Corporal Punishment in Schools

Oh Suzy, I love that punishment - writing the essay. It gets them to think about what they have done and makes them sit too. And you are right, they would be great keepsakes. I will have to keep that in mind when my girls get old enough to write.

What job could ever have consequences so important? You are absolutely right. As I have to work full time, I get so exhausted some times, but all I need is to see my girls smile and give me a hug and it seems to give you additional energy. Hey I can sleep again in about 18 years!

Unless they still live with you then! In that case, you'll be up waiting and worrying whenever they're out somewhere!
When they move out, you no longer know who they're with, what they're doing, or what time they get home! You eventually stop worrying and go to bed! Parenthood is so funny.

I love the essays you made your kids write!! That definitely is a keepsake! I can picture my kids. My son would eat the pages. My daughter would write how mean I am to her. I have to wonder if dads ever have to be so creative as mothers. I doubt it. Being a parent has to be the grandest form of self torture!!

No kidding, huh?
But the rewards are great!
If I never accomplish another thing in my life,
I am still satisfied.

Maybe the parents should decide if their child should be punished this way, not the state.

Agreed, and suzy does seem like the sort of parent to tell the state to stick their policy where the sun don't shine. I'm actually shocked that this still goes on.

Well, I, personally, would allo my child to be paddled.

Obviously all this is a "cultural thing" - my hair stands on end, when I would hear/read such here in Europe (which might be as well due to the fact that I worked professionally with abused children).

I've known some children that only respond to paddling. I've known other children who weren't phased by it... it depends on the kid.

Honestly, its more about the humiliation and embarassement, than causing them pain.

Well, if you say so.

I know when I was little, being embarased was the worst thing in the world, for all the kids... so I guess that would be my punishment of choice.

Thanks for the much needed encouragement. I had my kids four years apart. That took me about a decade to get two kids in school full time. I have at least a decade dealing with teen kids. They are so difficult!

Do I regret it? Never. I know what I have given up to give to my children. It has been very hard. It is especially difficult now. My husband beat me up. The police pressed charges. He went to jail and lost his job. He has a serious drinking problem. The depression got worse every day I lived this life with him. I wouldn't get a job because I knew it would enable him to drink more and work less.

Why does everything have to cave in on you all at once? I guess because I let it happen that way out of sheer stupidity. I'm left with a house, bills that are behind, no job, and two difficult teen kids that need me. The way I feel today is to just give up. I can't look at my own children and do that, no matter how scared and rotten I feel. They have always given me something to live for. They are two people I love more than I can ever love myself.

I have tried to explain this to adults who choose to have no children. I don't advise having children unless you are willing to give up your life for another. Meaning, don't have children unless you make an active choice that you are willing to sacrifice your self for another life. It is that life altering, but worth ever single struggle and sacrifice, in my opinion. Others do not share the same thought and don't have to. I do say that they are missing something important of the human experience.

Sometimes I feel that I have been so stupid having kids. It did destroy my life, or did it? On down days, I say it did destroy my life. When reality hits me, I say it made me a stronger and better person for my efforts. I sure don't feel all too strong today. I feel overwhelmed with responsibility. I don't feel like I can handle it alone, but have to. I could never leave them with a drunk for a father who is unfit. I could. He did it to me. Love and obligation to something more important than myself makes me continue to fight. That's all I have right now.

Whether or not any loving parent chooses corporal punishment for their child or even teen, is an individual choice of the parent who knows and loves their own child. Parents know what works and what doesn't. The public school employees cannot ever know our children as a parent does and should never be allowed to do anything but throw them out of their classroom, not ever strike them.

Sometimes nothing we do convinces a teen that they are making a poor choice for their future. We all still try for someone we love more than ourselves. We want them to have a better life than we did. We hope they listen to our on mistakes in life and don't reinvent the wheel. The fact of the matter is, we can teach no one experience in life. All people, including adults, have to learn it for themselves. If you only follow rules, you never get a chance to experience live for yourself. I have made many that I hoped my children would learn from. They can't.

