Comments on: Do you need to invite everyone to the birthday party?

By: Arlen

Arlen — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 20:29:36 +0000

If you’re not going to invite the whole class, make sure that the number of kids you allow your child to invite is limited so that the whole class except for one or two children don’t get invited. Limiting the party to ten kids, maximum, is reasonable. And then kids don’t get left out for mean and petty reasons – so it’s not a negative exclusionary process.

By: Cindy

Cindy — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 05:56:47 +0000

If the point is to avoid exclusion and disappointment think how disappointed a child would be if they learned they couldn’t have a party because the parent couldn’t afford to have the whole class over or the close friend who live close to you and can’t come to the party because they happen to be in the same class?

my self I’m not much for big parties I i were ever in a position to though a big party for a class it would be a getting to know you party at the beginning of the year no pressure for gifts or handouts just a place for kids and moms to get to know each other then I believe birthdays will be a family affair until my kids are old enough to ask to have friends over

By: Ann

Ann — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 18:13:22 +0000

When my kids were in preschool, we never had birthday parties that included the whole class because of this. In all honesty, the sheer cost of having a party for 20 kids kept me from doing it along with the fact that I thought a party of that size would be overwhelming – for my kids and me!. I understand not wanting to leave kids out at that age, so we opted for small parties with different groups of friends. Then I’d do an in class treat and a small goody bag (something like stickers and 1 piece of candy) to celebrate. It always worked fine.

By: Danielle

Danielle — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 20:23:14 +0000

I have recently grappled with this myself, at the pre-school level its hard to understand why you may not be invited and its also harder for the children not to discuss the party in the classroom thus making it more obvious to those that are excluded. Sometimes “all boys” or “all girls” makes it easier and makes picking an appropriate theme to go along with the party and this seems to make sense to those not invited for the most part. Eg,Billy may not mind being excluded from the princess tea party. I still feel that is the parents decision and not the schools since they are paying for the party sometimes the cost for extra guests is quite significant.

My almost 7 year old is having a small party 8-10 boys to play lazer tag in a couple of weeks. I feel so badly that 2 boys from his class are not invtited but the fact is the boys that aren’t invited haven’t were recently mean to my child. It makes sense that he doesn’t want them to be there. It is HIS birthday so shouldn’t I honor this request not to be “annoyed” by these boys on his birthday. We would have to may $18.95 extra for each child too, so to pay extra for him to be aggravated just doesn’t seem logical.
I am sticking to his wishes and hope that since they are no longer in pre-school its time to handle dissappointment.