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Ohio Bans Corporal PunishmentWhen Ohio's children return to school in just a few weeks, they'll finally have long-overdue protection from corporal punishment (or "paddling") in their public schools. Last Wednesday, the Ohio legislature passed a ban on corporal punishment as part of the state's biennial budget. With Gov. Ted Strickland's signature, Ohio became the 30th state to ban corporal punishment. You can send Gov. Strickland a message supporting this move here: Corporal punishment is still legal in 20 states. It typically takes the form of students beaten with a wooden "paddle" or board about 1 ½ feet long, 6 inches wide, and 1 inch thick. The ACLU has interviewed students who were beaten for a wide range of misbehavior, from being late, to fighting. Students can be seriously injured by this punishment. You can see more in our report, A Violent Education. Now that corporal punishment has been banned in Ohio, children there will be able to learn in safe, secure environments. Corporal punishment is ineffective and abusive; it discourages children from learning and has been linked to higher drop-out rates. Better methods of disciplining children, including Positive Behavior Intervention and Support, provide safe, secure schools where children can learn. The ACLU congratulates Ohio in this important move for securing a better future for its children.
Tags: children's rights, corporal punishment, Human Rights Program
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16 Responses to "Ohio Bans Corporal Punishment" |
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Jul 20th, 2009 at 1:10pm
I believe we should leave corporal punishment to the parents, and take it out of the schools. Ohio has made a great move.
Jul 20th, 2009 at 2:04pm
It is not innaffective, and does not encourage violence. I had to "grab my ankles" many of times and I believe I was a better person for it. These kids are not "beaten" but given one swat in the behind. You're going to see an increase in disipline problems now that this form of punishment has been removed. This is why home-schooled and private schooled children are much better behaved than those in public "education", where the kid; not the adult, controls the asylum.
Jul 21st, 2009 at 8:44am
What kids learn from "corporal" punishment is that violence as a way of solving problems. Only those who succumb to parental and school bodily punishments are keen to advocate its usage. When punishments like this are banned and other sanctions are used, the result is more confident kids who will not perpetuate using violence on kids.
Jul 21st, 2009 at 10:02am
It's about time for Ohio to completely ban corporal punishment. Most school districts in the state had already abolished it years ago.
Jul 21st, 2009 at 12:33pm
Apparently Steve has never had a real paddling. His "one swat" story doesn't sound at all credible. If severe enough, which some are, they can be not only unbearable and indescribably painful but can cause permanent emotional trauma. I hope the article is incorrect about the thickness of the paddles used since the kind of paddling I referred to is often administered with paddles that are between half an inch and 5/8 of an inch thick. The lighter ones welt more and the heavier ones bruise more. I should know since I, as an adult heterosexual masochist, am in the minority having been on the receiving end of severe consensual paddlings. I acquired that proclivity receiving non-consensual hairbrush spankings when I was young. What I find truly bizarre is how people can reconcile advocating the non-consensual corporal punishment of children and at the same time claim that corporal punishment involving consenting adults is perverse.
Jul 21st, 2009 at 4:56pm
Tracy...If corporal punishment encouraged kids to perpetuate "..using violence on other kids", then our school systems back in the 40's and 50's would have had to be some of the most violent, crime-ridden institutions in the country, because corporal punishment was used as a common form of disipline back then. Look at public education then....and look at it now. Corporal punishment is almost unheard of these days, yet what is the state crime and violence in the public schools now as compared to then? Go into any good size high school and talk to the teachers who are physically treatened and sexually assaulted, told to f*** off, have to put up with gang violence and drive-by shootings, and they will long for the days in the 40's and 50's when common problems were paper airplanes, gum chewing, tardiness, ect. Sissy....it WAS only one swat, and I can count the times on one hand that I had it done to me, in other words, it didn't take long to learn my lesson.
Jul 22nd, 2009 at 12:11pm
hi, im a vet who has issues with the va and mental healtj systen of fairfield county ohio.my condition has been misdisginosed,ill treated.confinentuality agrements broken.denied phsy.tratement with veterns add. for 4 years and 3 case manegers.very tramitiesd,but wont trust the systems.need majore help.thanks
Jul 22nd, 2009 at 9:41pm
It's too bad this blog is set up the way it is and that the search engine works so poorly on civil liberties issues. The Categories should list the Articles and Amendments to the Constitution, the search should not have a cut-off of 1994, and there should be links to Citations or annotations from the ACLU's 100 Greatest Hits.
