Not sure if this is the right place to post but it relates to school friends so here goes!
DS is in Yr 1. Class of 30 and a multi-form year. He’s been with many of the kids in his class since pre-school and they all moved up together. I do drop-off / pick-up about 50% of the week. I tend to arrive and drop, rarely get there very early. Throughout reception year a larger group of boys that DS was friends with seemed to split into a larger group of 6 or 7 and a smaller group of 3 with DS seeming to play across both groups but with his ‘best friend’ (mostly!) being a boy in the smaller group. DS is very sociable and always asks for play dates. At his request I’ve tried to arrange with some of the boys from the larger group throughout reception year and got nowhere. I also tried to arrange a couple of weekend / school holiday meet ups at organised activities or co-ordinate holiday club attendance but either their mums didn’t reply at all or said they’d let me know if they could make it and what their plans were but didn’t. The mums of all the boys in the larger group seem to have become more and more friendly over the year. The larger group of mums are there 50%+ and always get there early and chat for ages. They get there so early that I sometimes see them in the playground in the morning as I drop DS to breakfast club and they’re always at the front of the pick up line. I find it hard to join their conversations when we are all at the same after school activity once a week. I actually have reached the point of hating going along to it as I feel so isolated. But DS loves it so I carry on for him. I’m not a shy person and I have known a couple of the mums since pre-school and before but the group dynamic makes me feel excluded and at least one of the other mums regularly ignores me when passing at school. She also seems to discourage her child from chatting to mine outside school. She’s also just cut any conversation that my son has tried to make with her at school drop off or pick up too, sometimes quite rudely and with a tone of disinterest. I thought I was being too sensitive at first but it happened too many times for me not to think something is up. I don’t know what the issue is. She is well integrated into the larger group of mums. The boys in the smaller groups have had the odd play date with DS, at our house and at theirs, and their mums are generally friendly but are not at school as much as those in the smaller group, and they also have older children so have made friends with mums in the years above.
The way I see it, if I can be friends with DS’s schoolfriends mums then that’s a bonus. If we can just be polite enough to facilitate play dates between the kids that’s all that really matters. And at our school the kids stay with their class groups until they leave for secondary so having decent relationships with the parents of classmates feels important.
But what is bothering me is that DS has now said twice at least that the boy whose mum often ignores me and makes no effort to continue any conversation I try to start with her, has told my son ‘My mum says you’re a naughty boy. / My mum doesn’t like you.’ Do kids just say this stuff out of nowhere? Or am I right in thinking he’s most likely been given this message, whether directly or subtlety, by his mum. DS says he feels sad that his friend says this to him. Whether true or not, I don’t want this boy saying this about my son within earshot of other children. And if there is a problem with anything my son is doing or an issue between the kids I would like to know to try to resolve it.
What would you do in my shoes? Ignore completely? Wait and see? Speak to the teacher? Speak to the boy’s mum...? 😬
I never thought school age parenting would be so fraught. Maybe I need to get a thicker skin?! But DS. I feel for him and want to stand up for him.