Question: My one-year-old has started slapping us. He also screams a lot, often for no reason, or at least we can’t figure out the reason. He is a very busy little boy and won’t sit still for longer than a few seconds. Is it too early to begin disciplining him?

Question: Our 16-year-old daughter has said three times over the past two years that she wants to play on the traveling soccer team. The coaches have actually asked her to play, meaning she doesn’t have to try out. She will say she wants to do it and then at the very last minute she gets upset, refuses to sign up, or says she feels too sick to go. This is very frustrating for us. Do you think it is anxiety? She had some problems with that in pre-school and first grade. Or do we just have a very spoiled child on our hands? Should we insist that she honor what she tells the coaches she’s going to do?

Question: Several years ago, I married a widower who never disciplined his children. They are now 9, 14 and 16, and he still has a very difficult time denying them anything. I love them very much and think of them as my own, but I often feel like the “bad guy.” In this situation, should he be the main disciplinarian? He’s given me the responsibility (he has a very demanding job, thus his at-home hours are not reliable) and sometimes I feel like I’m drowning!

It’s time for me, once again, to make my perennial case against parental involvement in homework. First, it is significant to note that as recently as 40 years ago, little more than a generation, the rare parent helped with homework. That would be 1971, when scholastic achievement was significantly higher than it is today. (In addition, average expenditure per pupil, in real dollars, was lower and the teacher/pupil ratio was higher at every grade, but those are future columns.) Furthermore, I believe it is more than coincidence that when parents did not render regular assistance with homework, children emancipated more successfully and much earlier than is the case today.

Question: I feel silly for asking, but what is your position on children killing bugs? I do not know if this is just 4-year-old boy behavior, but my son seems rather fascinated with bug-killing. He is, by the way, very kind with our dog and other pets. I have explained that bugs have families too and need to return to them. Is this a mountain I should die on?

Question: My daughter will be 3 years old soon. Her father was primary caretaker until she was around 20 months of age; then he left and she hasn’t seen him since. I expected her to be clingy in the beginning; however, it is still continuing. She cries and screams when I drop her off anywhere—at the sitter’s, church day care, even my sister’s house, and she clings to me like I’m going to disappear at any moment. I don’t play with her constantly in our free time; however, I do spend time with her. Any suggestions? It’s embarrassing and driving me crazy.

“When is the right time to introduce my girlfriend/boyfriend to my kids?” is a question single parents frequently ask.

Question: My 8-year-old son is the youngest in his third-grade class. Some students are more than a year older because most parents are holding back boys these days. I am concerned because he is really struggling socially. He says he has only one friend who is also younger and kind of immature. Should we consider holding him back a grade to see if that helps?

Question: Our 4-year old is fairly well behaved but her best friend is definitely not. We just got back from a weekend trip with that family, and I was constantly embarrassed at my daughter’s behavior. She did whatever her friend did, like running down the hall at the hotel, yelling and laughing all the while. Furthermore, because he doesn’t listen to his parents at all, she didn’t listen to us either. How would you handle that? We are really good friends with his parents, but they really don’t seem to parent the same we do or expect from their son what we expect of our daughter.

Question: Our 15-year-old son, a high-school sophomore, was an honor student until he got to high school and took up with a group of kids who think good grades are “uncool.” As a result, his grades have been in the tank all year (and most of last year). We put him on slight restriction after his first report card, but nothing changed. For the past three months, he’s been on full restriction: no social life, no outside activities (unless at our church), and no cell phone, television, computer (unless absolutely necessary for schoolwork), or video games. All the things he loves have been stripped. He now tells us that nothing he does ever satisfies us, our expectations are too high, and that he’s resigned to living like this forever. Have we gone overboard? Would restoring some of his privileges motivate him to do better?