Odd girl in daughters class

[Scottishbornandbread43]

Daughter is in primary school and has always had a nice group of friends.
There is a girl in her class that is a bit strange (sorry please don’t think im
being mean). She talks and sings to herself at inappropriate times, she chews everything and leaves bite marks on everything including other people’s property- her conversations are odd - constantly talking about bugs, she asks my daughter every day if she’s had her period yet (daughter is 10). There is a list of strange things this girl does.

My daughter felt sorry for her as no one played with her but now my daughter has found her other friends now don’t want to play with her.

My daughter spoke to me over the weekend and said she doesn’t want to be friends with this girl anymore but says she follows her around saying ‘she worships her’ (which I think is bizarre)and doesn’t want to be told off for telling her to leave her alone.

I feel sorry for this girl as did my daughter but I don’t think my daughter realised how intense she would become.

any advise? My daughter tried being kind but is now so upset as she doesn’t want be unkind to her but she just wants some space from her

No, the OP has taken the behaviour at face value - different from the norm. The rush to attach labels to every kind of different behaviour these days is alarming - especially unseen. This could have been a really helpful thread for OP. Instead she’s been chased from it in record time by a ridiculous pile on over one word that wasn’t meant the way it was taken. MN is a pit of vipers at times.

DS1 had a friend in primary school who was similar to the little girl in the OP. He had autism and my son probably does too (still awaiting assessment at 16.) Nobody else wanted to be friends with this boy and his mum told me that my son was the first child to get along well with him. He had a lot of sensory issues and felt the urge to bite things, including himself. He ate paper and cardboard and bit pencils in half. He could be confrontational and always seemed to end up in arguments with other children (and the teacher!) He was also incredibly smart. My son distanced himself when the boy started threatening him with various objects, like a sharp broken ruler or a piece of playground equipment. He still liked him but found him unpredictable and a bit frightening. I suppose what I'm saying is that children aren't obliged to be friends with anyone if it is making them uncomfortable. My son reconnected with his friend a couple of years after they started different secondary schools and now they get on like a house on fire!

I would speak to the school as my daughter use to help out children with sen issues until I had to put a stop to it as she was really ill one day and crying as I kept her off saying she can't miss school and would get told off as she has to look after the younger ones and I said it ain't your job to as she said it is. then it all came out that my daughter misses playtime and lunchtime to look after them she lost friends because of it and also got told off if the children with sent didn't have snack or lunch if there parents forgot to give them so she was giving her lunch away so she wouldn't get told off. I would ask the school to put boundaries down.

The girls needs to put boundaries in place but OP absolutely needs to speak to the teacher so she can handle it properly, together with TAs in the playground, etc.

The OP’s daughter merely insisting she should
‘go away’ or ‘leave me alone’ every day isn’t going to be effective, for either party.
I suspect the setting might not be right for the poor girl and the sooner she can be moved, or plans put in place, the better. With those behaviours, it’d be a most likely be a nightmare for her to end up in MS secondary.

OP, I’d say speak to the teacher and they should then be able to assign adults in the playground to monitor and intervene accordingly. That’s the price that children who are ‘caring’ pay for including those that fit in, unfortunately. I don’t blame your daughter at all for not wanting to be a social outcast too when she doesn’t have any additional needs herself and can avoid that. I hope she’s back with her friends soon.

I think it's more unreasonable to assume diagnoses.

It’s perfectly fine to describe her behaviour as odd. My dc have ASD and they are odd!

I wonder if everything is ok at home for this poor little girl.

l have no idea if this child has been diagnosed with something so that is why is used the word odd.
it is not my place or business to assume someone has asd/autism etc…
she may not be sen and therefore I am ok using the word odd

This is what OP said. No offence meant. But a bucketload taken on behalf of a child people are perfectly willing to label as ND unseen. I know what l think is more damaging.

Do SEN teachers diagnose now? That’s going to make a massive difference to a lot of families.

I have an adult child who is autistic and has a learning disability, which means their behaviour is often not that of a typical thirty-something, but never have I come across anyone that thinks they should be shamed for their disability. Luckily most people these days don't think that disabled people should be excluded from society either.

This is what l wondered. Everything has to be labelled as a condition or disability these days, but it could just as easily be something to do with the home situation.

Writing "It sounds to me like she could have ASD," on a talk board about an anonymous person isn't quite the same as a diagnosis.

I can imagine it would be annoying to be asked all the time, but not inappropriate- unless the daughter is uncomfortable talking about periods, in which case I’d suggest the problem lies with the way she’s been taught about them.

As for biting people’s stuff - of course it’s not ok, but that’s where education is required to remove these unacceptable behaviours.

The only other behaviour mentioned is an interest in bugs. Would it be ok if instead of bugs it was dogs? Or something cuter…kittens?

Some of you are clearly very uneducated and it shows. Nobody is asking you to understand neurodivergence, but just be a little less narrow minded then to call children odd. You have no idea what these children go through, or how alien they already feel in a world clearly not willing to even attempt to understand them.

Don't be so naive. She knew exactly what she was doing

No Vet on here would dream of diagnosing an animal from a blurry photo, No GP would either, yet time after time on here people are happy to diagnose a behavioural issue {Or whatever} from a few lines of description.

Yet it is supposed to be hard to get a ''diagnosis'' {?} on here it seems anyone will give a diagnosis instantly, with zero waiting.

It is simply factual that people are not going to react well when their property is being bitten and they are asked inappropriate questions.

Totally agree. The girl does sound ‘odd’, and it is ‘odd’ behaviour. Could have said ‘weird’ too, and that sounds correct also.

Fwiw your dd sounds lovely op

Be kind and treat her as she’d like to be treated herself. You shouldn’t shun someone just because they’re different to you. It can happen to us all at some point and it feels awful.

The alternatives aren’t polar opposites: either an intense friendship or no friendship at all. The kinder alternative is they remain friendly, but within boundaries.

My DC had schools friends who have SEN and were sometimes quite clingy to them. They never asked me how to handle it. But if they had, I’d have said still be friendly, but play with other friends too.

If she says anything that makes your DD uncomfortable, she should say “I don’t want to talk about that”.

I would feel uncomfortable with a new friend repeatedly asking about my periods. I think an interest in bugs is fine too.

Definitely

She also describes the girl liking bugs as odd, so I’m not massively inclined to agree with the OP’s take.

ND is a spectrum - we are all on it. Being ‘ND’ means reaching a diagnostic threshold that requires intervention.

Thus describing anyone as ‘odd’ - especially a child - for having different tastes and for asking a question repeatedly is pretty gross. The word strange was also used to describe a 10 year old.

Apart from the biting other people’s stuff, none of the behaviours described warrant being othered and shamed.

‘No offence meant’ isn’t an excuse for being offensive.

Really? I can’t think I know a ten year old who doesn’t know the word worship? It’s hardly like the kid is telling OP’s DD she’s in limerence.

Your poor daughter, she sounds like an angel who got utterly taken advantage of by the staff at her school. I hope she’s ok now, and the children she was trying to look after her, bless her