My son has no friends

[lifesteeth]

My son (8) has no friends at school, ever since he started the nursery at 3 he was excluded from the boys' social circles but I thought things would change as they got older. They havn't however and now even the kids that my DS consider to be "friends" refuse to play with him, tell him to "go away" or simply run away from him when he approaches them. I have no idea why he is treat like this, he's not a 'laddish' boy so maybe this all they need to exclude him but his school life is resembling mine so much that I'm starting to find it all very upsetting.

All the school say is "we can't force the others to play with him" etc...today at break time he walked around the playground on his own and at dinner time he did the same occasionally running over to play with people who then ran away or ignored him.

What can I do if anything? is this likely to continue all through school? will it change when they hit seniors or get worse??

This might post twice as I have just tried and it didn't work - but have you tried contacting KIDSCAPE? It is a charity that offers lots of support and advice, including weekend activities and workshops, counselling etc for children experiencing bullying.

It might be cohort dependent, especially if he’s in a one form entry school. We’ve had a group who’ve just left Year 6 this summer who were just hideous. The boys were this gang if hooligans, for want of a better word, and soundly excluded the two boys who they considered to be not part of the pack. The girls were just as bad to be honest, though sadly they also ignored these two boys.

Our headteacher spent seven long years dealing with this, but tbh the issue was the parents of the pack leaders; they themselves were excusing behaviour, sometimes actively encouraging it and, in the case of harassment via WhatsApp, refusing to comply with things like device bans following serious sanctions at school.

One of the boys eventually banded together with some of the quieter girls and made some firm friends. As a teaching body we watched the other boy like a hawk and encouraged him to make friends with children in other year groups, let him stay in to do jobs at break etc. He wasn’t bullied as such once we got a handle on it, but he had no friends outside of school, wasn’t ever invited to parties or play dates or WhatsApp groups and the parents refused to engage with his mum on the playground.

His mum refused to move him because the schools in other villages are CofE and she felt they couldn’t cater for her Wiccan beliefs well enough. However, she did agree to go for a different secondary, so we’re hoping he makes friends there.

Children can be bloody horrible, but IME if parents aren’t sanctioning/are encouraging the behaviour, there’s little a school can do to force proper friendships.

I hope you get this sorted OP.

This thread is from 2007. It's all very sad though, I wonder how the boy is getting on now? Hope he's happy and life is going ok for him! He'll be 23 now!