It used to be working mothers who had to juggle their lives. Now it's 16 and 17-year-olds. Just ask Smaller Son, ace juggler and guinea pig. Remember when you were 16? Chances are you were having a jolly good time. Maybe you were working, earning money and feeling grown up.

Even in school, life wasn't so bad. After the solid slog of O-Levels, you could catch your breath a bit in the sixth form, a chance to explore ideas instead of cramming facts, to be educated instead of just being trained to pass exams. There was time for a little job, sport, romance, adventure, all the things that made it good to be young.

Until some idiot invented AS-Levels.

Smaller Son's doing these. It means that, for three years running, teenagers are doing public exams. Aarggghhh. Never mind the students, what about the effect on mothers? AS-Levels are fine in theory, terrible in practice. Definitely the invention of the Devil, or the type of chap who was the school swot and had no life outside his books. The idea was that by studying four or five subjects instead of three, sixth formers would get a broader education. Tosh.

What's happened is that, because they have so much school work, the poor kids barely have time for anything else, certainly not lying about doing not very much - which is what teenagers have always been so very good at.

There's a full school week, no free periods to slouch off, and masses of homework. Smaller Son and his friends, the first to try this new regime, have had to live the rest of their lives round the edges. The lad - determined to do a bit of living despite the syllabus - squeezed in some football, a girlfriend, a part-time job and the occasional party. But only just. The job's down to about one shift a week, which would leave him seriously short of money, except he's got no time to go out and spend it.

Goodness knows what effect it's having on those super-conscientious kids, the vulnerable ones who fret and worry. One night out or a top football match on TV and the carefully time-tabled week collapses into chaos.

Is this really broadening their lives?

I know, I know, compared to their great grandparents' day when 16-year-olds were expected to do a man's job for pocket money pay, these lads don't know they're born. But if life isn't for living at 16, then when is it going to be?

Anyway, after battling along since September, Smaller Son has made the supreme sacrifice.

The small treat he allows himself when he's finished his work, last thing at night when everyone else is in bed, is to slump in the study and play computer games - endlessly absorbing and utterly time-wasting but a harmless enough relaxation.

But, with the exams coming up next month, something's got to give. His brother would have just ditched the revision, but this lad's decided that it's Championship Manager and SimCity that have to go. What's more, just to put them utterly beyond temptation, he's parcelled up the CDs and put them in the care of a non-exam taking friend. Dedication, or what? Let's hope he doesn't get withdrawal symptoms.

The irony is that when this lot see what older brothers and sisters are doing at university, they can't wait to get there - compared to Year 12, university seems like a holiday camp.

Published: 11/05/01