“This student has no friends.”
I often hear teachers and therapists commenting that a particular student has no friends. These comments always make me wonder about how we see friendships developing in young students. What do we mean by “s/he has no friends”?
Do we mean that these students:
- sit mostly by themselves?
- do not seek out others in a way that we expect them to?
- show no preference of whom to play with?
The comment “This student has no friends” generally signals the beginning of a discussion on how what we do in classrooms impacts on students’ opportunities to make friends.