ABSTRACT
It would be wrong to assume that, because ESN children are limited in intelligence, their emotional life is similarly limited. They are less capable of a varied and subtle expression of emotions but they have the same basic needs as normal children. This chapter discusses the basic emotional needs of ESN children. While many children will be sufficiently mature by the age of eight or nine, there will be many others whose urgent emotional problems require a continued informal approach to learning, as well as special efforts to help them grow up emotionally. Many of the emotional problems of ESN children are not related directly to low intelligence so much as to the educational and social consequences of low intelligence. Having less to contribute in class or in the play groups in the street, they easily get left on the fringe and are denied the full participation with others through which so many social and emotional developments are possible.
