[Katy Benson]

I'm writing an essay on when corporal punishment was used in schools.
Do you think your behavior at school would change if you could still be smacked or get the cane by the teachers, or would you be exactly the same?

[MrJohnDClare]

Good piece of original research, Katy - I hope you get a few answers.
If you don't get many answers here, why dont you conduct a poll of your firends/classmates.

As for me, I think that discipline was better when the teacher could use corporal punishment.
One sort of misbehaviour you did not get in schools then which I see now is the cheeky little boy giving smart-alec answers to the teacher; 30 years ago, all that got was a clop round the ear, and they learned very quckly not to do that!

However, I believe it would be impossible to bring back corporal punishment now.
Children nowadays are VERY different from children 30 years ago - they know their rights and they are much more assertive. 30 years ago they 'took it like a man'. I think many of the tougher boys would hit back nowadays.

[Katy Benson]

MrJohnDClare, on May 27 2009, 08:24 AM, said:

Good piece of original research, Katy - I hope you get a few answers.
If you don't get many answers here, why dont you conduct a poll of your firends/classmates.

As for me, I think that discipline was better when the teacher could use corporal punishment.
One sort of misbehaviour you did not get in schools then which I see now is the cheeky little boy giving smart-alec answers to the teacher; 30 years ago, all that got was a clop round the ear, and they learned very quckly not to do that!

However, I believe it would be impossible to bring back corporal punishment now.
Children nowadays are VERY different from children 30 years ago - they know their rights and they are much more assertive. 30 years ago they 'took it like a man'. I think many of the tougher boys would hit back nowadays.

I agree with you I think it would make far too frighted of getting into trouble to brake the rules. I certainly wouldn't dare brake the rules if they could still do do that. Not that I get into trouble much now but a few weeks ago a friend of mine felt ill in class and the teacher said someone could go to the nurse with her and three other girls went with her and I went to. When the teacher found out we all got sent to the headmaster. The headmaster shouted at us and gave us a detention which was more than I've ever had before. I'm sure a thirty years ago he would have smacked us all for doing that and we would never have dared do it again, and probably wouldn't have dared do it in the first place knowing that that might be the punishment we got.
But I agree some of the tougher boys in my form would of needed more than a smacking, being tougher than the girls they would need the cane to stop them misbehaving. And I'm sure you're right that some of them would hit back as many of them are as big or bigger than the headmaster and so wouldn't take being disciplined by him.

[Katy Benson]

Quote

Children nowadays are VERY different from children 30 years ago - they know their rights and they are much more assertive. 30 years ago they 'took it like a man'. I think many of the tougher boys would hit back nowadays.

It's quite a funny expression to say that they took it like a man, does that mean they didn't argue or cry over being caned?
Were girls expected to take it like a man as well or was it more normal for girls to cry when being smacked or caned? I imagine boys would be laughed at if they cried especially by the bigger boys.

[MrJohnDClare]

Katy Benson, on May 29 2009, 12:08 PM, said:

It's quite a funny expression to say that they took it like a man, does that mean they didn't argue or cry over being caned?

It does mean that.

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Were girls expected to take it like a man as well or was it more normal for girls to cry when being smacked or caned?

I don;t really know how girls took corporal punishment because I never hit a girl myself. But I would guess they were not as brave about it - though some woul be.

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I imagine boys would be laughed at if they cried especially by the bigger boys.

They TRIED not to cry, but often they didn't succeed. Few people laughed though - most were sympathetic.

[Katy Benson]

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I don;t really know how girls took corporal punishment because I never hit a girl myself. But I would guess they were not as brave about it - though some woul be.

Don't think I would have taken it like a man, I think I'd want to cry as soon a the headmaster told me I was going to be smacked, I would just imagine that it was going to be so horrible and painfull. You say you never smacked the girls, so you did smack the boys? did you feel sorry for them when you did it? and if you have of had to smack one of the girls, might you have felt sorry for her and let her off if she cried?

[MrJohnDClare]

Katy Benson, on May 29 2009, 12:41 PM, said:

Don't think I would have taken it like a man, I think I'd want to cry as soon a the headmaster told me I was going to be smacked, I would just imagine that it was going to be so horrible and painfull.

Yes - but you are a lovely, gentle person, and not a naughty pupil at all.
You would never have needed smacking, even in the olden days!

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You say you never smacked the girls, so you did smack the boys?

Yes - but you have to remember that this was right at the beginning of my teaching career, when it was acceptable to use corporal punishment - the school I was at took a whole-school decision in 1979 never to use corporal punishment ever again, but to find other ways to control the pupils, and I have never struck a pupil since.

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did you feel sorry for them when you did it?

No. In those days, teachers did not use corporal punishment because they had lost their temper. They used it because it was one more technique of discipline. So they would do this and that ... and then they would hit the child - in the same way that your teacher nowadays might give you a consequwnce one, then a consequence two ... and then might send you out of the room.

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if you have of had to smack one of the girls, might you have felt sorry for her and let her off if she cried?