I was a horrible teenager. I would never have know that without being a parent myself. I understand why my parents chose to physically use what we call violent behavior today. I have been hit and had soap shoved in my mouth. I was disrespectful. I was making mistakes. I scared my parents that did love me. They just didn't know what to do, as I don't.

One thing I do know is never, ever use physical force on a child or teen as primary punishment. It causes nothing but resentment. I couldn't allow my parents to beat me up and make me fear to do as they wanted. I never quit smoking cigarettes and wouldn't, in younger years, with welts all over my body being beaten with the buckle end of a leather belt. I refused to allow anyone to beat me into submission and resented this.

My parents were right, not me. I should not smoke cigarettes. My dad, to this day, claims cigarettes killed his 82 year old mother. Like something at that age wont kill you! His dad died much younger from results of cigarette smoking. He was afraid that I would die like his parents did. He didn't know what else to do, but instill fear in me. His intent was good, but actions were not as he desired. At 40, I still smoke cigarettes and still get lectures from my father and stupid newspaper articles he cuts out sent to me so I will stop.

This sort of physical deterent doesn't work at all with any kid as a primary form of punishment for something they are obviously doing stupid or ethically wrong. I do believe there are times you are forced to utilize physical force on your child. I have had a few, always due to blatant disrespect for your rules attempting to run the show, which no child is mature enough for. Sometimes this is the only language they understand.

I know people will say that you should never use physical force in anger or even rage. Kids will push you that hard. Mine have! They have to know when they have crossed the line entirely. Every parent has the right to feel anger and rage when a kid clearly acts outside of what you have taught them. We also have the right to act on it to make our children better people, if this is what it takes and often does. I believe this differentiates abuse out of anger from anger due to your own childs behavior past the point of reason, which parents are right to feel anger or fury, not because they forgot to make their bed or something equally as unimportant.

We can all criticize each other and point fingers. We shouldn't as long as we know the parent actually does love their child and acts in ways that are in their best interest. Parents know their own children. Parents should be able to make intelligent choices, not those of abuse. A few don't, who make the rules for all reasonable parents, which is tying our hands to teach diciplipline to our children. They need this teaching to ever be a self diciplined adult. It does go hand and hand.

It is not just the fact of my child being paddled. Since my daughter has been well behaved so far in school and in other types of group activities, I am not concerned she would be paddled. But I am concerned that she would even see this type of punishment. I would imagine it would terrify her. I remember as a child seeing a boy being yanked out of line by the principal and being spanked several times in front of the entire school. It really frightened me. I wonder how my daughter would feel about her teacher after seeing him/her paddling another child. Would she no longer trust the teacher? Would she be so frightened of the teacher she would not speak up in class?

Just an aside: Corporal punishment is explicitly prohibited by several international conventions on human rights, including the European Convention on Human Rights and the United Nations' "Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners" ... and the "UN Convention on the Rights of the Child", which the USA didn't ratify.

Of course the US didn't ratify the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child -- we want to hit our kids, dammit! In fact, we want to hit your kids!

Since I did know that, Joe, we don't have own - but hands away from our god-children! Otherwise, the Hun in me wakes up!

Being an individual that was paddled in front of the class multiple times for not doing my work, I can easily say those students are swiftly headed to be a high school drop out. Other students didn't seem to be bothered by it. It was a reason to socially outcast me for a matter that should have been discussed with me in a private, civilized manner. The fact that I was bored to tears with schoolwork and spent too much time daydreaming and drawing, as I loved to do with any piece of paper in front of me, should have been brought to my parents attention. It was always an academic problem, never a behavioral one that disrupted other students or showed any disrespect for teachers.

I was not ill raised by my parents at all. My mother would always see my brother's teachers first. She was in tears, not understanding why there were pictures of something I saw interesting, instead of the work I was supposed to be doing. She didn't understand. I got her wrath. My father, who was big on diciplined children, never got upset with me. He knew and understood me. I am quite a lot like him. He would tell me that I was making the same mistake he did and why, but I was too young to understand his words. I am talking about early grade school, not awful acting teens.

I did not find other students upset by paddling other students, as long as it wasn't them. I don't think it was a deterrent either. If I had to use one word to describe it, I would have to choose entertainment. It was always the same students, in my school, who got paddled anyway. It was normally done in front of the class as an effort at public humiliation, which they did in grand form. I never saw, through a child's eyes, that it deterred any behavior and often made the problem of the individual worse.

