Moving Secondary schools in y8 yay or nay?

[ExtrovertedIntrovert1]

Hi all,

My lovely daughter is begging me to move schools.

The school she is at now is great. It's a very well regarded school with good results, great pastoral team and it's only a few minutes walk away. It's perfect and the reason why we moved to the house we live in.

She is doing very well academically, come on loads since primary. The school have also been great when various issues have cropped up regarding extra bits of help she has needed.

So she suffers with social anxiety and struggles to make friends or go places. She's so quiet, almost mute. She has made one or two friends but cannot cope in large groups so the friendships broke down when the friends wanted to hang out in groups rather than 1 on 1 (as they seem to do in y7!).

Unfortunately she is ending y7 as a complete loner. She spends break times and lunch alone. She does have somewhere to go (on a computer) and is fine on her own in terms of she stays occupied, but she's very very sad, probably bordering on depression.

She is begging me to move schools. She thinks that all friendships have been solidified now and it's too late for her. She is the quiet weird one who nobody wants to be friends with.

All schools in the surrounding area are over subscribed so it would be a case of adding her to a waiting list rather than moving her. But has anyone moved their child for the reason of shyness/no friends? She feels she wants a fresh start and I completely understand that but it also seems a shame when she goes to and school thats so good and has offered so much help. (Also I'm not sure she would be any different at another school!)

Was also interested to know how it works. Do children normally get to visit or spend a day there before you add them to waiting lists? Or is it a case of adding them and then visiting if and when a place comes up?

Hi,

Sorry to hear your child is struggling. It's so sad to see your kid with no friends.

In our situation we decided the best thing was to stay.

I'm not sure this was the correct decision.
She did make a couple of friends but subsequently lost them when they all fell out so we are still back at square one.

Her mental health deteriorated so much she became seriously ill and currently isn't attending school.

In our position we would have been sending her to a school further away so it was a harder decision, and the school she is at is good for SEN etc.

Does your child accept any help? Mine doesn't so it could be the most SEN helpful school in the UK but it would be pointless for us because my child refuses to accept she needs any help or accommodations.

I'm just wondering whether you child needs/accepts the pastoral support that is offered at the current school? If it has been helpful that's a consideration when moving.

Looking back, I would have probably taken her to look at different schools. I'm not sure it would have helped us but I do wish I had looked at it more than I did. I think it's definitely worth taking your child for a look round.

You say the school is good pastorally, so see if they have a learning mentor who could create a group session for her with some of the girls that she likes (3 to 5 other children). I taught a boy who didn't like football and as a result had no friends. The learning mentor created a group for him and taught them to play 4 square and did other activities with them and the change was dramatic. The friendships developed and he became a different child. I remember telling his dad, with a big smile, that I had had to reprimand his son for chatting in class. This was in year 6 btw, so primary but not much younger.

@ExtrovertedIntrovert1 thank you so much for replying. I’m so sorry to hear how badly your daughter has suffered. It’s so hard if they won’t accept help you must feel completely helpless.

in our case, the school seem genuinely baffled and have no idea what to do. I would say intervention has honestly been quite minimal, which is another reason im not sure it’s worth it to stay, despite their caring nature. My DD did have one friend, which is why they maybe thought things were fine, but this girl really sought my daughter out as she is vulnerable and soon dropped her for others. This is one of those things I know, but my daughter has been devastated by it. She isn’t invited to socialise outside of school at all.

sadly the local secondary school is full and we are second on the waiting list. I have no idea how long we’ll be waiting and that’s what’s killing me I think. My dd wants to go even though we know the support might not be as good. However, she really isn’t receiving that much where she is if I’m completely honest. It all tends to be reactive rather than proactive.

I really hope you find a solution for your daughter. How old is she now? If this next secondary doesn’t help I think we are going to opt for an online school such as Minerva. I’ll have to go back to work full time to afford it though!

That sounds lovely, but once girls (I'm generalising here) get to a certain age (11, 12, 13) this just doesn't seem to work. Our school offered a similar sort of thing. Cue "nope, I'm not doing that, you can't make me, I'm not being FORCED to be friends with random people, if people don't actually want to be friends with me why would I... That's just embarrassing, everyone will think I'm weird....Etc etc" this is especially true of some ND or anxious/avoidant kids.

I think if she isn't actually accepting the help that's available that changes things because in our experience that won't change as they get older... If anything it will get worse, so they may as well just go to whichever school they want to and added bonus if there are kids she might get on with and hang around with..

there's also a change she might meet people walking to/from school of it's close enough to walk, and it may be easier to socialise... E.g hang around after school at each others houses. It never quite happened with us but she has talked to kids to/from school.

Good luck getting a place. Second on the list isn't too bad. I would think it's not really rare for people move or decide to home school so hopefully a place will become available soon. There is also a chance that the person who is first on the list might not want a place when it comes up.

My Y7 DD who sounds similar and does have an autism diagnosis was feeling like this earlier in the year and then school supported her to join a club and this has made a difference... She was adamant she didn't want to go to anything to start with but she now goes to Anime and then went with kids from there "Geek Meet" which is dungeons and dragons and Pokémon etc. she's found a bit of a tribe and finds things a bit easier... To get her to go, the school asked one of the older kids in the club to meet her and take her which I think worked well because it wasn't me or a teacher telling her to go

@ExtrovertedIntrovert1 I totally agree with your response there. My dds school have offered to facilitate a ‘ice breaker’ game between her and some girls in the Sen area that are excluding her at break times. My DD isn’t enthusiastic as they’ve made it clear they don’t like her. And honestly? I can’t expect her to join in, I wouldn’t in the same position. It sounds kind of humiliating. That said, she will go along with these things, but she knows they won’t work so she does find it rather pointless. In that respect I guess you could say she will and she won’t accept help.

I suspect we’ll end up in totally the same position locally but at least she can build a bit of a life for herself alone, and she’s happy with that as the bare minimum. She’s hoping for friends obviously, but I’ve tried to manage expectations. This is by far the worst parenting stage for me. This past year has been one of the hardest of my life and I actually think it’ll get much worse as she gets older.

I hope you find a resolution for your daughter too so that she can return to education. Life for young people these days seems truly brutal.

@clareykb my DD has joined clubs throughout the year and does attend one outside of school but sadly it’s the same story. She can rub along with others fine but they don’t want to socialise with her or get to know her any better.

Clubs are great as they keep them busy, give them somewhere to go so they aren't alone etc, but I think there has to be some sort of spark of interest to get them to agree. Unfortunately we don't have any special interests (or none general enough that would be able to become a club). The idea of another kid taking them is a good one though, rather than a teacher and feeling "forced".