Supporting tamariki with comments like ‘you’re not my friend’
we don’t always know how to manage well - the “she’s not my friend” or “you’re not coming to my party” statements. Often we might remark with “you don’t mean that” or ask one tamaiti to be ‘nice’ or just ignore it. But we know how tough these statements can be really for the recipients.
Firstly...
Tamariki are always kind and inclusive friends if they can be. They recognise it feels good to connect and be a supportive friend. But sometimes tamariki make comments like, “You’re not my friend,” which can sting. Usually, there’s a reason behind these words. It might be due to a missing social skill, feelings of worry or uncertainty, a need for control in a situation, or even a sense of overwhelm that’s making it hard for them to regulate. When we address the “why,” we can help the kind friend in them shine through.
What can
we do?
In the moment:
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Be a detective: Try to identify the underlying reason for the comment. Even if you’re not sure, reminding yourself, “There’s a reason behind this,” helps shift your perspective and prepares you to support them.
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Debrief: You might address it right away or come back to it later, depending on what’s best for the tamaiti. Some ways to start a gentle kōrero could be:
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“I heard you say Olivia wasn’t your best friend. I wonder why?”
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“Oh, I saw Olivia’s face when you said you weren’t her friend. She looked a bit sad.”
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“It’s okay not to feel close to Olivia, but we don’t always need to tell her that.”
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“Who is your best friend? That’s great! You can tell them, but imagine if you tried to tell everyone else they’re not your best friend—that’d be way too many people!”
At other times:
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Encourage perspective-taking: Supporting tamariki to understand others' perspectives is one of the best ways to nurture friendships. Tamariki who can see things from others’ viewpoints are more inclusive friends! Try pointing out and appreciating differences - “Look, Joe loves jumping off the box, and you enjoy the slide. You both had fun, even in different ways. Isn’t that cool?”
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Share stories: Tamariki love hearing stories about your own experiences. Try saying, “When I was a kid… ” and share a similar situation to offer guidance indirectly.
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Teach kind communication: Reinforce that it’s okay to think anything we want, and even okay not to like everyone. It’s about choosing kind words when speaking to others. Let tamariki know they can always talk to you about tricky feelings:
“It’s okay not to feel close to Jonny. You can tell me about it if you like.”
“Some words can hurt people’s feelings, so let’s figure out what those are. You can share them with me instead of Jonny.”
If this becomes a recurring issue, consider creating a special signal or code word for them to use when they need extra support in the moment.
For older tamariki
As tamariki grow these comments may diminish, but if you’re noticing there’s conflict in the friendship groups for your older tamariki, it might be a nice time to bring the focus in on this a little.
You could start with a video such as 'Why Friendships Matter' from News 2 Me, which Anna from our tīma worked across at TVNZ
Hone in the fact that your school is pretty small and so there are only a few people they have available to them to be friends with. This takes a bit more thoughtfulness and work. Focus on perspective-taking - outlined above, and problem-solving skills
In fact, supporting tamariki to develop effective problem-solving skills is an absolute game-changer and builds their resilience and independence. The best thing is that supporting tamariki problem solving is a step-by-step process, and once you teach it to them and run it through with them they can begin trying it for themselves, or with your support. Here are the foundations:
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Identify the problem and, encourage self-awareness. The best way to get to this is “tell me what the problem is here” - this is really different to “what’s the matter” because it really helps to define what’s actually going on.
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Think about why it’s a problem, support each other to air their perspectives and uncover why this is important, what they may be worried about.
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Brainstorm solutions - it can be fun to come up with different solutions to the problem - name 5 ways we can solve this problem
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Choose a solution and implement a plan - use the whiteboard or write this down, make sure everyone is clear about what their role is in this
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Check in and reflect on how it went and adjust as needed.
We liked this piece from Raising Children here. It’s from a parenting perspective, but might be a goodie to drop into your whānau comms to support the same approach at home.
And to add to this...
We also love this podcast Anna recorded with Megan which explores how we can support tamariki to build strong friendships with others.
We'd like to say ngā mihi nui
To Megan Lewis who collaborated on this acticle with us. Megan is a speech and language therapist and the director of Talk Together. Talk Together is a collection of speech and language therapists who work to provide evidence-based as well as neurodiverse affirming practices for speech and language therapy for tamariki aged up to 18.