It is the one being paddled who never trust teachers or authority figures again. The audience actually enjoys it. I couldn't ever allow a teacher that was physically striking me to give them the benefit of conformity. I hated them. I resented them also. Not only did they inflict physical pain on me, but cause me to be a social outcast. It never did get me to do my school work. I completely lost what little interest I may have had hating the fact that I even had to be in school at all.

From my experience, this usually takes place in early grade school, decreasing use of a paddle as children get a bit older. Another thing that I noticed, teachers never took the time to evaluate what the problem really was with any student repeatedly paddled. Thankfully, I see better ways used today. No one, in the past, took the time or effort to bother to see what the underlying problem was with young grade school children at all.

I could have been helped, but only one teacher even tried. Again, I didn't trust any teacher at that point. The majority were disruptive boys. Many lived in my neighborhood, given it was a small school well before the days of overcrowding. I know for fact that the boys paddled, who lived in my neighborhood, were allowed out past hours the rest of us were. Most didn't ever have to ask their parents if they were allowed to go wandering off to play outside of what most parents found acceptable. They wore the same old tattered clothes.

Once you get on the paddling list for not complying, you were marked. I even got paddled in front of the class in second grade for not asking permission to use the pensil sharpener. There was no rule that any of us had to ask while we were supposed to be working on an assignment. Since I failed to comply with doing the work asked of me, other things were taken from me, without my knowledge at all, where I would be paddled again.

These disruptive boys in tattered clothing had parents with drinking problems, huge families with few resources, and a lot of factors I understand as an adult. I believe it was possibly a sign of the times. Parents were also quick to strike a child as the first means of action also. I believe that today, we have grown and learned, as a society. If you really want to create a larger problem with a child already displaying a problem at a young age, paddle them in front of the class. I never did see conformity out of fear. You get used to it, as a child, and really have no other choice but to attend the public school.

Adults change jobs, if they feel they are not treated in a decent manor. Young children cannot make this choice to go to a better school. I was not impressed with PTA when my son was in grade school. It always seemed like some social clique interested in fund raising. I do feel that parents need to discuss the needs of their individual child and expect co-operation between teacher and parent.

I still can't say all schools are flawless, but grand steps forward have been taken. My son is another school screw off. Most teachers did try with him. A few suggested Ritalin. That goes against my beliefs. I don't agree with drugging a child with something so powerful for performance.

I did have him evaluated by a psychiatrist who specialized in children and adolescents. He could not diagnose my son with anything. He said it was a problem of maturity. Children grow and develop at differing rates. You cannot compare your child to the neighbors. He did offer drugs, but said they were often not extremely effective with a child, with rules and discipline in the home, to expect much of a change. He also said counseling was probably not an option because a person has to wish to change for therapy to be effective. This guy isn't some quack. He has an excellent reputation, which is why I chose him.

He ended up being a high school drop out, just like my father and me. Thankfully, he was not put through the hell my father and I were. My father was put in a small closet with no lighting. They also forgot about him at the end of the day leaving him there with no lunch. I feel that any child with a decent home who fails to thrive in the public school environment is subjected to abuse, if treated like my father or me. I only wish that we had the variety of private schools that cater to needs of individuals, but most of us cannot afford this.

My dad is an old guy now. He got a GED and an adult HS diploma. He found the Air Force as a changing event in his life. He found he wasn't stupid, as those who fail to thrive in the public school are led to believe, as I was as well. I found a university the place for me. I went in with little confidence, thinking I was stupid because of poor grades and failure to thrive in public schools. I have a very hard earned degree at a university with high academic standards. I found myself outscoring quite a few college ready kids right out of high school in some tough classes. What a relief! I'm not so stupid, as I always was led to believe.

My son is far from stupid either. I'm not claiming any of us are of any superior intelligence at all. I am only saying that it is such a relief to find that you aren't as stupid as you are told because you didn't thrive in the public schools. You can't imagine what a poor self image this give an individual. You are fearful to try anything to further your education at all because you are not smart enough. You give up on yourself and assume others are much more intelligent and have more to offer than you could ever dream of because you are stupid.

