To not invite a child to the party

[Christiners]

My son is 6, he’s having a birthday party next month for his 7th birthday and he has invited 10 (out of 30)children from his class. I asked him over and over “are you sure there’s no one else you want to invite?” “Are you sure this is everyone?” Even went through his list and said “who’s this one’s best friend” so that everyone had a friend to play with at the party. Only 3 of them are girls, idk if that’s relevant but il include in case.

anyway, today he took the invites in and I told him to give them to his teacher so that she could put them in children’s bags.. I thought that would work better than handing them out infront of everyone when not every child would receive one. The teacher told my son to hand them out.. big mistake.
A little girl started crying that she didn’t get an invite, but not just any little girl, a girl that has been very unkind to my son up until now. Every other day he comes home and says “she punched me” “she strangled me” “she pulled my shoe off” “she threw water at me”. My son now feels bad that she’s upset and wants to invite her, I’ve said no.
If it was a random child that he hadn’t thought to invite then my opinion would obviously be different and I DO understand that they’re children and they’re still learning etc but this child has been very unkind to him for a very long time.. I don’t think it’s fair that my son is guilt tripped into having to invite someone to his party. He’s upset and now really wants to give her an invite but I feel like he’s just worried that she’ll be nasty to him if she’s not invited.

AIBU?

How many times does she need to repeat the below:

I couldn’t hand them to parents as my children attend wrap around childcare before and after school and I don’t see other parents.

We banned invitations in the school for this reason, children being upset and it's absolutely nothing to do with the teachers.

At the start of the school year we opt in or out of having our numbers shared with all of the other parents. Then a doc with all numbers and names of kids and their parents is sent out for party invites. It's the only sensible way to do it imo.

You sound quite arrogant in regards to feeling more superior than parents who join the group chat. Chats can easily be muted as well. The whole purpose is to provide useful contacts of other parents for the specific purpose of making birthday party invites or play dates more convenient. We haven't had paper invites for any parties...it's always a picture invite shared directly through Whatsapp, or sometimes a phone call.

Printing out invites and then having your child hand them out to a class of kids where 2/3 won't be receiving any seems like a disaster waiting to happen. It sounds like you want confirmation from MN that the girl who was upset about not getting an invite deserves to suffer through the rejection because she was a twat to your son.

However there are many things surrounding of kids that age which are impossible to say for sure. Maybe they were play fighting or did have times where they got along well and she thought they were friends. Maybe it was a one off incident where she was horrible to him or she was provoked and you only heard his side. Maybe she has a terrible home life and lashes out at school but feels very upset at being so clearly excluded from things such as visibly not getting a paper invitation.

Obviously not your business to fix whatever problem this girl has nor to invite her out of pity but ALL of this could have been avoided if you deigned to join a group chat with the direct contacts of other parents.

@Christiners I can empathize with your problem about sending out invitations and if it’s standard for the teacher to put them in the book bag, either they didn’t for a reason or DS forgot to ask. How a girl reacts to not being invited is not your fault.

However I cannot imagine not knowing a single parent by y2. Has he no friends at wrap around care and parents you see at drop off? Do you live totally separately from other parents? I have rarely seen this by y2. Has he never had dc to play at weekends? I think I would try and get to know parents a bit more.

Oops, missed that.

I'm a bit baffled by a parent who can't do any drop-offs or pick-ups then deciding not to join the class WhatsApp group. I can understand preferring talking to other parents in person etc and not wanting the constant "noise" of the chat, but if you're not able to have any in-person contact, surely you're one of the people for whom the WhatsApp group is the most useful in terms of getting to know who your child's friends and their parents are. Unless you're just not interested.

I agree there. He probably does miss out, but what I hear of it I’m not keen on. Fortunately I’ve not hidden the fact I’m not on and the people who my DS is friends with I’m in contact with outside of it. I had an issue over my daughter’s party years ago where a child who was horrible to her wasn’t invited, along with 2/3’s of the class. The mum tried to show me up on there in front of everyone. It was horrible. I’m generally wary of group chats. It always feels like there’s politics

WhatsApp is a relatively new thing and not every class has one. Invites have been handed out by kids in the playground for many many years. Yes some children will get upset but as long as you aren't singling out a minority of children to exclude, they get over it.

YANBU

Kids don’t benefit from contact with kids who treat them badly

We aren't allowed to hand out invites at our primary for the very reason. You tried to do it a better way - I don't know what the teacher was thinking.

