Schooling tips for highly sensitive empathic children
Answer: Empathic children need to have their sensitivities respected and encouraged by the school. If this can happen in a school environment it can be very helpful. Typically, society or schools don’t give these exceptional children much understanding. Conventional physicians and teachers often label them as “shy,” “antisocial” or “fussy,” or they’re diagnosed with social phobia, an anxiety disorder, or depression. In addition, they may be quieter, thoughtful, deep, and gentle rather then highly verbal or assertive–which others can perceive as withdrawn. Because of these misconceptions, your role is critical in supporting their sensitivities, intuition, creativity, wisdom, and in teaching them tools to cope with the world. I devote a chapter to raising empathic children in my book The Empath’s Survival Guide.
It’s a wonderful thing to have empathy encouraged as part of the educational system. The advantage of this is that the child learns to socialize with like minded children and peers. This can foster creativity and confidence. But home schooling is positive in certain cases where you intuitively tune in and feel this will be most helpful for the child. I applaud your efforts to tune in to find the right school for your daughter. Try that and see how it goes. You can always switch to home schooling later.
Best regards,
Judith
Judith Orloff, MD is a New York Times bestselling author with the upcoming book The Genius of Empathy: Practical Skills to Heal Yourself, Your Relationships and the World (Foreword by the Dalai Lama). She has also written The Empath’s Survival Guide and Thriving as an Empath, which offers daily self-care tools for sensitive people. She integrates the pearls of conventional medicine with cutting edge knowledge of intuition, empathy, energy medicine, and spirituality. Dr. Orloff specializes in treating empaths and highly sensitive people in her private practice and online internationally. Her work has been featured on The Today Show, CNN, Oprah Magazine, the New York Times and USA Today. Dr. Orloff has spoken at Google-LA, TEDx U.S. and TEDx Asia. More information about Dr. Orloff’s Empathy Training Programs for businesses, The Empath Survival Guide Online Courseand speaking schedule at www.drjudithorloff.com.
