How can we help a lonely Year 7 girl build friendships?

[OneShyQuail]

Apologies if in the wrong thread, admin please move if needed.

It is regarding friendships for young people.

I am a teacher and am trying to help/advise a girl in Year 7 - she is 12 (13 in October)

She is a lovely girl, great manners, works hard, achieves well academically and helps her peers, and her hobby is acting (goes to a class on a saturday) She isnt sporty at all.
This is how I perceive her at school.
She however is really lacking good friends. She isnt picked on, and has some friends in class, but they are already paired up or in small groups so whilst they will talk to her to pass the time of day or work with her in class, at lunch she is usually alone. Bless her she will try and speak to girls (and boys to be fair) some are polite, others ignore or are very sassy.

She has taken a part in the school play so coming in at lunch times to practice lines and she has been talking to me about her sadness and loneliness. She has a phone (with just WhatsApp on) and has some friends on there but says they only message if she messages and no one invites her to do anything. If she asks to meet up (as she says her parents are happy to give her lifts to places or have people over) they say they are busy or another excuse.

She has had chats with her mum, who has also noticed socially she is lonely and she says her mum is supportive and trying to help too.

I really feel for her, its like shes out of place, has anyone else experienced this with their children? Or if you work in a school with students there? If so, what helped? Any advice? Any tips, things I could suggest?

She says the few close friends she had at primary school arent close anymore (they were all split up when they moved up) as it was a very small village school and where they have made new friends she hasnt.

Thanks all

Hi,
I don't really know how to help her make friends but I would make sure that she knows she is ok that there is nothing wrong with her, and that she feels supported. It's so hard not to have a low self esteem especially at that age when you have no friends. She sounds amazing. Sometimes it's the best ones get rejected. I don't know why. Maybe as a teacher you could couple her with some of the nicer kids in group activities?

Thank you for replying. Yes I do this in class, but its just surface level stuff, not developing a friendship.
I agree with the support and that theres nothing wrong with her, thank you 😊

I’m also a teacher and have teen daughters- in my experience kids have quite fixed ideas about friendships/feel like friendship groups are settled and they can’t join/move around, even though we obviously know as adults that teenage friendships often change a lot. I think suggesti things like trying to take it to the next ‘level’ with current friendships, eg someone she gets on with in class - she could say hi when she sees them in the corridors, chat about tv/music, suggest swapping numbers or meeting up at break to hang out.

It's hard when a child hasn't found their tribe yet 😕 are there any lunchtime clubs that you could encourage her to attend? What about asking her to help you organise a fundraising charity event - you could get together a little committee and have them work together on it as a project (maybe a talent show/fashion show/litterpicking/funrun). Usually when children are working together on a project and meeting regularly for a while, they can hit it off and find some common ground.

I was very much like her at school, I said hello to everyone, never bullied but never anyones friend. I really started making friends around late teens/early twenties. Fast forward 40 years and I still have those friends and lots more from along the way. Tell her not to be disheartened she will find her tribe hopefully through acting, I think a few of us have been in that position as a teenager x

First of all you sound a bloody lovely teacher!
My DS was the same and a cliche as it is clubs do work for making friends. Does she have an interest is something like crafting or art? I am thinking something like a knit and natter type of club or therapeutic colouring. Learning support run board games clubs in my DS school at lunchtime that non SEN can attend if they are at a loose end.
It is also worth encouraging her to make friends with different year groups in clubs as there could be some lovely potential friends in the same position. My DS now has a mix of friends over different year groups snd in September there will be a new intake loads of which will be wanting to make new friends. Also I am sure you know there are often fallouts after Year 7 so there will be plenty of kids at a loose end I reckon.

Thank you, really appreciate your response. I remember having only a few close girl friends from y7 onwards, the rest were lads which suited me! Its different now as the boys in her class and year dont seem to want friends, just girlfriends which she isnt interested in

She took part in a science experiment snow with another girl in her class, they do seem to get on well from what I can see but the girl I made this post about said she doesnt want to meet up with her out of school.
Thank you for the suggestions, yes it is sad, I hope she finds one as she gets older, I would have loved a friend like her in Y7!

