What do most Year 7s do after school and at weekends?

[ZanyGoldFish]

This thread is probably going to sound so lame but I just don’t know where else to get some advice from.

What do 11/12 year olds get up to after school? Do they chat to their friends every night after school and also meet up on a weekend?

So my DS started year 7 in September with a great group of friends, who he went all through primary with. He is also friends with lots of other kids in his year and is happy, seems confident and doing well at school.
For years now, probably about 5, as soon as he came in from school he would be straight on the phone to these friends, sometimes one - sometimes more and they would chat and game for most of the night.
Since starting high school, it’s all kind of dwindled away…it’s gone quiet, no one seems to ring or text him to play and he now comes in and either just sits on his phone or is doing some homework and when I ask him if he’s going on his PS or maybe playing out, he’s just like no. I feel like he doesn’t seem to want to make an effort with anyone. I’ve asked him if everything is ok and if they are all still friends and he says yes there’s no problems.
I’m worried that he’s not putting himself out there to speak to anyone and not getting involved. Logically, I know I’m probably totally over thinking all of it but I keep thinking it’s coming up to the holidays again and he’s not going to be speaking/meeting up with any of his friends.

I’m curious to know what other kids this age do? Am I just so used to him being on call to his friends and now actually they are a bit older and school is harder so they can’t be bothered when they get home?

@Iloveluna did you actually read what you quoted? To be clear…just because I said he had a PlayStation that doesn’t mean that is all he’s ever done. He can interact face to face with people of any age without any problems! My post is asking people what their year 7 children do after school?

At weekends rugby and football. During the week also training and doing other after school clubs. Evenings HW and then PlayStation with friends online for a bit before or after dinner.

Ds is Y7 and I was thinking similar to you. He plays football twice a week and it mates with a lot of boys in his team. He also does boxing twice a week. He games with school friends at weekend (no ps in the week) sometimes messages with friends on his phone. He has a great group of mates at school but doesn’t really see them out of school. I think it will come soon though…. He’s in quite a geeky/ quieter group rather than the rugby boy crew.
They all do it at their own speed my two older DDs hit year 7 and were off, I barely saw them they were always out and about.

So many judgy parents on here , pretty sure a lot of y7 upwards spend quite a bit of time on their phones and can happily socialise in real life too
my daughter is 14 loves her outside school life but also loves her FaceTime calls / gaming etc
some parents allow screen time, it’s all about balance

My year 7 does music one night after school and sports training one or two nights more. Different groups of friends at all activities. The other week nights are homework and music practice, then relaxing. About once a fortnight they make the evening meal. At weekends one day is usually music lesson plus sports training and homework, and on the other we visit family/do a different sport/explore.

‘So, if I understand this correctly, I’m going to repeat your very easy to understand post back to you and give you my sneery judgement instead of offering any advice’

@Worrieddancemum ah it can be so worrying! Does she do things outside of school? Like a hobby? Do you know the friends parents and maybe ask them? I was going to do this but feel like they would think I was ridiculous😬
My DS is an only child so I don’t know if that makes a difference. He used to do football and a youth club on a Friday night but he lost interest in football and outgrew the youth club.

W

Not a lot, DD is year 8 and doesn't see friends outside of school much though I keep suggesting it every so often e.g going to town at the weekend. She swims for an hour one weekend morning where she had a few people she chats to, and does another activity on a Sunday morning though more ad-hoc as it run by volunteers. Otherwise she will call friends to play Roblox a few nights a week. One of her friends still goes to a childminder after school, and is fully booked with activities for a large part of the weekend. Occasionally available Saturday afternoons. Dd1 is year 10 and was similar she does a sport after school several times a week now so does get lots of social interaction there.

Mine are older but year 7 - usually came home after school in the week- would text friends or have a club at school after school. On weekends would have another club, see friends in the daytime. On Fridays after school they’d often go out w friends as they had an earlier finish. DS was a real gamer too on the PS at this point!
Year 7 was still a sociable year, I’d say year 8/9 was less so.

@slopeyj thank you! It’s my first time posting and I just was looking for a little bit of advice. I know I’m putting it out there and it’s open to opinion 😬

out with mates most evenings, or they all come over and hang out in the summer house. Except days they have sports club.

Yr 6 when they all started getting phones, they spent as much time as they could blathering on group calls or messaging in groups chats. That seems to have died right off now in yr 7 though, I think the novelty of having immediate access to friends to chat has worn off. Dd will send a few messages to a small group of friends between school finishing and her phone being put away for the evening but not loads. She spends her time crafting, doing homework, watching YouTube shorts, playing on the switch, reading etc at the moment but as soon as the weather gets warmer and the evenings lighter I expect her and her friends to be out hanging around or in the garden lounging in my hammock.