I'd let the teacher know, tell your son that there is no more space and join the WhatsApp group as otherwise your son will be left out of stuff as time goes on. As a parent you just have to deal with all the headaches of WhatsApp because you are responsible for your children’s social life.

The teacher should be there to teach and not be the OP’s admin assistant. The teacher probably won’t be bothered how much space there was at the party. Yes the OP doesn’t mind her son being left out if it means she has to put herself out.

Not sure how old your kids are but I have one at university and another doing A levels. Going strong at their primary from around 2011....

Nor could I to be honest
My last born finished Primary in 2014 (I don't count Secondary as that went tits up and also because I couldn't tell you whose parent was whose) and we never had such a thing.

Perhaps Whats App wasn't out then. I can't remember when "new apps" for communication appeared but I wouldn't have been part of it

FFS those saying he shouldn't have given them out at school! If the school allows then of course he can bloody well hand out invitations in class, our school allows and most of the time it's a select group of kids invites, rarely the whole class, kids can't expect an invite to all parties and need to realise that. None of them in my child's class get upset about it.
He did nothing wrong OP and he shouldn't feel bad, she isn't a friend and more than that she's mean to him, maybe she'll adjust her behaviour now.

If inviting school mates to a party is that important, you actually have to take a half day from work to make it happen and make sure you're at the gate so that your child can point out the parents to you.
You also don't get the option of opting out of WhatsApp groups (there is a mute function in the app if you're overwhelmed by the volume of nonsense texts) if you want to take an active role in your child through their school life.
Otherwise you limit the invite list to neighbours and kids your child may know from after school activities, where you do know the parents.
I say all of the above having been the parent who didn't want to be in a WhatsApp group and also the parent who worked outside the home and couldn't do drop offs or collections at the school gates.

Agreed (again) :)

All this whole class or none stuff spouted.
How the Hell is it even affordable these days ?

It's not the teacher's job and as it's an activity outside of school hours, I think unless you had asked the teacher if it was ok to do this before actually sending in the invites, the teacher was completely within their rights to refuse to put the 10 pieces of card in bags for you, to make your life easier.

You could have sent a note in to the teacher explaining that you're not part of a WhatsApp group, that you work outside the home and you're not at the school gates either in the morning or at pick up time and if they could, would they mind if you sent in some invitations with the child's name on the envelope popping the note into their book bags/school bags for you?
Then, if the teacher refused (still within their rights as it's nothing whatsoever to do with the school) you could be a smidge aggrieved. If the teacher was ok with it, then you start building a contact list when the RSVP's come back.

As a parent, you don't get to opt out of many things school related.

And what if other parents aren't at the school and there is no WhatsApp, do those children get excluded?

I have one at uni, one in S6 and one in p2. There was only a whatsapp for the child who is now in s6. We only had 2 years of WhatsApp and no parties were organised through it.

When my kids were at primary school (up until last year), we were encouraged to give invitations to the class teacher. They would then manage putting them in bags. The school was quite large with a lot of kids in breakfast club or afterschool club so the playground wasn't always a practical option.

Surprised that this is no longer the case and no, YANBU to not invite his crying bully.

Why my kids were young (many years ago now), reading bags were put in a tray as the kids went in on a morning. The teaching assistant would put reading books, school letters, any note home and party invitations in the relevant bags to be picked up as they left the classroom at the end of the day. No drama and complaints that she is too stressed/busy/tired to do it. It was well organised and worked well. I know it still happens the same way as my friend is still a TA at the school.
It was never a requirement to invite the whole class. I am amazed that some schools will not have anything to do with handing out invitations unless it is a whole class. How is that teaching children resilience and acceptance that they won't always get their own way? Its crazy.
OP, I wouldn't invite the little girl either.

Like I said before, it just goes to show how different various communities are.

This thread is bonkers. The amount of people saying the OP needs to hand them out even though she's at work. Or use a Whatapp group etc.

My kids have never had a WhatsApp group (current year 6 and 3) and both choose to invite about 10-12 kids to their parties. Like everyone else they give them out at playtime. At times some have parties they're not invited to and vice versa. There is no drama. Why can't children be taught they can't be invited to everything?

YANBU. Why should he be guilt tripped into inviting a child that has bullies him? Actions have consequences and her actions has led to no party invite. It is his day, not the bullys. What happens if you invite her and she bullies your son at his own party ruining it for him? Also inviting her would be giving your son the wrong message about bullying.

I'm going to pick up on this point as you have said more than once that you do neither the drop off or collection at this child's school so you have no idea how the previous invites make their way home, do you?