ArcaMax

Q: Our son, age 8, did fine in school in first grade, but has struggled in second. We’ve taken your advice and not helped much with his homework other than occasional and brief “consultations.” He’s making average grades but his second-grade teacher – she’s fairly young, by the way – tells us that he is actually slightly ...Read more

Do we – here in the USA, that is – or do we not have a child and teen mental health crisis and if the answer is yes, we do, then what should be done about it?

Without doubt, the answer is yes, we do have a child and teen mental health crisis. Today’s child, by age 16, is five to ten times – depending on the source – more likely to ...Read more

Upon arrival on-site for a recent speaking engagement, I am told that several rather vocal parents refused to attend because I am not an advocate of “gentle parenting.” That implies that I proselytize for “rough” or “harsh” parenting, which I do not, and be assured dear reader, at this stage of my life I am acutely clear concerning ...Read more

Q: Even though he had an early-August birthday, we started our son in Kindergarten this past Fall at a private Christian school. They did some testing prior to the start of the school year and told us they thought he would do okay. Now, however, they are telling us that he is “somewhat immature” and would probably benefit from ...Read more

When I began reading “The 9 Words Parents Should Never Say to Their Kids” (January 5, 2018, www.fatherly.com), I was skeptical that essayist Patrick Coleman’s point of view would line up with my own, and I wasn’t disappointed. Coleman began by saying that certain words have “overwhelmingly negative consequences” to children but only ...Read more

An individual who occupies a fairly high-level position in the mainstream media recently told one of my associates that I’m “old-fashioned.” She meant it as a slight, but I hardly took it that way. I do, in fact, espouse a child-rearing philosophy and approach that prevailed when I was a child. To my media critic, I’m a throwback.

When ...Read more

Thirty-something years ago in this column, I offered a free (expenses-only) speaking engagement to any community that would abolish all adult-organized-and-run children’s sports programs (excepting those run by high schools) and replace them with programs organized and run by the children themselves.

Each child who signed up to play a certain...Read more

Question: When our daughter, an only child, turned thirteen and entered the 8th grade, it was like a switch was flipped. Almost overnight, she went from being a sweet, respectful and obedient child who had never given us any serious problems to being petulant, sassy, and often belligerent. She wants nothing to do with us anymore and ...Read more

Question: You seem to be opposed to putting children into any sort of psychological therapy. That’s curious, especially given that you’re a child psychologist. What is your explanation for this and are there any situations in which you would be in favor of therapy for a child?

Answer: As I said in a recent column, I was...Read more

A true story: When my daughter, Amy, was a pre-teen, she became anxious about going to sleep because of fears of dying in the middle of the night. When I tucked her in (I was her preferred tucker-inner), she would tell me, usually tearfully, that she didn’t want to go to sleep for fear of never waking up.

As a good daddy is supposed to do, I ...Read more

We’re a month, more or less, into the new year and America has already suffered two school shootings. As usual, the usual voices are calling for increased restrictions on the buying and selling of guns. But guns are not the problem, a contention I can prove.

In 1963, at age 15, I packed my bags and went to live with my father in Valdosta, GA,...Read more

Four sentences into her Wall Street Journal article on recent research into spanking (“Spanking for Misbehavior? It Causes More!” December 17, 2017), the author, Susan Pinker, makes two grievous errors: first, she says that children under 7 cannot master their emotions; second, she says a fair amount of misbehavior on the part of a young ...Read more

In Raleigh, North Carolina, on the backside of the Department of Education building is a structure known as the Education Wall. Completed in 1992, the EW was conceived and created by artist Vernon Pratt and writer Georgann Eubanks. Engraved into the polished red granite are various messages that presumably reflect my home state’s commitment to...Read more

My critics are providing me much material of late for this column and my weekly radio show (Saturdays, 6:00 ET, AFR). Most recently, a family therapist in Kentucky pleads with the Lexington Herald-Leader to stop running my column (“Stop Rosemond,” Letters, December 28, 2017), citing my “dangerous” belief that ADHD and other childhood ...Read more

Question: Our 17-year-old daughter wants to begin visiting colleges. She’s a high-school junior this year and this is when the college visitations begin. We’re feeling like the Grinches Who Stole College Visitations because neither of us feel there’s any value to this practice. We fail to understand how walking among and through ...Read more

Is a father owed respect from his children? Actually, the question, from a father, was rhetorical: Isn’t a father owed his children’s respect? The dad in question maintains that because he loves his children unconditionally, provides their standard of living (he is the sole breadwinner), and has made many sacrifices – financially and ...Read more