4yr old DD doesn't talk or play with other children in Nursery????

[princesspants]

Just had parent consultation at my DD's pre school nursery and this is what they told me although I had noticed myself to a point.

She is not quite 4 and has been going to nursery for 10 months. She is the middle child, has a 1 yr old brother and a 6 year old brother. Speaks well and plays (and fights) with her big brother in the house.
She has always been very intense, needs constant attention and gets extremely grumpy when she doesn't get it. I do my best and even leave my 1 yr old with a child minder 4 hours a week so I can give her my undivided attention to see if it helps. Not convinced it has!

I have noticed she barley converses with anyone outside of the family. I have been trying to encourage this. Even just getting her to acknowledge the lollypop man is a struggle!

She isn't shy, or at least I've never thought so. I have seen her actually shout at my friend when she has got frustrated which was very embarrassing.

There is nothing obviously wrong with her as she is fine in the house and can chat with us no problem.

I feel sad at times as she is my only little girl and she is beautiful but I can't help thinking she isn't the most likable child to an outsider.

When I pick her up at nursery she is on her own all of the time. If Im out and about and we meet another child her age I will ask her to say Hello to xxxx and she won't. I give her a row for being rude sometimes after the person has left but she doesn't seem to care.

I feel like it must be something I have done. My 6 yr old DS is sociable and pleasant so it must be a difference in the way I have brought them up/treated them.

He has play dates often but she doesn't. I have tried to get mums with other little girls round but it isn't easy. The few mums I know with little girls are all at different stages, ie afternoon nursery, 2 yr olds etc and for some bizarre reason her class only has 5 girls to 15 boys! I seem to know so many people who have 6 yr olds and hardly any 3/4 yr olds.

Does anyone have a child similar? Any ideas to bring her on and help her to be more friendly?

Is she used to playing with older children, older siblings. My youngest has displayed things like you describe. He has improved slightly with age, he is 7. He plays with friends in the park after school, but would only like his older cousin to play at the house, or to play with his older brother and sister.

Would you describe your child as sensitive?

I would ask the nursery to let you go in and help once a week for an hour or two, enabling your lo to show you round, have your undivided attention and take the role of leader with you. Games like Orchard Tree's Knickerbocker Glory or Tummy Ache are good for turn taking and using simple phrases. Equally ask the nursery for a home visit so that they can see your lol in her home environment, where she is comfortable.

Selective mutism is the terminology for someone who manages to go for extended periods of time in specific environments, in silence. At your daughter's age and stage I would ask the doc for a referral to the behaviour team/SALT/Ed Psych, to see if they can support. The more the habit of silence develops the harder it is to break. I'm not trying to be alarmist, but early intervention is the key and if this need has been identified then action needs to happen.

Try recording your daughter engaging in play and chatting at home, or singing, and let her take the recording into nursery, on a tablet or similar. Build her confidence and reward her frequently for spoken efforts in new environments, but try to reduce her anxiety not add to it iykwim!

New Ipad apps are often a big stimulus and exciting factor - try Barbie I can Be for a freebie that promotes lots of opps for "choice questions". That means ask something with an embedded answer e.g. "do you want to make the cupcake or the pizza? Do you think the puppy is feeling happy or the puppy is feeling sad?" Encourage her to repeat the phrase to answer. Ask nursery to use this style of question with her, mealtimes are good here.

Book a hearing test asap to ensure there is no hearing issue.

Get a jam jar and glass pebbles, and explain that they are her "magic talking pebbles" when she speaks at nursery or in a new environment she gets a pebble in the jar, and ten pebbles earns her fave thing - park/chocolate/tv etc.

And don't worry - she'll probably grow out of it! PM if you want to chat about it any further.

She really only plays with her brothers. Obviously the 14 month old doesn't 'play' much but she crawls around on the floor with him chasing him.

She loves the 8 yr old girl next door and is pleasant with her but she barley see's her.

I suppose she hasn't had friends like my 6 yr old DS has had. I kept in touch with my ante natal group with him and the 6 of us regularly met. The younger ones just tag along don't they? I wish I could arrange play dates for her but I really don't know anyone her age.

fuckingup she does chat to the teachers no problem. It's just other children. Does that still sound like the same problem you are describing? She just doesn't seem interested in the other children. She can be pretty un interested in other adults too but she will answer them if they ask her something. Just rude at times if she isn't interested in what they are saying!

She is just so intense with me. If we are walking to school and she is happily chatting to me or even just walking in silence and another mum comes up and I am chatting with them she starts acting up and pulling my sleeve, desperate for me to talk to only her. Very very intense on the attention seeking front!

I was going to suggest sm too. Children with sm can present very differently, some are completely mute outside the home, some will speak to adults, others to a trusted friend. I'm sure you've googled it by now, but if you think it sounds like dd, then early intervention is definitely the key.

Just googled it. Hmmm, I don't know. Yes there are some similarities there but how on earth she would be anxious is beyond me.

We have a happy family home. My husband and I get on well and he is hands on and brilliant with the kids.
She has a normal relationship with her sibling's too, loving/fighting!

She seems confident enough to me.
Her main problem is her clingyness to me which seems to bring about her disinterest in others.

Even in saying that though, if I take her to a soft play she will run off and play. I've seen children being dragged into soft plays and the poor mothers having to sit inside the thing! Or there is the children brought to nursery screaming blue murder and having to be physically pulled off while the mother makes a run for it. So yes, she is clingy but not unbearably.
Surely if she had emotional problems id see a bit more of that?
I did have anxiety when she was a baby/toddler as I had an undiagnosed under active thyroid so this is worrying me that somehow this could have rubbed off?

I will speak to the nursery again but her teacher did say she isn't worried about her at all, she just isn't bothered about the other children.

Rest assured it is nothing you have done - all of the theorists on child development agree that different children can respond very differently to the same factors, be they educational experiences or parenting. I too had an undiagnosed underachieving thyroid when my ds was small, so don't worry about that either!

If it is not a problem and she is just not untested in interacting with kids at nursery and you are not worried, great. If you are worried, go to the GP and start supporting for an hour a week in the nursery - your presence may make her behave as she does at home, which would be an eye opener for the staff, or she may behave as she always does there, which could be an eye opener for you.

The intensity and clingyness to you sounds frustrating but as you say are less uncommon- reward charts, play dates with peers from nursery (catch parents at pick up), and strategies such as having lollipops or a timer in your bag, to give her when you want to stop and chat to someone, may help.