Being Excluded from a Group Activity Briefly: Building Social Resilience in Children
Last Thursday, my 8-year-old came home from school with tears streaming down her face. “The girls didn’t let me play soccer with them at recess,” she sobbed. “They said the team was full.” It turned out that the group had made a decision to keep the teams balanced, but my daughter interpreted it as personal rejection. I knelt beside her and whispered, “Life-Ready Parenting means your child won’t face this for the first time at age 25—with rent due and no safety net.” In that moment, I realized we had a perfect opportunity to practice navigating brief group exclusion in a low-stakes environment. ...