"We don't want you to sit with us"

[challengerequired]

Is this ever an ok thing to say? When the student in question is just sitting quietly?
Head of Year thinks it's okay - "you can't force people to be friends"

My son has been completely isolated.

I changed his school. I told him that he isn't going to be everyone's cup of tea, and that's ok. I stepped up his appointments with his consultant to review his medication, and arranged appointments to assess and help with his social skills. I started him on golf lessons, and biking, where he could engage with other children in small doses.

So yes, been there, and that's what I did. And the results have been really positive.

What I didn't do, was try and force the school to make provisions to force children who simply don't like my son, to pretend to want to be around him. That's no solution for anyone.

@GlencoraP

To be fair the OP did say that he doesn’t have anywhere that he feels comfortable and has to wander at lunchtime on his own . That’s not acceptable.

I agree that the world cannot change for children with social difficulties and they have to learn to cope but I do think that people should learn to meet them halfway.

Surely we should strive for a better world rather than just accepting the ‘dog eat dog’ model. Would it be ok to ask someone to move because they were gay or trans or of a different ethnic background or because they had no limbs or were deaf; no it wouldn’t . But because their brain is wired slightly differently it’s suddenly ok to tell them to push off .

In my experience teens can be very empathetic and most will give you a lecture on the theory of inclusivity, surely this is a learning experience that inclusivity sometimes involves hard work or doing something which is difficult. It’s not just about talking the talk you have to walk the walk.

This!

@TwinsAndTrifle

My son has been completely isolated.

I changed his school. I told him that he isn't going to be everyone's cup of tea, and that's ok. I stepped up his appointments with his consultant to review his medication, and arranged appointments to assess and help with his social skills. I started him on golf lessons, and biking, where he could engage with other children in small doses.

So yes, been there, and that's what I did. And the results have been really positive.

What I didn't do, was try and force the school to make provisions to force children who simply don't like my son, to pretend to want to be around him. That's no solution for anyone.

Well not all children are on medication. Golf isn’t necessarily something that is available to everyone (quite expensive is my understanding- perhaps I’m wrong)

You done what you felt was right and that’s completely understandable. You’re right that you can’t change others so you made decisions based around that and I’m pleased it worked for you.

But the bigger issue is children with SEN should have alternative provisions made for them if they/parents want that. Because being isolated seems to be a huge issue with these children

Twins you are right and we did all those things as well . But you know when they grow up and start work you can’t do that , and I could write pages on what happens then . My son is now pretty successful in a good job where his team not only tolerate some of his differences but embrace them. In turn the fact that they have done this means that he has grown in confidence and his ‘difference’ is barely noticeable.
Society has to start to accommodate difference , life isn’t standard , people don’t come as prepackaged brands . In life NT people will have to work with many different people , they might just be difficult or they might not be NT, but you can’t just refuse to work with them because they think a bit differently to you. As a society we cannot just ditch everyone who thinks or acts differently from the norm, it be a huge waste of talent and we will be the poorer for it

@GlencoraP

Twins you are right and we did all those things as well . But you know when they grow up and start work you can’t do that , and I could write pages on what happens then . My son is now pretty successful in a good job where his team not only tolerate some of his differences but embrace them. In turn the fact that they have done this means that he has grown in confidence and his ‘difference’ is barely noticeable. Society has to start to accommodate difference , life isn’t standard , people don’t come as prepackaged brands . In life NT people will have to work with many different people , they might just be difficult or they might not be NT, but you can’t just refuse to work with them because they think a bit differently to you. As a society we cannot just ditch everyone who thinks or acts differently from the norm, it be a huge waste of talent and we will be the poorer for it

Another spot on post

I've seen this sort of situation from all sides as a form tutor. It's a tricky one because nobody should be unpleasant, and nobody should be saying who can sit in empty chairs in the dining hall, but equally the students are in Year 9 and it's also understandable if a group of friends want to have their group of friends together at lunch without anyone extra (SEN or no SEN).

If the school are failing to adequately support your son then that needs raising, formally if need be, but it's not reasonable to expect school to dictate teen friendship groups because one student wants to join a group. It's not unreasonable for a group of friends to want a moment in the school day to catch up with their friends over lunch.

@Wearywithteens

“I am shocked by the number of parents on this thread saying it’s fine for their popular children and their friends to be so rude and unpleasant to another child, instead of teaching them kindness and tolerance.”

My dd was considered ‘popular’ at secondary school - she left several years ago but people still talk about her with envy as being beautiful and popular. She, however, was dealing with psychological bullying, constant hate, death threats and people would fabricate things she’d said and done just to create drama and ramp up the hatred for her. She didn’t tell us at time so we had no idea that the threat was so bad she had to go and sit by herself with her form tutor at lunchtimes for months because it involved a significant amount of the year group. She was terrified to take a pencil out of her pencil case in lessons in case just making a simple movement would lead the teacher to speak and she’d have more jeers and hate of ‘attention seeking’. We didn’t know at the time but she has admitted she considered suicide.