Is this not about the kids having smartphones? I saw a statistic that teenagers now spend 50% less time interacting fage to face with peers than they did 20yrs ago. Their social skills are being limited and they are being fed addictive content, it’s no wonder.

You said, for the last 5 years he’s come home and got on the PlayStation to talk to his friends and game. And now he’s in senior school he’s not doing that.

So I suggested, that perhaps it’s made it harder for him to make new senior school friends f2f if he’s just used to gaming with friends and chatting about gaming. Does he have other hobbies or things he’s interested in?

My kids were very like this in y7 and often still are a few years later. They are sociable, have friends and play sport. School days are full and busy - quiet downtime at home is no bad thing.

What else did he do in primary, what clubs? sports? Drama? Art?

Dd is year 8, she too had a fairly big group of friends in primary school most of them are her half of the year but a few got sent to the other half. Apart from about 3 she’s not close with a lot of them anymore, she’s made a new group now. Year 7 she only went out a few times during the summer etc, would be on a lot of FaceTime calls though. Now even though she’s on a call with sometimes up to about 10 people everyday (not an exaggeration) she’s been going out to the park everyday after school for the last 2 weeks. Your DS will get there, it’s a right of passage. Year 7 is always difficult as you desperately try to hold on to friendships whilst kinda making new ones and it’s tough to work through.

@Iloveluna but you’ve picked up on the PlayStation thing and I was asking what kids do now in year 7 after school and weekends. I was only giving a bit of background history, didn’t realise I had to give a whole life story of everything he’s ever done since he was 6. To be honest the PlayStation thing was a way of keeping in touch with his mates during lockdown. Not one person can really say that’s a bad thing, seeing as you couldn’t meet up with people. He’s got no problems making friends, I said in my post he’s got lots of friends. He done after school clubs in primary, went to football on the weekend but gave it up after he suffered a foot injury and once/twice a week will go to the gym now. He doesn’t have any problems making friends and can speak to people of any age. I’m just a bit worried that all the after school chatting/ playing out seems to have dwindled…
Maybe if your child hasn’t ever done that you don’t get what I mean.

My DS is an only child and in Y7 and in a similar situation. He had a small group of great friends in primary - lots of playdates (for want of a better word), sleepovers, time together. And then he started secondary school and it's completely changed. He only has one of his original friends in his secondary school class and I think he has made a group of new friends (I think a lot of the boys in DS's class are quite loud and bantery, whereas DS is quite shy and geeky).

So of an evening he goes on his phone/laptop for a bit, watches TV with us, draws, reads, writes stories. He also plays sport two nights a week. But he seems happy enough and is heavily involved in a school activity as well which he seems to be making friends through. I think Y7 is a really hard year for some as friendships form and re-form and everyone adjusts. And new friendships can take time to bed in until they spill over into outside school. Plus a lot of children have activities and other commitments after school.

Lockdown? That was 6 years ago? My daughter is yr 6 and she was in reception during the first lockdown. So it doesn’t make sense. Unless all the year 1s were on PlayStation all the time.

My year 7 hangs out with his mates til around 5ish - usually kicking a football round or in kfc. He has football three evenings a week, scouts and guitar so he’s home in time to get changed for those. There is a lot of phone/chatting but also homework and activities so balance wins

Agreed. I found yr7 awful. It wasn’t until the end of yr 8 that I found my place. Then I never looked back

@Bedtimetime exactly this! Thank you! I think just assumed because they were all so close in primary that it would carry on the same. He has mentioned new friends at school, so maybe I should just give him some time.

It's really hard because obviously we want to see them in a situation similar to primary school, but I think for some children it can just take longer for friendships to form - might be the dynamics of the class, the children's availability... anything. Like I said, my DS is shy and geeky and a real rule follower but in a class where most of the boys are louder and more boisterous - nothing wrong with either personality type but it just means my DS struggles to make friends with them. He has found a school activity where the kids are more like him, but even that will take time.

The main thing I think is, is your DS happy with the situation? If he is then (as hard as it is, and trust me, I know it's hard 😂) the best thing is to leave him to it. It'll sort itself out eventually, even if it looks different from primary school - the main thing is he is happy and knows he can talk to you if there are any issues preventing friendships like bullying or something?