Friendships and starting secondary school

Spendless

You couldn't ask for children to be kept together when son went to Secondary school only asking for ones to be kept apart, which I did with a child he had clashed with throughout the Junior school years. They also do the majority of lessons with the form for yr7 and only maths and English by ability until yr 8 when the majority are ability based. Son ended up in a class where 7 kids had come from the same Primary as him but 5 were girls, the only other boy, he'd never had anything to do with (his Primary year had over 80 kids in it so easy to not 'know' someone) and lived in a different area to us. It made yr 7 incredibly difficult for son and I do wish he'd had a friend with him, so tough choice to make. I think for that reason I'd go with MrCow's suggestion, keep them together, but not sat together (if you can). Good luck. I shall have a similar dilemma next year for my dd.

Savvy_Sue

It's a while ago, but I asked for DS1 to be with a friend he'd made at junior school: they'd never actually been in the same class, but had linked up at playtime. Since DS1 had always struggled with friendships I was really happy to think they might start secondary school together. DS1's friend's parents also said they'd like their son to be with DS1.

Everyone happy, right? No. Some other mother who had NOT asked for her child to be with DS1's friend found out they wouldn't be together, and decided she wanted her child to be with DS1's friend. She got onto the secondary school, the school changed everything around, and DS1 was on his own again.

I was, to put it mildly, angry. I didn't see why MY child, who had NEVER had a particular friend in his own class, should not be allowed to start secondary school with the friend of his choice at his side. But they wouldn't budge.

Fortunately DS1 came out of it OK, the SENCO had him for history and noticed his almost complete lack of social skills and inability to 'pair up' for activities etc. So she paired him up with - as she put it - 'another bright boy', and they were away. He stayed friends with the original friend, who didn't particularly like the child who'd been foisted on him anyway ... who knows WHAT was going on there.

Then we moved away at the end of year 7. DS1 had finally picked up a few friend making skills, I wasn't completely terrified of how he'd get on at a new school, and he found friends who made him look normal ... :rotfl: