Q: My son is studying for his Leaving Cert and I am quite worried that he is working too hard; he stays up half the night and gets no fresh air or exercise at all. All the guides I read say this is wrong. What can I do? - Co Offaly parent

A: You get down on your knees and thank the Lord that you haven't got the opposite problem, namely trying to get him to study. You son knows himself best - if staying up half the night is the best way for him to prepare for the exams, then relax and leave him at it.

Every year around this time I read tracts of advice which tell young people to do no study in the final days, to go for long walks and take plenty of fresh air. And I must say that my own experience over the years has always been that if I didn't cram up to the last second, the stress of not doing so would have killed me.

To have wasted vital hours going for a walk when I could have been genning up on that bit of the history syllabus I had ignored would have been far more stressful for me.

Different people handle exams in different ways. I know a university student working for exams at the moment who goes to bed at 10 p.m., sleeps for a few hours, gets up at 1 a.m. and works through the night when everyone else is asleep. It works brilliantly for him.

The worst thing you can do is to try and impose rigid patterns on an exam candidate - unless he's not studying, of course. If you have a girl or boy who needs relaxation and long walks, that's fine, but if you've got a "crammer", then let him cram away to his heart's content.

Just make sure your candidate gets good food and a certain minimum amount of sleep. For some kids, studying through half the night is their way of psyching themselves up to the exams.

If you have real evidence that the long hours' study is counter productive - i.e. that he is really stressed then try to help him relax a little. But I can assure you that I get vastly more letters from people despairing of getting their off spring to study than from those whose kids are studying too much.

Don't hassle him, just try to be an unobtrusively supportive as possible.

Q: We are moving to Ireland with our daughters, aged eight and 10 1/2, in the summer. I understand the young girl has to do Irish but the older one does not. Is it worth her while taking Irish in any case? - Dunfries, Scotland, mother

A: The regulations are that if the child has had her primary education up to age 11 outside of Ireland, then she is exempt from Irish. So if your older daughter is 11 before she starts school here in September, then she is exempt.

I would, in your case, give some consideration to her taking Irish anyway. A lot of time is spent on Irish in primary school; as all the pupils are together in the same class all day, it would be quite a waste, really, for her not to give Irish a try.

She would be at a bit of a disadvantage, but it still seems to me that she would pick up some Irish pretty quickly. The Junior Cert Irish course is a very communicative one, and I wouldn't really see her having lot of trouble with it. Secondary school classes also tend to be timetabled around the principle of everyone doing Irish, and students not taking it often end up just hanging around during Irish periods.

if she is having trouble with Irish later in secondary school she can always drop it - she would still be covered by the 11 year old rule.

You say in your letter that you yourself are Irish and yours husband Scottish, so I imagine that you would both have a cultural interest in your daughters having some Irish. If she were already into secondary school, I would probably give different advice, but it seems to me that, at age 11, she should be able to cope quite well.

Q: Our eight year old daughter has had a very bad experience with her class teacher for the past year. "Now we discover that the class is to have the same teacher again next year. We feel this is terribly unfair - can we do anything about it? - Co Meath parents

A: Most national schools are organised around the principle of each class having a different teacher each year. Some have a policy of leaving the same teacher with junior and senior infants to give the children a more secure start to their school life and some schools have a policy of leaving each class throughout the school two years with the same teacher.

A small number actually have the teacher move with the class through several years.

This is fine if you have a great teacher, but a real problem for those landed with the burnt out teacher under stress. From your account of your daughter's experiences, it sounds as if she has one of the latter.

Strictly speaking, you do not have any rights, though it does seem unfair of the school to leave classes with this teacher for two years - the principal must be aware of the problem.

I would suggest that - as quietly and diplomatically as possible - a few of the parents make an approach to the principal, pointing out the problem and asking if alternative timetabling would be possible. The more low key the approach, the less threat there will be to the problem teacher. You don't want her to feel that the parents are ousting her - and have her dig her heels in and call in the union.

If you get no response from the principal, then I think you should approach the board of management. You could start with the chairperson, who is probably your local priest. Again, this might be preferable, to raising the issue in open board session where other teachers will be present. Your best chance of success lies in avoiding making the teacher feel threatened.

Your other line of approach could be to have the parental representatives on the board discuss the issue quietly with the principal. You can't force the school to change. if it won't change, then I think you must - through the parents' association or parental reps on the board of management - press strongly for the principal to take a detailed interest in what is happening in the class and to take responsibility for how this teacher is behaving.

Your best hope might be if the PCW deal - which the INTO has voted for - goes through. Maybe this teacher would apply under the special quota for early retirement for teachers under stress.

Q: I am a lone parent with a baby and a child at primary school and have just moved into an area in south Dublin. The local national school has been unable to provide a place for my daughter in September - or even any guarantee that the baby will get a place eventually. At the moment I have had to borrow to pay for a private school. What should I do? - south Dublin mother

A: I get an increasing number of letters from parents, particularly in south Dublin, who are failing to get a place in their local national school. I have mentioned this before, but new complaints continue to come in to this column.

Several correspondents report that the attitude of the national school is often "well sure you can afford a private school anyway, so why are you bothering us?" But often these are people who appreciate the superior quality of the national school system and also want to support public schools, yet they are being forced into the private sector.

And there are many, such as yourself, who simply cannot afford private education. Everyone has a right to free primary education and it seems to me that people who are turned down by their nearest national schools should write to the Minister for Education immediately so that she can appreciate the extent of the problem; she has a constitutional responsibility - this has been affirmed by the High Court in the Drimoleague case - to provide free primary education for all children.

It seems to me that for too long the State has assumed that, in south Dublin in particular, parents will make do with private schools if the national schools cannot cope. It is time that this approach changed. It is also time that the rights of parents were spelled out: is the local national school obliged to take local children or not?