It would never have occurred. I would never have hit a girl for any reason, even in the bad old days.

[Katy Benson]

Thanks you very much MrJohnDClare you have been very helpful and I have a lot to write about.
Thanks
Katy

[Snorri]

I think we should bring back corporal punishment in schools.

In my experience all a teacher could do was tell someone to stop talking or give them a detention. If you didn't turn up to a detention, nothing would really happen. It was completly ineffecitve.

I think this is best showed by bullying. In the 50s or 60s if a kid was bullying someone they would have been given a caning and would probably have stopped. In year 7 & 8 I was badly bullied and I went to the teachers almost every day for those two years and nothing happened beacuse despite their continued promises to help me, there was simply nothing they could do.

The bullying only stopped when in an IT lesson I punched the bully in the face and broke his nose (much to my suprise). Unfortunatly he toppled over and hit his head on a table which knocked him out. I was almost expelled for this and was suspended from school for 2 weeks! If he had been punished by a teacher effectively from the beginning, none of it would have happened.

[MrJohnDClare]

Snorri, on Jun 5 2009, 03:06 PM, said:

in an IT lesson I punched the bully in the face and broke his nose (much to my suprise). Unfortunatly he toppled over and hit his head on a table which knocked him out.

Hurray!!!

Quote

I was almost expelled for this and was suspended from school for 2 weeks!

Booo!
We're on your side here!

[Snorri]

MrJohnDClare, on Jun 5 2009, 04:56 PM, said:

Snorri, on Jun 5 2009, 03:06 PM, said:

in an IT lesson I punched the bully in the face and broke his nose (much to my suprise). Unfortunatly he toppled over and hit his head on a table which knocked him out.

Hurray!!!

Quote

I was almost expelled for this and was suspended from school for 2 weeks!

Booo!
We're on your side here!

Cheers Mr Clare. I was originally told that the suspension would be on my school record etc, but my school offered to take it out when I threatened to go to the LEA and The Sun/Daily Mail etc wuth my story (which those type of papers would love)

[MrJohnDClare]

I'm a bit old fashioned about this.
I reckon that sometimes a young man needs to stand up and defend himself by force.

I also understand it when a young man uses violence for good; I once refused to suspend a pupil when he had punched out a bigger boy who had hit a girl. I felt that I had to tak into account the young man's sense of moral outrage at what had happened.

However, we both need to be aware that we are entering a world where all physical force is regarded as wrong.
There is even an offence now 'Grevious bodily harm without intent' - ie accidentally injuring someone.

Furthermore, you have to understand that if you commit an offence of GBH (ie if you cause physical bodily harm which breaks the skin) - even if you are only given a police caution for it - you are therefore guilty of a Section 1 offence and it is on your record as a criminal record..
And if you have committed that offence against a child - even if you are a child yourself - by the current state of the law - you will not be allowed to work with children.
So a young man nowadays really needs to be careful not to use physical force almost WHATEVER the situation.

And if it comes to self-defence, you must remember that you might need to be able to prove in a court of law that you used the minimum necessary force to do so.


So, whereas wemight cheer you morally, in practice you were lucky that the other boy's parents did not insist on going to law.

[Cyfer]

Snorri, on Jun 5 2009, 03:06 PM, said:

I think we should bring back corporal punishment in schools.

In my experience all a teacher could do was tell someone to stop talking or give them a detention. If you didn't turn up to a detention, nothing would really happen. It was completly ineffecitve.

I think this is best showed by bullying. In the 50s or 60s if a kid was bullying someone they would have been given a caning and would probably have stopped. In year 7 & 8 I was badly bullied and I went to the teachers almost every day for those two years and nothing happened beacuse despite their continued promises to help me, there was simply nothing they could do.

The bullying only stopped when in an IT lesson I punched the bully in the face and broke his nose (much to my suprise). Unfortunatly he toppled over and hit his head on a table which knocked him out. I was almost expelled for this and was suspended from school for 2 weeks! If he had been punished by a teacher effectively from the beginning, none of it would have happened.

Same thing here, got called a neek/nerd all the time until i burst and made a tiny fracture on someones skull with a padlock.

I too wish they brang corporal punishment back.

It works so well in some countries.

[Cyfer]

I'd just like to add (sorry for double post) that corporal punishment would be AMAZING to shut up some of the kids in my class. Not to sound like a snot, but they just don't let me learn!

To Mr Clare... I would have used physical force a long time ago if my school wasn't so strict. You can't push someone without getting a detention if a teacher sees it. Thankfully i get spontaneous outbursts the only reason my school pardoned me once for my outburst was because i am one of the best pupils in my year (not trying to brag), i represent their school at every national event etc etc...

I still wish they would bring corporal punishment back or all be as strict as my history teacher who i admire because she can keep the class under total control.

~Cyfer/Cipher

[MrJohnDClare]

What strikes me as very clear is that:
1. Hard-working, academic, clever pupils often have a hard time of it at school.
2. School does not do enough to protect them from the thugs.