At School Anxiety

My second grader is well behaved and does well at school with her work.  She turned eight at the end of the summer, and I think, she is mature; however, she has recently begun to cry at school if she doesn't finish a piece of school work, or if she misses one of the problems on one of her activity sheets.  Ironically, she is usually one of the first ones done with her work and the teacher often has to find her other tasks to keep her busy.  She and another boy do separate spelling lists and reading groups than the rest of the class.  On Wednesdays, the class works on a word search consisting of the spelling words for the week.  They work on it for a short time in the morning and set it aside; they can work on it through out the rest of the day- time permitting, then take it home if not finished.  Today, I happened to be there when the teacher said to put the word search aside so that everyone can begin work on D.O.L.; she burst into tears! for the second time in a short period, I might add.  When the teacher and I asked her why she cried, and what she thought was going to happen?  She replied that she thought she was going to get into trouble.  The teacher told her that if she didn't quit, she would have to go to the other spelling lists that the rest of the class did.  I don't think the level of difficulty is the issue, but I am not sure what is.  The teacher has been patient with her, but this is taking class time away from others.  Both, she and her sister are very bright.  Her older sister, who is twenty months older, skipped kindergarten.  I am wondering if she thinks she has to live-up to her older sister.  How best should my husband and I and the teacher handle these outbursts and try to steer her in a positive direction?

[Kevin Kennedy, Ph.D.]

You can see that she carries a misperception - i.e., that she will be 'in trouble' if she does not complete the work at that time. She may have overly high expectations of herself and somewhat of a perfectionistic tendency. Reassure her that it is not expected that she finish the sheet, that she can complete it later. Over time, as she adjusts to the real expectations, she will likely relax about this.