We have an unusually sensitive child who has presented many difficulties and home, but few in public, although his extreme fussiness as an infant and extreme shyness as a preschooler were apparent to outsiders in the early years. Because of David's (not his real name) poor adaptability and shyness, we were always apprehensive when trying to introduce him to group situations, from play groups to primary school.

He also had a very short attention span and difficulty following instructions and expressing himself, making social and school situations even harder for him. People thought his attentional problems were related to social anxiety, but they were apparent at home, too, where he was far from shy, and in fact, was a very oppositional, negative child, who expressed his frustration and reactions to stress most often with me, his mother.

Our problem in introducing our child to the world of education was whether to say to the teachers that our son was 'difficult' when the main difficulties -- in the commonly understood sense of inappropriate, so-called 'bad' behavior -- occurred only at home. We certainly didn't want teachers to develop any apprehensions about his behavior, with his self-esteem already in jeopardy. Besides, we were sure he would be well-behaved (although maybe sometimes confused and stressed) at school.

Although, especially in the early years, I desperately wanted to tell teachers how 'difficult' David was, perhaps to get some support from them, I decided not to use this actual term in discussions with them. But the problem remained: exactly what should we say to them?

Then I heard a child psychiatrist at a talk say that teachers should not try to diagnose children in discussions with parents but should only describe what specifically the children are doing that is causing concern. For example, the teachers should say: "He has difficulty paying attention for long" rather than "I think your child has attention deficit disorder". Or they should say: "Your child isn't interacting much with the other children" rather than "Your child is anxious".

After hearing this, I thought to myself that this might be a good rule for me to follow when discussing David with teachers, since a screening exam had found nothing unusual about David that a teacher needed to know. One mildly abnormal EEG is not useful information for teachers, whereas knowing that another child actually has epilepsy would be. So I decided only to describe David as a whole person when talking to teachers. This included emphasizing his high intelligence, gentleness with other children, and fun-loving nature, as well as mentioning his slowness to adapt to new situations, his need for positive attention even when he seemed to shun it, and his tendency to get confused easily.

I also developed a routine of saying to the teachers how much David up to school (true) even though he was so shy and, at first, uninvolved. (In play groups, through kindergarten, he was a bystander, just watching the other children and doing his own playing.) I emphasized how much David liked school because I thought that maybe teachers would like him if they knew he liked them in their programs. I also didn't want them to feel that they were failures as teachers because they couldn't make him as shy or more adaptable. I knew only too well what it felt like to be a failure at making a child more like other children. I explains that much of David's behavior was related to his temperament, and that both a child psychologist and pediatrician had said this. I explained that he had been born sensitive and that we were a shy family. Because I knew that they would offer alternative theories, I always acknowledged the role of his allergies and family stress in his sensitivity. (I didn't bother to point out that he, being such an allergic and fussy baby, had caused most of the stress!) I also asked for their suggestions on ways we could help David at home. I figured they must know something about children. I found that when I approached teachers this way, they were very willing to understand.

Of course, a parent doesn't just want a teacher to understand her child's difficulties, but needs the teacher to be an ally in helping the child overcome any serious adjustment problems. One thing I did to help this along was to ask the teacher to let me know if she observed any budding friendships occurring between David and the other children, so I could invite those other children over. I knew that going to school with a buddy that he also saw outside of school would help greatly.

Teachers have been quick to pick up my suggestion to use humor, even tickling, to help David relax at school and to give him the attention that other children get by asking for it or acting out.

I know my story doesn't offer much to parents whose children are likely, for reasons related to their temperaments, to misbehave at school. In a way, your situation is much harder, and I wish you luck!