The reason I say all this is because I think many posters on this thread have, quite rightly, centred the Op’s child as being the victim of ‘unkindness’ but very few if you have any idea how brutal secondary school is for most kids. The peer pressure, the social media pressure, the need to appear ‘in control’ etc. You have no idea what this group of young people are dealing with themselves, and whether having to encompass another student with his own challenges is just a step too far for them. The OP’s son, as sad as it is, clearly has social difficulties - it’s not just this small group that have rejected him. They’re just the ones put in a position to have to be honest about it.

Horrific for your DD absolutely horrendous. With that, I don’t think it’s the sand kind of situation.

Sounds like they were jealous to death of your daughter though, which sounds like a separate issue. Perhaps because she was beautiful? Who knows. Receiving death threats etc is way over the realm of typical experiences of teenagers I would say.

I'm really sorry, I wish everyone was nice and kind. But people aren't, children are so direct too. No one can make them be nice to your child and include him. They don't want him sitting with them. Perhaps he's talking about things they're not interested in? I would suggest he goes to the sens area at lunch time. But in my experience they're even more direct! Most fall outs among students have been in the sens break room!

same

Sorry, but I think it's incredibly rude and borderline bullying.
Groups don't own the canteen, if there is a chair they sit down where there is space. Tough luck if others don't like it.

"In life NT people will have to work with many different people , they might just be difficult or they might not be NT, but you can’t just refuse to work with them because they think a bit differently to you."

School is not adult life. In adult life you might not get to choose your colleagues specifically, but in general terms you do. And if they are awful or just not your cup of tea, there is the possibility of moving jobs. Most awkward teenagers find their place later in life because they can gravitate to a field that suits them. I certainly did. But school is hard for kids, all of them, because they are thrown together in a highly regimented environment, with a pretty limited choice of friends, and all of them with immature ways of dealing with life. I'm not that surprised I didn't fit in at school - I was intense, highly academic, socially awkward, insecure, and quite chippy as a result. I wouldn't have wanted to be friends with teenage me! As an adult I have matured socially, had the edges knocked off me, and found friends who appreciate me for who I am. And because we aren't compulsorily thrown together from 9-3.30 every day, I have friends from all walks of life, including those who would not have looked twice at me at school, and vice versa! Inclusivity in adult life looks so very different to at secondary school. Your DS will most likely find his place eventually.

So @LolaSmiles if they didn’t want somebody to sit with them because they were of a different ethnic background or because they were of a different sexual orientation would the school tolerate that ? I understand the friendship point but it does seem to me that you can’t insist on inclusivity on one characteristic and not another . Either you promote inclusivity or you don’t.

So @LolaSmiles if they didn’t want somebody to sit with them because they were of a different ethnic background or because they were of a different sexual orientation would the school tolerate that ? I understand the friendship point but it does seem to me that you can’t insist on inclusivity on one characteristic and not another Either you promote inclusivity or you don’t

If it was "we don't want you to sit here because of your race /sexuality/SEN" then that would be rightly dealt with.

If it's a group of students who want to eat lunch with their friends and don't want one student always following them around and expecting to be part of the social group then they're well within their rights to.

It's secondary school are we're long past the point of teachers policing friendships. Inclusivity doesn't mean dictating that students must sacrifice time catching up with their friends because someone else wants to join the conversation.

That's an interesting point.

Throw it the other way. Should I have to sit each lunch time with someone I actively dislike and who irritates me, if they are "popular and beautiful", or am I ok to to have my boundary encroached every day because my discomfort doesn't matter as long as I'm inclusive. Or should I be able to say, no, I don't want to have lunch with you. And they can accept that, being "popular and beautiful"

Now what if this very irritating person is in a wheelchair. Do I have to allow them to irritate me, and encroach on my lunch every day, because if I don't, I'm not inclusive and now disablist to boot.

The fact is, you can be a lovely person with dsylexia, or a horrible person with dsylexia. A lovely person with ADHD, or a right git with ADHD. What's not ok, is not being able to say, "hey, that's horrible, I don't want to be your friend" to NT people, but not to Non NT. As I tell my son frequently, ADHD is not a get out of jail free card. Sometimes, you are not responsible for your actions, but for plenty of the time, you are.

My DS is wonderful. And frequently very irritating and repetitive. It's all part of his ADHD. If he'd decided to focus on one group of his peers, every day, knowing how intense he can be, when all they want to do is eat their lunch with their friends. Am I correct in the understanding that I should be up in arms about this nasty isolation when they tell him they want lunch in peace? That is not preparing him for the real world. Like it or not, that's how it is.