Thank you for your honest reply. Can I ask how you made those friends in your older teen years and how you felt when you were younger not having those close friends relationships? What would have helped you in that time?
Sorry to pry, if its painful please dont feel the need to answer x

Thank you for saying that. I really appreciate it. I really see teaching as a passion, not just about the academic side but pastoral too, so try to help where i can, especially if young people are comfortable talking to me.

Yes, she has a friend in Y8 I have seen her with at lunch occassionally but the lunches are staggered so not a lot of time together, so she is clearly trying to be social etc
I will look at some other clubs at lunch and make suggestions/encouragement, thanks again!

I get it that lunchtimes are staggered. Is there any way that you could wangle an early pass for her and her Year 8 friend? Xx

I think quite a lot of kids are only socialising on their phone. My dd also year 7 and hasn't had any out of school socialising, the summer 6 weeks will be lonely. She attends several school clubs, goes to the friendship clubs because she doesn't have a "group or special friend", and has met lovely people through that, but it hasn't developed into any interaction beyond that.

On the plus side, the girl the thread is about has the freedom to do the things she wants to do (acting), and make friends along the way. She isn't held back by a friendship group who don't want to do that/ can't audition because the group don't want too.

what a lovely reach out by you OP.

im a eyfs teacher but in a similar situation with my dd year 8and just yesterday had dd in tears saying she is lonely and although she has friends at school, she is a bystander friend and not invited out with term, though they meet up, and if dd asks to hang out after school they all say they can’t. She changed friendship groups several times and not finding her tribe yet!

I’ve messaged her tutor and sendco as she’s AuDHD, so seeing if they can provide any support and all the advice I give, I get teenagers don’t do that now!!

I’m late diagnosed AuDHD. I strongly suspect DD is too. I advised her to do what worked for me - get into extracurricular activities. I don’t find it easy to make friends so this really helped. Common interests are where we found our people. DD is in year 8 now and has found lovely, quirky friends. They’ve started socialising, parties, days out in town, study sessions (!) in the last year as well.
I agree you sound like a lovely teacher.

I will ask her HoY tomorrow when I see her, thank you for the suggestion, it really helps to have an outside perspective for ideas!

Very interesting to hear this, thank you. I wonder if you are local....they could meet up! :)
I really feel like she would just love a close friend or two, she would be very loyal. I do wonder if it is because she is quite empathetic and kind, and seems unable to be sassy (hate that word but unsure how else to describe it when girls can be quite mean and derogatory to others) its just not in her nature and I wonder if this is why as well.

I hope your dd is doing ok and has a lovely summer

I was like this, the teachers said go find the weird kids who don’t fit in well. Had a group of 20 of us, we’re all still friends 20 odd years later!

Ah so sorry to hear about your dd, I truly hope she is doing ok. It must be so hard when you just want a couple of loyal friends. If you are in the same area to us it would be handy, this girl and your dd could meet up!

She definetly is a physically social person, rather than an online/phone person, she is very chatty and good conversationally which must come from the acting!

Thank you for the kind words, I do love my job and helping young people where I can, the world is so tough for them now isnt it

She says she has friends at the acting school but only sees them there. I think she'd love to meet up with them out of the school setting but perhaps difficult to facilitate. Will ask her if this is something her parents could maybe look at facilitating. Thank you 😊
Glad to hear your daughter found her tribe!

😂 love this, probably not as diplomatic as I need to put it nowadays but you are spot on. Its funny really because if you look at stereotypes (which i know we shouldn't but we all do) she should by rights be in with the sassy girls based on her looks, but has lots of quirks to her personality which make her not fit there, and she isnt exactly "wierd" using your word either, or "nerdy" as it was called in my day at school 😂

my dd is into her acting

Gosh they sound like each other's cup of tea! What area of the country are you?

OP, could you suggest she looks for someone else in her year who seems to be in the same position and actively makes friends with her? I bet it isn't just her. Could you sell it to her that she could stop other people feeling like this? Sometimes when you have a role and a purpose it makes it easier to approach others.

Year 7 is tough, socially. I think my DD, now Y9, is much better at meeting up after school than she was, and she has lots of friends but there still seem to be some solid rules about who you can hang out with outside school, according to her teen logic. She will describe some people as friends in school but not out of school. Her social circle really widened with extra curricular activities in school: school play, orchestra, sports teams. The next school play sounds like it would be a good fit for this girl.

notts

Ill message you, if thats ok?