Advice needed 25/10/2011 21:06 - Ask Mother Hen (Locality: Cork) ----------------------------------- Hi, My four year old daughter recently started school. She was born with a very rare syndrome which affects her facially but not intellectually. I have been told by the teacher that she is finding it hard to make a friend in the school yard and has even asked the yard SNA can she find her a friend to play with. Isn´t that just heartbreaking and a parents worse nightmare. She is such a lovely child and I know as a mum we all think that of our children, but she has gone through so much over the last four years and has years of surgery ahead of her. We are living in this world of perfection. I wonder if anyone can make any suggestions as to how to make schooling a little easier. I know it is very early days but my preference would be to nip this in the bud earlier rather than later. Parents you have to educate your children to the differences in this world as it is having a day to day negative affect on my daughter.
re : Advice needed 26/10/2011 08:41 - Ask Mother Hen ----------------------------------- Hi - are you friendly with any of the mums in your daughter’s class that you meet outside when you are collecting her, maybe you could try to arrange a play date for her at your house. Best of luck
re... : Advice needed 27/10/2011 09:46 - Ask Mother Hen ----------------------------------- What a great little lady to go through so much! I think the suggestion of getting to know some of the other children´s parents is a great idea. If you can arrange some play dates that will get her some close friends in the class. You could also talk to the teacher and see if he/she has any suggestions. Perhaps they could do something in the classroom to highlight accepting difference or there may be a story that he/she could tell to the class about a similar situation? One such book is "You´re different - thats super!" by Carson Kressley, or "It´s okay to be different" by Todd Parr. Do keep chatting to your little girl making sure that she has plenty of opportunity to talk about school and how she feels so that you can give her support. Make sure that you don´t bombard her with questions or get upset when she talks about the situation - that may cause her to ´shut down´ communication for fear of upsetting you or being put under pressure to talk about it. Do let us know how you get on!