If another boy followed my DS around every lunch, not taking the hint, until my DS said, "no more!" I would be happy that DS stated his boundary. It's not the children's duty to placate this boy, or be deemed mean and non inclusive if they don't. SEN or not.

I can be precious about it, under the guise of a protective mother, and force an unnatural dynamic to exist, for his school years perhaps. Or, I can throw my energy into helping him grow better coping strategies, to become resilient, to focus on what he can achieve, and to ignore those who aren't his friends.

I spent enough time being the first type of mother. I had my time again, I wouldn't have made that mistake, but at least I've recognised it now and things are already moving in the right direction.

Yes, imagine a random work colleague coming up to you in a restaurant one evening where you're catching up with your best mates and expecting to join in - would you welcome them in to join you just because Inclusivity?! Would you heck. Everyone has the right to choose their friends. We expect more of teenagers than adults sometimes.

I dont understand why anyone would WANT their child to be tagging along when they're not wanted? Surely its better to be on ones own than that!

That's a really good post TwinsAndTrifle.

I think some people forget that secondary school is a stepping stone towards adulthood, so staff don't tend to do the equivalent of "But SoandSo wants to play with you you you should stop playing together and do something different".

Equally Mumsnet threads make me laugh because there's always dozens of posters who think the sun shines out their DCs, that their DC would always welcome everyone, their DC is inclusive, their is so nice unlike the other children who are mean, exclusionary, cliquey bullies for wanting to have lunch with their friends. In reality their DC is probably just like almost every other student in a secondary school: nice child, gets on with most people, isn't unpleasant to others, doesn't turn their nose up if another student or group of students sits near them, wants to get through their lessons and chat to their friends at lunch, catch up on their friends' private lives, find our who has a crush on who, share life's ups and downs, and generally get on with being a teenager with their mates.

@baldafrique

I get where OPs frustrations lie. It's hard when it's always your child that is left out. They don't fit it, and don't understand why. They're desperate for a friend. It's really hard.

I truly believe, however, OP is looking for a solution in the wrong place though. From hard learned experience. The focus needs to be on her DS and coping strategies/alternatives. This will not be the last "please, can you give us some space" her DS will hear in his life.

I don’t think that my children are perfect, far from it. I have dc at both ends of the spectrum and one in between. I am also fully aware that children are entitled to spend time with friends and that friendships can’t be forced but I also don’t think we should just accept the status quo. If we did that girls would still be having to move over for boys and it would be ok to discriminate for all sorts of reasons . You don’t have to accept someone sitting next to you for a few minutes a day that you don’t like but you should be encouraged to confront your reasons for that and to consider the wider implications. I don’t accept that the canteen is not school, school is where we learn a lot of our social skills and as such it’s a place were teenagers should be encouraged to think about these issues. They can freely socialise outside school. It’s interesting that these NT teens cannot be expected to feel even slightly uncomfortable for 30mins but the excluded child is fine to be uncomfortable all day.

Hear hear @GlencoraP

But he's not uncomfortable all day. Where's that come from?

OP says he chats to one of the boys in his physics lesson.

It’s interesting that these NT teens cannot be expected to feel even slightly uncomfortable for 30mins but the excluded child is fine to be uncomfortable all day

Literally no one has said that’s fine. Everyone has said that it should be a situation where everyone feels comfortable in an ideal situation. One child’s wants shouldn’t trump a whole group though.

Different situation as (I don’t believe) there was no SEND but, when we moved into secondary school, a lot of the parents from my class asked not to have their child put in a tutor group with one specific boy. This boy was disruptive and unkind to others and the parents felt that their children had had 7 years of it at primary school. The secondary school put him in a different tutor group. The boy’s dad kicked off at him being with none of his ‘friends’ so the school moved him back into their group. They then spent 5 more miserable years feeling uncomfortable. His needs - one child - were put before everyone else’s to make him comfortable.

Dear God, some of these replies are awful. Bloody heartbreaking for you and your child. I would not except this response from school; they have to look after his social needs along with his educational needs. Does he have an EHCP?

The kids were mean and need lessons on inclusivity but it’s unlikely to make a huge difference to your son at this stage.

Make a fuss, push the school to make some effort with buddying schemes, activities etc. You may find support if you look at charities that support his particular disability/need. Does he have any visiting professionals at the school that can support you?

I would also look at groups and activities outside of school that your child can practice their social skills, again charities are worth investigating.

Do not except this for your son and ignore the ignorant responses on this thread. Having a child with a SEN is a constant battle. Sending you strength and remember there are a lot of good, kind and accepting people in this world.

I agree with Glen too, it's a short time, your child isn't asking to be best buddies. I suspect this boy is the 'leader' of the group and I bet some in the group aren't bothered if he sits there or not, however aren't assertive enough to say. We are not raising our children, especially girls to be assertive enough imo. .

As an aside I wonder how the school would react if a disabled/trans/muslim pupil was told this? If the answer would be different then it's not on.