Hoping someone can give me some experiences/viewpoints - apologies in advance for the essay!
DS is 3.5. He's a really lovely little boy - bright, funny, thoughtful (not as in considerate but as in thinking deeply about things), inquisitive. But he's also stubborn, shy, and often withdrawn, and definitely not a joiner-inner (or a follower of instructions 
). He can't cope well with busy, noisy environments and takes ages to warm up to social situations like playdates (he does OK one-on-one, but with more than one other child he just goes off and plays on his own or sticks to me like Velcro. Baby and toddler groups and classes were a dead loss once he got over about 10 months).
Lately things have been getting a bit tough to manage; I can't easily go and meet the other mums I'm friends with, who have kids the same age, because DS won't go and play - he just clings to me and wails/whinges. He's also started lashing out at kids and indeed staff at nursery (he goes 3 days a week), pinching, pushing, hitting or biting - usually when he's forced to join in with something like circle time, rather than being left to his own devices.
But a walk in the nice, quiet, spacious country park with me and DD (1 yr) and a stick to poke toadstools with? He's happy as Larry.
I found this quote online from a book called "Highly Sensitive Children" by Elaine Aron. (Which is now on order!) I'm not usually one for psychobabble or any other woo nonsense, but this really sums DS up perfectly:
"HSCs are born with a nervous system that causes them to prefer to observe all the subtleties in a situation and to process all of this information deeply before acting. As a result, HSCs tend to be highly reflective, intuitive and creative (having a strong sense of how things came to be how they are and what could happen next); conscientious and concerned about fairness and what others are feeling; and aware of subtle changes, details or 'what's missing in this picture'. The trait also causes them to be more easily overwhelmed and hurt, both physically and emotionally; slower to warm up or join in; and sometimes quiet and unwilling to speak (in groups).They are more easily overwhelmed by 'high volume' or large quantities of input arriving at once. They try to avoid this and thus seem shy or timid or party poopers. When they cannot avoid overstimulation, they seem easily upset or 'too sensitive'."
Does anyone else have experience of parenting sensitive children, particularly boys, and what strategies did you find worked for you?