ticked if kids distribute party invites at school?

[parentrapped]

in the class, in front of teacher and only to less then half the girls in class who subsequently open, hide in desks and say 'its a secret but nothing' to the rest of the losers watching?

I wouldn't have a problem if its less than half of the class its the malicious or muppet mums that allow their DC to use party invitations to exclude only 1 or 2 that I have a problem with.

Where else would you have them distributed?

makes sod all difference whether they're distributed at school or outside school.........the ones that aren't invited will soon find out from the ones that are

I sympathise as this happened to DD today (she was one not invited). Also, In Feb she was the only girl in the class not invited to a "leaving party" for one of the girls. I was bloody livid.

Toccata is right though, they'd find out anyway.

i always post them and or email and write please ask daughters not to talk about it-they all know about them but in my opinion it humiliates publiclly the excluded girls(mine being one this time but not al all always)
so im glad i asked, clearly im just a looser old fashioned try to do the right thing to not hurt others kinda mum and i better get over it

lol - they'll talk about - doesn't matter what age they are it WILL be talked about at school..........

Ds has never been invited to a party. Thats kids for you.

ok you are all making me feel either super nice or super crazy. lockets-it went down totally differently as in girl walks around classroom of 16 and gives BIG invites to about 7 girls and they open in front while everyone else looks on and teacher is apparently just on computer at desk. i still believe this is wrong. fine have teacher put in backpack or do it outside at break with entire year. to me thats the moment that matters and in addition my dd (who always invites this fairly disliked girl to all her parties to be politically correct) asked whats in the envelopes and the mother heard this and tells me she told her dd "dont you dare tell her whats in the envelopes" . sorry the whole thing was just toooottally wackadoodle-doo and im still going to stick with thoughtless. clearly it upset me but noone seems to agree so i go to bed hurt and wrong

Its not nice, some kids are not nice, its a fact of life and a valuable life lesson im afraid.

How odd to ask the daughters not to talk about a party...

How would that work I wonder

DS2 gave his out last week and just took them in to school with him then handed them out when he saw people. Hopefully discreetly enough not to offend those not asked.

I couldn't phone or email everyone anyway - I don't have contact details for everyone in his class.

parenttrapped that does sound as tho it was done thoughtlessly. But however you do it, as others say, they all know all about it soon enough.

OP, you're neither super nice nor super crazy, but you are (IMHO, of course) a bit over-sensitive on your DD's behalf. Life is full of disappointments, she might as well get used to that young.

And, if she doesn't like someone, don't invite him/her to her party. Nothing PC about making your child's birthdays a series of horrors.

thnx oldlady but we invite the girl because other child friends with sister.not always so clearcut and if u met me you would not call me sensitive parent! bc i usally tell my kids to suck it up on these issues BUT this felt wrooonnggg an the mom being crazed about it being secret? well then f@@@king mail the invites,distribute secretly yourself or use email -we have the class list and all use it for this. noone pases invites at this school and it happens to be a school policy...all the invites always say "please ask kids not to discuss in school in effort to be senstive.." i learned this there and when we lived in another counrty, the school had the same policy.
BTW bithday parties are a series of horrors any way. the best thing bout them is when they are over and old enough to not want them.

I think it's a bit bizarre to ask the kids not to talk "in effort to be sensitive".

FGS it's a birthday party. Nobody died. Y'know, no child's life is ruined if they are not invited.

One of DD's good friends had her b/day a few weeks ago and had a very expensive party (£20 a head) so she just invited 4 very best pals.

I mentioned to DD and she said, oh that's fine; if I just invited 4 I would ask X, Y , W and Z - ie not this child. I thought that was pretty grown up - kids are a lot more able to deal with this sort of thing than some of us realise.

DD is 8 btw. Not sure how old OP's DD is. But even if young; 6yo DS2 is fine with the "rejection" of not being invited too.

I am soooooo glad that my DC are adults... and, tbh, that they're boys/men. All of this seems much more of a minefield than it was 20-odd years ago.

Or maybe I'm just an insensitive [expletive of your choice]

But, as others have said, you cannot realistically expect children not to talk about an upcoming/just past party. I remember not being invited to birthday parties as a child; although it hurt, it actually increased the pleasure when I was asked, iyswim.

