The Truth Behind the Tears: Emma’s Silent Desire to Speak

Around this time, Emma’s desire to speak at school was growing, largely because her close friends in class had started asking her to “talk” every single day. Emma was becoming well-adjusted to school life; she was understanding English better and starting to enjoy playtime — provided it didn’t involve speaking. Because of this, her friends genuinely wanted to get closer to her and hear her voice, so they gave her gentle little nudges. They never made negative or forceful demands like, “We won’t play with you if you don’t talk!” or anything unkind. I was struck by how sensible and kindhearted these children were, even at such a young age. However, given Emma’s personality, this attention also began to turn into pressure.

When we were doing our “Greeting Challenge,” the teacher wasn’t actually all that enthusiastic about it. While not negative, they responded quite calmly. When I mentioned that Emma was trying to practice her greetings little by little, the teacher advised, “It’s better not to make her too conscious of it. Just let it happen naturally.”

And unfortunately, things did take a turn for the worse. After a while, Emma’s anxiety seemed to intensify. At that point, she had become able to whisper “Hi” when facing away from people, but whenever she tried to face someone and say it, she just couldn’t bring herself to do it. Emma began to burst into tears frequently during these attempts.

I started to think, Maybe she just doesn’t want to speak at school after all. Maybe this strategy of trying to force the words out is too much pressure and isn’t right for her. I worried about what to do and what other methods I could try to help her build confidence through small successes.

But the reality was different. Emma wasn’t crying because she didn’t want to talk; she was crying out of sheer frustration because she desperately wanted to speak, but simply couldn’t.