OVER THE last couple of weeks thousands of parents have been breathing deep sighs of relief as their teenagers return to school at last. Summer is supposed to be a time of easy living but for many parents those who work outside the home in particular it can be a nightmare.

Keeping children occupied for months on end during the summer holidays has become a major problem for many Irish families.

Children who are involved in sports are much easier to accommodate, parents say. Keen tennis players and golfers, for example, will happily spend all their free time at their clubs.

However, the consensus among the parents who spoke to E&L is that boys are more difficult to accommodate than girls and that it is 12 to 15 year olds who present the greatest difficulties.

"We're both out between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. every day," says Orla, the working mother of a 15 year old boy. "Things weren't so bad when he was at primary school, because we could employ a childminder. But now he's too old for that and anyway the holidays were only two months long.

"Keeping him busy for three months is extremely difficult. I felt that at IS he was too young to take on a holiday job, but by the middle of the summer I was beginning to regret that I hadn't tried to organise work for him."

Parents worry that during the holidays their youngsters adopt lazy lifestyles that are difficult to shake off once term begins. And left to their own devices, many teenagers especially boys spend at least half the day in bed, parents complain.

"I ring during the morning to check on what he's doing and he's either in bed or watching TV," says Kay. Come lunchtime though, the youngsters are beginning to surface and they start to ring around the friends to check on the action. Quickly, groups of young people begin to congregate in one house or another, giving their parents more to worry about.

"It's like controlling puppy dogs" groans Anne, a mother of two young teenage boys. "You really have to work very bard at keeping them busy. They're easily bored, and unless they're occupied they moan or they get into trouble. Their idea of bliss would be to spend every night either at rock concerts or hanging around town." Then, as many parents point out, late nights result in even later mornings.

Although many families identify the length of the second level school holidays as a major problem, other parents point to the diminished freedom young people now have, and suggest that this contributes to the difficulties they experience.

"When we were kids we were able to come and go as we pleased we could go casually into town and nobody turned a hair. But nowadays if your kids are in town for any length of time you worry about what they're getting into," says Anne, who says she sets strict rules about the hours her boys spend in the city.

Many parents resort to sending their youngsters on courses or to summer camp during the holidays, but this can prove expensive. "I feel that I'm having to pay for school all over again in the summer," one mother says. "You can end up paying for courses the kids don't want to go to and they may start to resent it."

"I know families who have I to scrimp all year in order to send their children to summer camp," Orla notes. This year, Orla and her husband solved part of the problem by each taking their holidays from work at different times, so that there were fewer weeks when their son was left alone.

However, while many parents argue that the length of school holidays should be reduced to accommodate changing lifestyles others view the long holidays as an opportunity for their children to extend their ranges of experiences. "You have to be incredibly organised," says Patrick, father of a 15 year old daughter and a 12 year old son. "We're lucky that our two both love Irish college, which is good value and takes up three weeks of the holidays. This year we also sent them on a cookery course.

"You do need to send them on a few courses it helps to rein them in and remind them that they're younger than they like to think.

"People complain about the length of the holidays," Patrick continues, "but schools are so pressured nowadays that I believe the children need them. It gives them the chance to try things they would be unable to do at school.

"If you extended the school year, I think you'd only increase the pressure on children.