No school playdates yet, feeling a bit sad for my DC

[Laradaniels]

DS is just finishing up year 1, he enjoys school and has school friends he sees at after school club three times a week and also attends a sports group twice a week with the same friends. He goes to birthdays etc but we've never really had a school playdate, is this weird? Im on a nod and quick hello with a few mums but that's it, I wouldn't really know any of them very well and feel bad now coming into the summer that he's never been to anyone's house or met up outside of organised school groups. Is this normal or should I be trying more with the other mums?

Have you invited any of his friends over? Be brave and ask someone.

Have you invited any kids home? You have to be pro active about it.

No haven't invited anyone, I suppose im a bit shy myself and haven't clicked with anyone. I have asked his best friends mum to meet at the park, both times she was busy and never came back to rearrange!

You have to be quite assertive with it. Is there a class group chat? Use that to get individual mums' numbers.

"Hi its George's mum! George was saying how much he enjoyed forest school with your Billy yesterday. I was thinking would you like to have a play date on Saturday in the park? He's got a new kite to try out"

Year 1 teacher

I think this is more and more the norm with most parents having to work. Children are in after school care or activities outside of school and parents rarely meet or spend much time together. Children are then often in holiday clubs over the holidays. It’s been a big shift in the last 10 years and certainly since when I started teaching.

You’re going to have to put yourself out there, text one of his friends’ mums and invite them to play at yours first.

Don't just go for his best friend, use a scattergun approach to basically every kid he mentions.

Unfortunately you can’t expect paydates to happen if you don’t do anything about it.

At that age you’re in charge of facilitating your kid’s social life (or not). Be proactive :)

And I'd invite the mum as well the first time because (personally) I wouldn't drop and go if I haven't been into the house myself

Aw I agree, it’s sad isn’t it. I have memories of after school play dates all the time (though maybe I’ve exaggerated the regularity in my head) but my mum worked very very part time and almost never in the afternoons, and several of my friends mums either didn’t work or worked school hours.

i only have 1 day off in the week to do school pick up for my reception child and we’ve packed that with 2 different clubs as she can’t go to anything else in the week except after school club til 6pm. Weekends are equally packed with clubs/parties/housework/family days out. We’ve had 2 play dates on a Saturday afternoon since September, both with at least 8 weeks notice to arrange haha.

I agree you have to put yourself out there and invite people. And then repeat a few weeks later - people forget to follow up!

Well, obviously you need to ask someone to come and play, come for tea. That’s normal.

Very normal imo, as the teacher PP above mentioned. If it bothers you by all means try to arrange something, but don’t feel that it’s anything about your son - people are busy, working FT, using wraparound care or grandparents. It can be nearly impossible to fit playdates in.

You don't have to click with anyone. Ask ds who he'd like to invite for tea. Then ask the mum/ dad in the playground and say you'll pick up after school and they can collect after tea at 6 or they can come for a cuppa if they'd rather. They'll be delighted to have a couple of hours to themselves and hopefully return the favour.

Okay, this is the problem. No point feeling sad, you need to kick it off. I found putting a note for the parent for my child to give to their friend helped, as obviously lots of parents work and aren’t on the school run. Something like ‘John would love to have Peter round to play at our house, if Peter would like this, please drop me a text on…many thanks…’ It worked. I host a lot, but never after school because of work, I think it definitely helps friendships.

This is a good plan.

You haven’t invited anyone over so I don’t think you can be sad that everyone else is doing the same as you! I think these days just more parents work and kids do more activities so it can be difficult to actually find the time.
But if you do want to kick things off then great! By Y1 I’d expect playdates to be unaccompanied so you would pick both kids up from school and then their mum would collect after tea. Just ask your DS who he’d like to invite, find the parent’s number on the class chat and send them a message inviting their DC for tea and suggest days where you can pick up at the normal time. The great thing about the kids getting older is that you don’t necessarily need to click with the parents! His best friend’s mum may not have been enthusiastic about hanging around a park with another mum she barely knows, especially if there are siblings with their own stuff going on, but hopefully she’ll be receptive to you having him over for tea. Good luck!

A play date not involving parents being there will normally be much more popular - unless a child has anxiety I guess. Try inviting for tea.

