I ran across this tweet in my feed a few days ago.
Now clearly, this was a whiteboard in a classroom, I don’t know for which level, but it made me think of a couple of things.
First, my mom used to tell me when I was growing up that you couldn’t have too many friends. Honestly, I hated when she said this because I felt like it meant that I needed to be friends with as many people as possible. And that sounded exhausting. But as I understood more of what she was saying, I think it meant that there is no limit to how many people you can be friendly with. This is much more attainable for me.
Second, who is telling kids (or adults) that they need to be best friends with everyone? I wonder if this is a by-product of the focus on social-emotional learning (SEL) in school. Don’t get me wrong, I love SEL, and I think it is needed. And I think that this tweet is an excellent example of how we can clarify the expectations in school.
What do you think of this tweet? Let me know. I would love to hear your thoughts. And we don’t even have to be best friends.
Comments
One response to “You can’t be best friends with everyone.”
That last line is the one I’ve really been working on — trying to see the world through each person’s eyes, even if I don’t agree with them.
Really, it’s ESPECIALLY if I don’t agree with them on something. Trying to understand their perspective is a great thing for both of us.