Being paddled for failure to thrive only causes problems of self worth, self confidence, and the will to even take a chance on education not worth it ever again. There are also that handful of kids who need guidance, which they will never get at home. They need help too. Teachers have no idea where and what these kids lives are like, just known behavior problems. The school may be the only thing a few kids really have to guide them.

Thankfully, educators are more informed than in the past. There are different programs and personal counseling for kids with various problems to help them. Not that all will benefit, but so many do. The failure to thrive thing is still misunderstood. We lack alternatives for kids like this. They are more difficult than disruptive kids. I only hope the public schools continue to make efforts they are today and expand upon it.

I feel very sorry about what you went, but do not agree with you. Maybe they did not show it, but the one time I personally was exposed to it, it made me feel frightened and horrified for the child. I did not enjoy it and felt horrible for the child. My daughter also seems to be the type who can be empathetic towards others. I would not want her to think that teachers are cruel and to be frightened of them.

Linkat, I am not asking anyone to agree or disagree with me. I am only sharing my experience. Today, I am 40 years old. A lot has changed.

There are laws about abuse that parents have to conform to. We cannot strike our own children without being brought to court, many times, if our out of line kids screaming abuse. Parents have to prove themselves innocent, with legal bills through the roof over a ill behaved kid taking advantage. Don't think they wont. Kids do this to parents every day.

I would like to know what gives any singular teacher the right parents do not have without calling this abuse of a minor. Given current law on abuse, do we have to be credentialed to impose individual decision, without question of authority as to whether or not this is assault or not?

By definition, if I am remembering correctly, is any unwanted touch of an individual after making themself clear that they object. Minors cannot be held to adult decisions of assault. I will not give up the right to discipline my child, as I see appropriate, willingly to the decision of any teacher or figure of authority. I can knock the hell out of my kids myself, if I see it as appropriate. I have not yet.

If anyone wishes for their children to have physical force used as a form of punishment, I feel a legal document is in order for such an act. I would never sign such a document for my children. I am capable of physical assault myself and don't need a teacher to do it for me. As a parent, I feel it is my right not to have my children assaulted by a teacher for punishment. Let me deal with my own children as I see fit.

The reason I say this is the fact that once authority is given, it is often abused. I have seen it too many times to allow anyone, aside from a parent, who knows their child, to administer any physical force on a child. I am an RN. legally speaking, I am not allowed to even touch a patient or it can be a criminal matter, if a patient makes it clear the do not wish to be touched. If I pursue, I am guilty of a criminal act, assault. Ice cream works great to convince senile patients, but it is still not legal for me to touch them when they have made themselves clear they do not wish to be. If a senile individual has rights, why doesn't a sane child when presented with physical punishment, or assault?

The fact is, it is illegal for me, as an adult, to use force or even physically touch anyone I feel is out of line of conformity. I will be charged with assault, and rightly so. No one has the right to utilize physical force or unwanted physical contact on another, no matter what age.

The difference here is authority using illegal assault against a minor, but parents and the child have no voice, just one singular individual. As an RN, I do have authority to do what I wish with your elderly parent. Do you wish my individual decision to stand with no consult of medical personnel, even an aide, that knows the person?

I try all matters of convincing, but never lay a hand on anyone who does not wish for a needed dressing change. I can usually convince them, no matter how senile. Kindness and understanding are key, not punishment and illegal physical force on anyone, including senile elderly or children. I have other abilitys beyond physical force. I can call family and talk to them about the problem. I can talk to a trusted aide to convince them of what is in their best interest, if ice cream (just an example) does not work. Children should never be treated with a violent act in public schools.

Decisions on how to appropriately handle discipline, within public school, should and are multi-disciplinary. It is not within any singular individual's right to assault another person, no matter what age, without taking appropriate measures.

Sorry wildflower - the only thing I was disagreeing with you is that the other children would not feel for you. Not anything in regard to it being incorrect on spanking children or not. Seeing that was my concern for my daughter.

I do agree with the majority of everything else you stated.