While growing up most kids have a lot of friends, there’s always that one special person who they called their best friend, who they shared all their secrets with, but now schools are trying to put a stop to that. These days more and more schools are banning kids from using the term “best friend” in an attempt to get kids to be more inclusive, a practice that allegedly started in the UK.
“There has been a movement in some American schools and European schools to ban the phrase ‘best friend,'” clinical psychologist Dr. Barbara Greenberg tells CBS News. “The idea of banning the phrase ‘best friends’ is a very intriguing social experiment.”
Greenberg insists the point isn’t to stop kids from actually having best friends, but it’s a way to try and get kids to broaden their friendship circle. “Let’s face it, you can’t ban somebody from having a close relationship, and you can’t really ban somebody from having a best friend,” Greenberg notes, “but what the schools are trying to do is foster the idea of kids having more than a single friend.”
Jay Jacobs, who operates Timber Lake Camp, says the camp always tries to foster a more welcoming environment amongst kids, and believes encouraging them to have a wider group of friends is a key to future success. He explains, “It’s now about promoting kindness, looking to children to be kind to one another and to be aware of what it looks like when you’re not.”
Source: CBS New York