7th grade girls & relationships

this year i'm working with a small group of 7th grade girls. our group has grown to 16--fortunately, i have 2 co-leaders. as we're approaching february and valentine's day, i wanted to do a series on relationships--friendships and romantic ones both. to get started i pulled some questions from ys's middle school talksheets books and came up with a questionnaire to learn what my girls thinking is around these relationships. here are a few interesting observations:

• the majority of the girls feel like they can be good friends and would like more friends (11 of 13 and 9 of 13 respectively)
• only 2 felt their parents should have a say in their choice of friends. 7 were firmly against it and 4 weren't sure.
• the majority of the girls feel their friends really care about them, like to hang out with them for who they are, and are fun to be with. (11 of 13 on all 3)
• on the other hand, 11 of 13 think their friends may talk about them behind their backs.
• all 13 girls believe that guys and girls can be best friends.
  
• all 13 girls believe it is okay to date non-christians.
• 10 of 13 girls think middle school isn't too young to start dating and 7 think middle schoolers can be in love.

there were 4 questions that were situational and the girls had to decide if it was no big deal, a big deal, or it could go either way (maybe). here's the breakdown.

• you're at a party and people start playing games involving kissing: 6 no big deal; 4 big deal; 3 maybe.
• you're close friends with a member of the opposite sex and you start liking that person: 7 no big deal; 3 big deal; 3 maybe.
• you're asked out by a member of the opposite sex: 11 no big deal; 2 big deal (no maybe's here!)
• you're home alone after school when a close friend of the opposite sex stops by to hang out: 1 no big deal; 7 big deal; 5 maybe.

we're going to have some great discussions over the next few weeks!