I don’t think play dates are all that common now, with afterschool care, clubs, older/younger siblings and longer working hours more and more people are doing their own thing.

invite a kid over after school to be picked up at 5pm or just take yours to the park at weekends.

It's increasingly normal as the teacher PP mentioned. So many parents are so busy balancing work, childcare, family time, house chores and keeping up with their own families that there is little space for playdates.

I have 2 friends who are experiencing similar. At this age playdates are usually meet ups with other mums. I am very lucky, I work very part time, term time only so I've had a lot of time to build friendships with other mums and put myself out there. There are some mums I can do drop and go with as I've known them 2 years now.

It's very much a game of getting yourself out there. As much as MN hates class parties, soft play and class WhatsApp these are the ways to meet other mums and start playdates. For example on our class WhatsApp this weekend we've had a couple of mums posting "hi everyone we are going to park/soft play on x day if anyone wants to join?" There are about 10 other mums and myself planning to join on both days. I'm on nodding terms with a couple of the mums going and do chat to the other mums and having gone to these sorts of things before I know we will all get chatting. It's all about been open. Something cheap/ free always gets a decent amount of attendance.

At this age, honestly, a lot of parents are burnt out with having to make small talk with other parents. I wouldn’t invite anyone over if I thought they might stay and chat. When the kids get a bit older, it’s much more obvious it’s drop and run, but Y1 is still a grey area. Best thing you can do if you want play dates is to make yourself free childcare. Offer to have their dc over and say you’re happy to even collect them from school and they can come to yours. Or now it’s half term, so offer to have a friend over for the afternoon to give their parent a break to go do something else.

The thing is, I don't think all mums are happy to drop their child with you, if they don't know you well.

So reception/year 1 is your window to do play dates (or joint days out) where both mums stay, so you get to know them. Then after a few joint hangouts they'll drop and go.

This is the impression I get with how it works with the families at dd's school, anyway.

I have a colleague whose daughters are 9 and 6 and they have never done a drop off play date!

I agree @Laradaniels it's really hard matching up schedules.

I work 4 days a week but my DH, although working 5 days a week, is often home from lunchtime as he does early shifts. We're both around at weekends, ds isn't in wraparound and we are not using holiday clubs (yet, he's in reception) as we're not sure how he'd get on, he has some additional needs.

But it's really hard to arrange anything. People are either on holiday or working we tend to find.

That being said it's never going to happen if you don't put yourself out there! Make an effort to chat at the school gates, get on the class WhatsApp and use it to message individual parents where you know your kids are friends and suggest a meet up.

My ds has a birthday really close to Christmas so his "party" was deliberately really small, which was fine... But we put some money aside and hired a bouncy castle for a day in the Easter holidays and sent out some texts, just called it a garden party and ended up with about 7 kids bounding around and looking for eggs while us parents actually got to sit in the garden and chat a bit picking at the food everyone had bought over!

If he’s in ASC 3x a week that’s really most people’s allotted playdate time used up – are the sports clubs the other two afternoons or on the weekend?

We’ve found that play dates are quite rare after nursery and reception – everyone’s in ASC at least one day, or with grandparents who don’t want to take on the additional burden, or if picked up from school then onto swimming/dance/whatever. Even with best friends the schedules just don’t coincide and when you factor in siblings – not everyone has the right car seats to get two school-age kids home, or it’s a pain to juggle picking up from a play date and nursery if you’ve got a set routine, blah blah – it’s one of those “we should arrange that” things that never happens. Like adults saying “we should do this more often!”

In spring/summer/autumn we just head to the playground closest to school and there’s usually an assortment of friends there, and DD counts it as a play date. We’ve also had luck with spontaneous offers but that’s with parents I know well – eg if they’re heading off to do the big shop I’m always happy to take a kid off their hands so they can do it solo, I get the benefit of DD occupied with a friend. But we only got there by actively befriending, hosting birthday parties, arranging outings, group play dates at our house, back when it was easier at nursery or over school holidays. So now the house and snacks have been vetted

This. Just invite children your child likes over after school. I didn’t know any of the parents as I worked FT, but would rearrange things periodically to be able to do school pick up. After an initial coffee so they can check their child has settled and that you’re not a serial killer, mostly they were happy for me to pick up from school on subsequent dates.