Hi everyone! I’m hoping for some advice. My 5 yo began kindergarten this year, and we’ve begun to worry about how she’s doing socially. She was invited to a birthday party a few weeks ago, and it became very obvious that something is up. All the kids at the party were classmates and (thankfully) were very friendly toward her and excitedly said hi to her. She…said nothing back. Like, not even a wave. I prompted her to respond, and if she did it was pretty inaudible. This is a striking difference to how she is at home and how she is with other family members. She didn’t really want to leave our sides at the party and only engaged with one kid who she referred to as her friend for about 2 minutes before they parted ways. When I asked her later what her favorite part of the party was she said “playing with (insert friend’s name).” She says she plays with other kids at school and tells me their names, but I’m beginning to reevaluate what that actually means to her. Her teacher has also told me that she is very quiet. The teacher sent out a video of the class where they all had talking parts. She was the only kid in the video who looked uncomfortable and whose part was so quiet we could hardly hear it. I don’t want to kill her confidence because she watched the video proudly, but I want to address this shyness she’s exhibiting at school and around other kids. I want to help her find her voice and to help build her confidence, but I don’t know the best way to go about it since she’s pretty loud and chatty otherwise. We’re thinking extracurriculars may be a good option. Does anyone else have advice for how best we can help her?
As an addition: When we ask why she is so quiet at school and why she didn’t play with others at the party she said “it’s because I feel shy.”
