At my wit's end

[shesgrownhorns]

Dd10 has been excluded from her group of friends now on and off since Easter. I've tried to talk to the mums about it but it just made the situation much worse. They all spoke to their respective girls and she ended up being ignored even more. They were and still are being deliberately mean.

I've emailed the teacher and told her to keep an eye, and she suggested taking the girls out of assembly and having a word with them about it. I said let's take a different tack and invite one of her supposed close friend round for the day. We did and they had a fabulous time! But once again today she literally turned her back on her, and pulled together a 'group hug' excluding dd. Group hugs are 'a thing' with this lot.

AIBU if I get involved? Or would I be micromanaging a normal year 6 issue?

She played with someone else today but tomorrow might be different again.
Help!

It is a normal year 6 issue. I work in primary and it happens all the time. This group mentality is all about control or lack of. It speaks more of those doing the controlling and is less to do with your DD. Girls are awful for this. We have clamped down on any group exclusive behaviour or private chats. I’d have a word with the teacher again and it should be passed on to lunch supervisors to look out for the unwanted behaviour too.

That sounds horrid. I wonder are there other girls in the year she could build friendships with. Perhaps inviting one of them round to kick off the process. I sometimes think when girls are being really mean best strategy is to just walk away and start up some new friendships. This kind of dynamic doesn’t always resolve that easily.

Thank you Red and Baby - please keep it coming. Last week she wrote a note (admittedly when she'd had a tantrum about being asked to do spellings - she's dyslexic, so we're very gentle with her but that day she just flipped her lid) She wrote me a note saying she does not mean to be bad and she is a mistake of a daughter and she is DEPREST! She is not bad (she is difficult sometimes but she has had a hard time keeping up at school and this has affected her quite negatively)

I obviously freaked out and got onto her teacher. I asked for a meeting with the SENCO, myself and her. Whilst I wait for this have you any suggestions for how to handle the immediate situation?

I agree that encouraging your DD to walk away and join a different group is a good strategy. It’s what I say when girls approach me in the playground with similar issues. It just removes the whole power trip that the others are on. Easier said than done I know. Also be wary of getting too involved. So many times parents fall out and the children have long moved on. I do think speaking to the class teacher will help. This things seem massive at that age, hence the note. Keep building your DD up and help her to see they are behaving badly, not her. My DD 15 still has issues like this but has learned to rise above it.

When children are occasionally mean to my DD I always suggest she should avoid them as they don’t deserve to play with her. It’s about supporting your DD to have boundaries and friends who are sometime ish and unreliable are not worth having. I really would sit down with her and work out a strategy of who she can develop friendships with to enable her to walk away from this mean group. In our school there is a mean group that call themselves the gang. I’ve guided DD to avoid them at all costs. I wouldn’t want her to be either a victim or a perpetrator of their mean girl ways. By ignoring them they lose their power.

Thank you. They are mean to her all the time in the playground but one or two of them who sit near her are nice to her in class. Any suggestions as to what to do in this situation?

Urgh I remember this happening to me in year 6 - but it helped shape my personality in terms of resilience and kindness to others and ability to make new friends- so although horrible for your daughter now it'll make her stronger in the long run. Plus secondary school isn't far away with all new children to meet and make friends with

The ones that are nice in class are probably being controlled too, they’re just happy to be in the accepted gang right now. If you can get your DD to see it that way, it might help.

Thank you. I wonder if it's true that it's the insecure ones who bully. They don't look very insecure from where I'm standing!

They also have a WhatsApp group. I'm thinking of getting rid of WhatsApp from her phone. This can't be a bad idea, can it?

The WhatsApp group is something to be brought to the attention of the teacher. We had this at my school and it was incorporated into our IT lessons of keeping safe online and cyber bullying. Parents were advised that their children were making groups and leaving people out.