My son is the type of kid who will be obviously sick and insist that he wants to go to school. He's in the fifth grade now and never willingly missed a day of school.

That's why it surprises me so much that my daughter is the complete opposite. Recently she learned that if she had the stomach flu, she gets to stay home with her daddy.

After a month, she's still having problems adjusting to her new classroom and over a recent weekend decided that she wasn't going to go back.

It turns out that in a class full of kids about to graduate to kindergarten, the big ones keep telling her she's too small. She's also an independent spirit who's having a rough time adjusting to stricter classroom rules.

One recent morning, as we drove to school, she kept telling me she had a stomachache and had to stay home. If she had managed to pull off at least one symptom, I might have bought it.

I think her stomachache was just anxiety.

We sat down and talked about it before going into the school and I assured her that they wouldn't have put her in the big girls' class if she wasn't old enough to be there.

For the first time in what seems like forever, she got that proud little expression over being a big girl.

For only the second time since her promotion, she didn't cry when I left. The other time was when she walked in proud to show off her koala backpack.

Maybe it helped that before I walked out I pointed out to her that she's not the smallest person in the class. Probably not the best tactic, but it worked.

I'm hoping it will last. A month seems like a long time for her to still be homesick for her old classroom.

I know she likes her teachers because she talks about them all the time at home. I think she just misses her friends.

Since my son has always had positive feelings about school, I have no experience dealing with a kid who absolutely doesn't want to go.

When she's not being a reporter, Treena Shapiro is busy with her real job, raising a son and daughter. A blogger at www.honoluluadvertiser.com, she is constantly on the hunt for child-rearing tips, family-friendly activities and amusing anecdotes. She'll share the best and the worst here and encourages you to do the same.

Reach Treena Shapiro at tshapiro@honoluluadvertiser.com.