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NORTH ATTLEBORO - There are a lot of 9-year-olds out there going to school under protest "because they realize it's going to be a long haul," says psychologist Michael Thompson.

If they can find their strengths, however, and develop a connection to adults, peers and something they love, obtain recognition, as well as a sense of power or mastery, then both the child - and his or her parents - will survive the school journey and beyond.

What parents need to realize, is that their child's life is larger than the report card, said Thompson, who spoke recently to more than 100 parents and educators at North Attleboro High School. The presentation was sponsored by the Council for Children.

Thompson, who was a school teacher before entering psychology and serves as a consultant to private and public schools, has penned several books on child development. The latest, "The Pressured Child: Helping Your Child Find Success in School and Life," was the topic of his talk.

Thompson believes that there are many pressures at school that parents don't remember from their own childhood, and that many parents pressure their children by just focusing on academic achievement and top grades. Thompson, who followed individual students through their school days as part of the research for "The Pressured Child," said parents have "romantic visions" about what their child's school life is like - or what it should be.

"Parents' dreams for their children are much different from what they experienced" going through school, he said.

Parents want their children to be better students than they were. But, Thompson joked, that means the kids better marry someone smarter than themselves and hope the child they produce inherits those intelligence genes.

Parents need to understand that children today are on "eight tracks at all times" - developing physically, socially, cognitively, academically, morally and spiritually, as well as forming attachments, an identity, and learning emotional self-regulation, he said.

"You don't actually want to go back to high school, and nobody would ever want to go back to middle school," Thompson said.

Nonetheless, parents' expectations of a child can be high without that empathy and an understanding of their child's abilities - which may not necessarily include being a top student academically.

For his research, Thompson followed students in grades 7-12 through the course of a full school day, and one of the things he learned is that, despite what many parents think, "from a child's point of view, school is not a competition."

He cited, for example, prizes given out at high school graduations. There's no surprise. As a junior "you already knew if you were in the top 10 percent or in the other 90 percent," Thompson said.

He joked that there were probably valedictorians in the auditorium where he was speaking. "I hate to hurt your feelings, but we laughed at you. We had already made our peace with where we were in our class," Thompson said. "Kids usually know where they stand at about age 10."

If parents have unreasonably high expectations for their kids in subjects where they might not excel, the resulting disappointment can weigh the children down. "Kids aren't always looking to be the top student in the class," Thompson said. "What a child wants inside is to be the most grown up they can be at their age... a kindergartner wants to be the cutting edge kindergartner."

He said with more compassionate parenting and some inspirational teachers, children can feel more comfortable in their own part of the school world.

"Every child is going to graduate from school feeling a little better about themselves and a little worse about themselves in some way," Thompson said. "Everybody has scars."

"Every child is doing the best he or she can at every moment. When as a parent you talk about grades and the future, after awhile, kids think you're not interested in how they're living their life today."

"How many of you started thinking about college in fifth or seventh grade?" he asked the adults during his talk.

"Parents have to develop a philosophy to follow their child's journey through school," Thompson said. While parents may have big dreams for their children academically, "you have to follow them through school and you have to trust their journey," listening to what they tell you about what goes on in school and what they're experiencing.

At some point, he said, the journey becomes their own.

"Keep about a quarter step off their shoulder - not so far out front that they're demoralized and not too far back that your patronizing - because in the end, we're not in charge," Thompson said. "Development is in charge."

SUSAN LaHOUD can be reached at 508-236-0398 or at slahoud@thesunchronicle.com.