AIBU for asking the school to help?!??!

[MamaGEO]

DD is in year 4 in primary, and has always had challenges making friends with her classmates....there's alot of people refusing to play with her for all sorts of random reasons, or none at all. I've asked the school to look into it. Even to the point of asking their opinions on my daughters behaviour to others to see if there's something we can work on at home - but there doesn't seem to be an appetite to help.DD doesn't have this issue outside school, and always finds friends in other activities, holidays, etc.But she's really unhappy at school, and I'm worried about her mental health.Can anyone provide any advice on what I could do next?!?!?

Are they all short term friends in the other activities or people she sees regularly over long periods so years? I mean for example has she been in the same club for years and still has the same friends? Does she see any of these friends at home or outside the club?

What do you want the school to do? What are some of the reasons other kids don't play with her?

I'm not sure school can make children be friends with each other

I think she’s asking the school if there seem to be any specific reasons. So they can work on solutions.

The school can’t ask other children about their views on your daughter. Would you really want to hear the response?
you can ask the school to provide opportunities for your dd to make friends through supportive lunchtime clubs or engaging in hobbies. You can ask the teacher to be mindful of this and try and create a classroom of inclusion.

if your dd has friends outside of school then celebrate that, and teach your daughter that we don’t always make friends with everyone and that’s ok.

The school must have responded in some way surely? It is a perfectly normal request from a parent to a school.

No they can't ask the children, but they can observe what (if any) behaviours they may find off-putting.

Our school has a friendship bench on the playground. Any child who has noone to play with can go and sit there and the others know to go over and include him/her. Teachers on duty make sure this happens.

Sometimes kids just don’t gel. One of my DC is popular in brownies, good mates with the neighbours children and has friends at afterschool club, but has very superficial relationships with her classmates and no one who’s actually her good friend or would invite her for play dates. She’s not being bullied or deliberately excluded and having met her classmates it’s not that they’re not lovely kids, but they just don’t have much in common with my DC (most of them are into a particular sport that my daughter isn’t), there’s a few clashing personalities and it just hasn’t worked out. It’s a small school so there’s just not a wide pool of potential friends. There’s nothing I expect school to do about it, they aren’t nursery age where they can be encouraged to play with anyone. If my DC was unhappy I’d move her to another school, but she has friends from elsewhere and isn’t bothered about the class situation.

In your situation, if you can’t change classes, I’d be considering a change of school. I really don’t think there’s much teachers can do, I’d expect if they could see a specific reason they’d have told you.

Hi everyone. Thanks so much for your responses.

I didn't mean that individual children should be asked, but like mentioned, maybe sharing some of their observations to see if there's something my daughter is doing to put people off.

I will definitely celebrate and encourage the friends she has outside of school.

I don't expect the school to make people play together, but if there's something my daughter can do, or if there is negative behaviour from the other children, I would like some support.....