[recalls Maureen's 8th birthday party, which ended in some sort of hysterical wailing. Circa 1970. But hell, I was there....]

As ive said. perhaps my children have been stymied for the sake of being considerate but this is actually proper etiquette.
Would you like to be at lets say a class coffee where one Mum passes out invites to a hot concert, the other Mums squeal with excitement and then tuck into the purses the invites dismissing them as nothing.
thats BULLSH*T if you wouldn't think they had no downright manners mamas! And guess where those manners are ingrained HERE and NOW! so if you can, mention to their children that it is not polite nor sensitive to talk about others upcoming parties in front of some who may not be invited. It is also not polite to talk about activities they are excited to get to whilst they are playing with another friend. It is also not polite to boast about the schools you were accepted to or put down the ones you did not think were good enough..you see we do have these tiny teaching moments and you know ladies you could help make the world a better place one ghastly birthday party at a time. Teaching a kids to flaunt and then to keep secrets that is very highbrow. is there not anyone who would agree? if not im going to quit mumsnet after my first try and start hitting pub instead.

YABU,

IME, the children do not see it as an issue, until the parents start making it an issue. At my DDs school, party invites are usually handed out in the morning before school. Sometimes DD gets an invite, sometimes not. However, as she has been brought up not to expect invites to parties, so she does not really care - as usually her close friends invite her, its only the people she doesn't really play with who do not invite her. Further, last year she had to make decisions about who she wanted to invite to her party (there was a maxmimum number of guests) and so learnt that there were some people she couldn't invite... she knows that it doesn't mean that she doesn't like the person, but simply that mummies cannot afford to invite everyone.

She was once asked if she was going to Xs party - to which she told the woman "Why would I go? I don't play with X".

She has no expectations that she will attend any party (except her core friends), and unless one of her core friends did not invite her, she (and I ) would not see it as a rejection, but simply as you can't go to every party. No big deal.

DD is in year 1 btw.

and onee more annoying addition to clarys point-my kids have always found out about parties and have not been at all bothered in same manner as your children. there was just something bizarre about the yourin yourout and then the motherload to follow. so yep,t got me n the girl is ten, they all finished harrowing year of 11plus so tired and sensitive after that.
For record it has not been a problem for all 3 daughters to keep lowprofile and honest dialogue about parties if they cant include everyone! TRY it, their capacaties for compassion shall astound you all. Good luck! ;)

Everyone has agreed with you it wasnt nice the way the party invitations were handed out.

OP, please don't tell me I'm typing BULLSH*T. Your idea of ettiquette/good manners (and there si a difference) obviously doesn't extend to strangers on t'interweb.

So a child that isn't invited to a party is a loser?
I teach Y5/6, there are many parties and sleepovers and going home after school to someone else's house for a 'playdate' type event. The children have always seemed very sensible and realistic about invitations. Surely it's a level of social maturity to accept that it's not always you? Or even very rarely you? It's a parent's job to help them develop that understanding. getting them to whisper, hide and not talk about it isn't very helpful.
My son hasn't been to any of these sort of things since he was 6 and his AS became too much for ordinary parents and children to cope with. He has other social events that he enjoys instead.

Up until this year i have always invited all of the class (30) as we were financially in a position to do so. also having my son birthday in august i knew half the class wouldn't come anyway (holidays, forgetting etc).

This year we cant afford to and he wants a more expensive party anyway so we will be asking only 10. I just feel SO BAD for the ones we are not asking (and a fear that no-one will turn up!!). However there are very few in his class who have had parties anyway so i suppose I shouldn't feel to bad.......

i think your use of the word loser is quite worrying, I really hope you havent used that word when speaking to your daughter.

So, 7 girls got invited, lots of others didn't - surely that's not the problem.

The attitude of the girl and her mother is the problem surely, they were insensitive and rude towards your daughter and others who werent invited.

yes gingernut. you hit the nail on head of problem. no we do not use the word loser except when playing board games ;)

Ladies, the word bullshit is not a question of manners and this is an adult discusssion.
Everyone but gingernut and claw are missing the point; we all teach our children sometimes your are included other times not. sometimes you include and other times it is not possible but it is the WAY we teach the children to go about these things that helps make worls nicer place and apologies if anyone was offended by use of stron word bullshit.;)