Just to clarify, starting DS in preschool now is not with a view to early entrance to formal schooling. As I understand it, the preschool only offers a one-year program which, if DS gets in, will mean repeating the following year.
Irisheyes, at the risk of over-simplifying our situation, I think the preschool thing is about DS's lack of peers/loneliness/personality. He was in full time day care until he was 18mos old because both DH and I worked, and he absolutely thrived (apart from speech). The centre had him spending over half the day in with the 2-4yos by the time he was 1, which we thought was primarily due to his advanced physical ability and the fact that he was bigger than most of the 2 year olds! Anyway, the key point here is that his OE's were always more easily kept in check/less pronounced in that environment than at home - You'd have thought DH and I were talking about a completely different child with what went on at night/weekends. With help (and a lot of hard work) we have almost got DS's sensitivities to a manageable level at home but I just can't magically produce friends for him, IYKWIM. He is keenly aware that he seems 'different' from the children that he already gets to play with, and tells me so. He asks everyday if I could 'try and phone the lady one more time to see if today is the day (he) can go to school because (he) really needs some good friends to talk to.' Its breaking my heart, not half because those 'good friends' may not be found at the preschool either?
