Q: My son is 12 years old. This is regarding his studies. I have to follow up with him on his studies. In this I check whether he has completed his class work / home work, ask him to practice his lessons and remind him to start studies. I also help him to plan for his exams by telling him what to study. He hates Hindi particularly and does not score above 60 in that. I have to follow up with him to read the new lesson and its question and answers. Unless I do it, he keeps postponing and does all other subjects except Hindi. He scores between 75 and 85 for all subjects except the languages. My husband is of the opinion that followup should not be done and that he should do his work on his own. He tells me that his current marks are a result of following up. My point is that we follow-up with a child on his eating habits, playing habits than why should I not follow-up his studies? He was in a Montessori School till the second grade. He moved into a regular CBSE school from class 3. At the end of Montessori, he was good at reading, but hated writing. When we moved him to the regular school, it took him more than 2 years to write regularly without complaining. Even now, given an opportunity he postpones writing and would not do it until it is repeatedly told. As a result of which he is unable to finish his class work. He likes to participate in project work, quiz and reading books and the newspaper. When he sits down to study, he is very slow and sometimes keeps looking at the question for more than a minute and when asked would tell me that he was thinking. Is this behaviour right? Is it incorrect on my part to follow up and make him study? What should I do to bring out the best in my child?

A:In bringing up children, there is no absolutely RIGHT way of doing anything. So much depends on the child's temperament, his strengths and weaknesses, the time the parents have and their own ability to enjoy watching their child grow to maturity. It seems to me that you have done a fairly realistic assessment of your child. I think the kind of help you are giving and the monitoring you are doing should be OK. Regarding what the boy's father feels: Many fathers are scared of mollycoddling their sons, for fear they would grow up to be timid and dependent. For this reason many of them are also unduly strict with their sons. You will have to work it out between you and do what is best for the child. I hear about many children who do not like to write and do not write fast enough to do well in school exams. This could be a problem in the short run, because your son will not get as many marks as he could get if his writing was faster. In the long run, he will just go on to the computer and do well in life. Parents must show their love for Hindi if they want their children to develop a liking for it. Sometimes a good teacher can also do that. But I do not approve of the expression - "He hates Hindi". It shows a contempt for the language, when it is really his lack of competence in it. You should work on changing his attitude to Hindi, instead of being proud of it!