Beginnings and repeats

Tomorrow's our followup meeting with the boys' teachers at school. I expect the first grade teacher to say that our son is developing well in the language but needs to stop scribbling on his papers and pay attention more. You know, normal stuff. Not too worried there. I AM worried about the other son, though. He was at the top of his class last year and tested out of a good part of his homework/class work. He spent a lot of last year at the back of the class, reading. This year, because of language, the teacher would like to put him back a whole year. (I think they don't give real grades until third grade, and that would take the stress off of trying to pass the year.) He's made a lot of improvement since we last met with the teacher, but at the same time, his language acquisition is MUCH slower than that of his brother. Some of it is frustrated resistence, but he also just isn't picking it up. And yet, when we return to the states in two years, do we really need him even more bored in class? So I'm rather apprehensive about tomorrow.

On to writing. Anyone have any good ideas on sparking an emotional connection with the focal character right up front? I've written a zillion different first chapters for the same book, and I think each new incarnation is better--yet I'm still getting ho hum feedback. Readers respond emotionally to later scenes in the book, but the beginning is still not there yet, apparently. (And for the record, I'm trying to show someone who is repressing feelings because she's afraid she won't be able to handle it if she does connect with herself. But that's not really getting across, either.) One of the most important things to me in a book is the emotional connection, so it REALLY bothers me that nobody is getting it. I don't have excessive dialogue tags, adverbs, "he felt sad," etc., but I still think it's somehow a writing problem. Ideas, anyone?