the same mums outside of school - but at school I just can't deal with the small talk so usually get in and out quickly with little more than a hello. I completely understand that feeling though of everyone else being in groups and feeling left out. I really think it comes down to integrating yourself. Walk over to them and include yourself if the opportunity arises. Get there a bit earlier before a group has formed and start chatting to whoever is already there. A lot of it just comes down to where you stand waiting for your child and talking to whoever is next to you.

This.

I find these threads so bizarre and paranoid. People are allowed to have friendship groups that predate school you know. Some of these people may have known each other for decades. Maybe they don’t but they just gel well and like hanging out. Is that a crime?

So many adults seem to have the expectation that their children’s school is a ready made social life on a plate for the parents and then get paranoid and huffy when they discover other parents can get on with one another without their permission.

What others do and the friendships they make is none of your concern. Let them crack on. You will probably find being less suspicious and paranoid will make it much easier to make friends.

I'm not bothered. I go to school to pick up and drop off my kid. What other people are doing with their time is up to them.

What stands out for me here is the posters complaining about these “cliques” also say I smile and say hi and no one approaches me. The thing is it’s up to the person who wishes tp join to approach them. On no planet is someone going to wander round the playground asking all the alone mums to join them. It’s silly to think they should

so a clique is a closed friendship group, if you’ve never actually approached the group and made efforts to join then you’ve no clue if it’s a clique or a friendship group , they aren’t doing anything wrong by being friends, and it really isn’t their job to be approaching everyone in case they want to join in.

My DS has just started reception. There are 6 kids in his class that have a sibling in DD's class, so I already know them pretty well. If we gather and have a chat I can see how a paranoid type might think clique. Actually we just know eachother and would be friendly to any of the new parents.

I have a clique but it's because we were friends before school started.

I'm making a conscious effort to talk to everyone there! That's what you need to do too.

Just say "how's <kids name> getting on?"

And go from there.

Why do you need to deal with them? Just take your kids to school then go home. You don't need to deal with groups of clicky mums loitering outside.

I've purposely started chatting to a mum who seems quite lonely at school.

We're going out for gins at the pub soon 😁 I actually think she's amazing. But I wouldn't know if I hadn't said "Hey, how's XX getting on at school?"

Hand on heart, I hope our friendship continues to develop as she makes me laugh so much and she's really down to earth.

I don't know why people are pretending there are not cliques at the school gates.

A friendship group= a group of people who are secure enough in their affection for each other that they can invite new people in sometimes, meet separately sometimes, realise that in jokes etc are not for public places. Really not related to those around them/not in the group as is about friendship within.

A clique: a group of people who try to create closeness by excluding others, some members don't actually enjoy the friendships within but feel safer than if they were excluded, in jokes are used in public as a way of excluding others, is ALL about who isn't in the group and whether you're accepted or not.

If you haven't come across the second type of group at the school gates you are lucky - but that doesn't mean they don't exist.

OP the way to deal with it is by genuinely but caring (you may need to work at this). Be friendly and appear confident even if the clique has hurt you. In this way you will find that people entrapped by the clique will slowly realise there is life outside it and you can guarantee at least one or two will approach you for your easy and friendly manner. Tricky though, but worth trying. Takes a while but works ime.

You might be over thinking this and need to push yourself to chat to people.

People might think I'm in a clique. I'm
Not. We are just people that have become friends because our kids have been friends since eyfs and want to see each other out of school or coincidentally go to the same clubs.

We are not mean or nasty people we don't leave people out, we always include other people to chat if they are stood nearby.

I always extend invitations to play dates to parents I don't know so well if the kids mention other kids they want to join us somewhere.

I never understand on threads like this why (some) people are so against making school mum friends. That attitude is just as bad as accusing people of being in a clique.

Since when is having too many friends a bad thing? Why does it matter how you know someone?

There isn't an issue though, mums having a chat for 5 mins after dropping the kids off. Smile, wave, they are probably discussing the bloody weather.
The OP is making this into a bigger deal than it needs to be and if more people were told this then maybe things won't escalate.

Because, it's just a temporary, transactional friendship that runs its course when kids switch schools and there's no more benefit to it.

Maybe I'm a little jaded. I have three kids, I've been doing the school run consecutively for 11 years. I only have to do this for another two years tops and then the youngest will be able to walk alone. Other than passing the time, chatting to others who are nearby, I'm just running the clock down at this point.

i have two dc in first school (a small school), my first is in yr3 and the mums all get along great, we're pretty similar and i could stand and chat to any and all but one of them. my youngest is in reception and its totally different. There's a group of 5/6 who stand in a group and when i try to smile just look at me like "what the fuck are you looking at?", then there's 2 who stand away from everyone else but will say hello on their way through the gate and a couple who mingle with the rest of us. I dread parties with my youngest

Just smile and chat away to all and sundry. You'll soon gauge which people you click with, then you only need to be polite with the rest.

FGS don't start getting paranoid about cliques because that's a surefire way to end up always standing alone in the playground.

I worked so never did school runs. I had my own friends so didn't need to find them at the school gate.

Just because people have children the same age doesn't mean they have anything else in common.

Just get on with your own life.

@Mardyface

A friendship group= a group of people who are secure enough in their affection for each other that they can invite new people in sometimes, meet separately sometimes, realise that in jokes etc are not for public places. Really not related to those around them/not in the group as is about friendship within.
A clique: a group of people who try to create closeness by excluding others, some members don't actually enjoy the friendships within but feel safer than if they were excluded, in jokes are used in public as a way of excluding others, is ALL about who isn't in the group and whether you're accepted or not

I understand what a clique is but my point is that all these "school gate mums" posts are based on the thinnest of evidence.

If you actually unpack what has triggered the evidence of "cliques" its always incredibly inconclusive. "She looked straight past me" or "She was talking to another mum and had her back to me." It's the sort of behaviour will people engage in all the time, unconsciously, because they are busy or preoccupied or not feeling themselves or whatever.

But for some reason the sort of behaviour which would be shrugged off in the workplace or at the bus stop takes on this huge almost spiritual significance when its at the "school gate". I'm pretty certain that in 90% of cases these incidents don't even register with the people who are alleged to have done it, they are getting on with their day.

This is a lot of fairly insecure people who subconsciously feel they are "owed" a friendship network when their kids go to school, often because they haven't bothered to keep their old friendship networks up when they had kids, who then get the hump about other people who have more social skills than them. It's jealousy pure and simle.

The solution is to get on with your life, do what you do and develop actual friends with actual shared interests. And stop caring about a bunch of randoms who you happen to cross paths with at school. Chances are they are thinking a lot less about you than you are about them but you certainly won't help your chances of making friends by getting huffy and sulking about perceived sleights all the time.

Cliques are petty. I never bothered to make friends on the school run. Women can be really childish.

Cliques aren't a thing. People are making friends, that's all, there is nothing at all wrong with that. Some of them are already friends, most likely.

The people who don't make friends are the people who don't understand them and call them cliques and ask how to deal with it....just drop the attitude and act like a normal person and you might make friends too.

I remember a woman ranting at some school thing about "cliques and bitchy women and alphas being mean girls" and so on....and pointed at a group of 4 women who were always chatting together in the school yard by themselves. I had to say "you mean X and her 2 sisters and her best friend of 30 years"?

You, apparently for one.

Because, it's just a temporary, transactional friendship that runs its course when kids switch schools and there's no more benefit to it.

Maybe in your case. But a lot of life long friends are made at the school gate. It’s no different from making friends at baby groups or NCT.

In any other situation no one would have an issue with a group of friends not including people they didn’t know.

@CallTheMobWife

I remember a woman ranting at some school thing about "cliques and bitchy women and alphas being mean girls" and so on....and pointed at a group of 4 women who were always chatting together in the school yard by themselves. I had to say "you mean X and her 2 sisters and her best friend of 30 years"?

Exactly this. The people who cry "clique" are usually just people who are outraged at the idea that other women can maintain friendships which don't include them.