The issue here is (corporal punishment in schools) has a relationship to the SCOTUS decision "In Re Gault". Minors have civil liberties too. The Eight Amendment applies. The search engine had trouble finding Nadine Strossen and it seems like most of the records even on a Google search are missing with respect to Professor Angela Y. Davis. Apparently they disappeared along with most of the other subjects of Cointelpro. Maybe those Supreme Court decisions are classified now. If memory serves me correctly there was a court ruling that the right defend ones self (Pro Se) did not preclude the right to the assistance of council (i.e. in Gideon v. Wainwright). I thought that was one of the precedents that came out of the United States v. Angela Davis. The ninth amendment says that the enumeration of certain rights shall not be construed to deny others retained by the people. It follows therefore that one listed right (representing ones self) should not be used to deny another listed right (a lawyer as co-counsel).
Jul 23rd, 2009 at 12:48pm
This is rediculous, as is most of the ACLU activity. For now, they will support a ban on corporal punishment. Next, the ACLU will say a teacher can't put little Johnny in the corner for slapping his classmate, because little Johnny will be emotionally scarred for life. Nevermind the classmate and the bullying that will affect that child's self esteem and right to a harrassment-free classroom. Let's just say that all discipline belongs in the hands of the parents. That will solve everything, correct? It would if ALL parents loved their children enough to discipline, and we know that is clearly not the case. I'll pray for our schools, those children that need love and discipline, and for the teachers who have their hands tied. If you want some real insight into our public school system downfall, look at many of the trends since prayer was taken out in '69. ACLU, this is still one nation under God, whether you say it is or not. You have no idea how powerless you really are. God is still in control, and you cannot legislate against that.
Aug 12th, 2009 at 4:03pm
Steve and Mike, do you both eat red meat, just out of curiousity?
Sep 19th, 2009 at 8:26pm
The comment by Ms. Farmer that children will be able to learn in safe, secure environments now that Ohio has banned corporal punishment is, with all due respect, fairly naive. I am a special education parent advocate in CA, a state which has banned corporal punishment and has some of the most restrictive language regarding "behavioral emergency procedures" in the country. And despite the fact that in CA a special ed student cannot be placed in locked seclusion, cannot simulatenously have all 4 extremities immobilized either by device or manually, cannot have any intervention used on him that is designed to, or likely to cause physical pain, including but not limited to releasing noxious, toxic or otherwise unpleasant sprays, mists, or substances in proximity to the individual's face, the denial of food, water, shelter, physical comfort or access to bathroom facilities, verbal abuse, ridicule, humiliation or deprivation of one or more of any of the physical senses, I GUANRANTEE you that someplace, somewhere, this happens on a DAILY basis here in CA. I personally have had clients who have had their children slammed to the ground by an adult for behaviors that were a manifestation of their disability. To think that just "banning" these things is going to stop them is incredibly naive. We can never just sit back and rest on our laurels and say, "OK, my state has banned corporal punishment against students with disabilities, I do not have to worry any more, my child (and every other child with disabilities) is now safe in this state." We must remain constantly vigilent, and where we discover instances of this happening, we must shine a big, bright spotlight on it. Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
Nov 5th, 2009 at 6:12am
When I was in third grade my parents put me into a "private" school in an effort to improve my education. Sadly, my parents believed that the more expensive something is the better it must be. They learned that this is not necessarily so. I had been struggling since kindergarten with "daydreaming" and my teachers reported that I was disorganized and failed to pay attention.
So, perhaps smaller class sizes would help, and this so-called "Christian" school was given the responsibility to help me. So the nightmare began.
I remember the teacher getting particularly frustrated with me one day and taking me outside the classroom to stand outside the door as she questioned and berated me. One of her questions was about if I had prayed to ask forgiveness for my sin of being slothful. I hesitated and so she asked me if I had been "saved". My additional hesitation (I was terrified) gave her the answer she was looking for and she decided upon a course of action. She dragged me into the classroom and stood me in front of the class and told my 3rd grade classmates that I was a sinner who had not yet been convinced of the error of my ways and that I was continuing to commit mortal sins, including this sin of slothfulness. She then gave my classmates permission to do what they wanted to "help" me to understand that I was in need of changing my awful ways and turning from the devil to Jesus so that he could save me.
My classmates accepted this duty with relish and over the next 3.75 years I suffered at their hands.
This teacher was not done, though. By Christmas, she was disgusted with me and after discussing the situation with the principal they caame up with a plan that would be more efficient since they already knew how this evil child that I was did things. They explained to my parents that "spare the rod, spoil the child" was a sacred duty and that the only thing to do was to use the "rod" in order to save the child. My parents did not know what else to do, these "experts" in child education were telling them this is the only way, so they allowed it.
Every morning, just after morning announcements, my classmates would be given some work to do in a workbook and the teacher and I would head to the principal's office for my punishment of what I would do later that day (not paying attention, not completing my work, not being prepared, and not being organized). I would stand and hold on to the arm of my teacher's chair and I would be given 3-5 swats as my teacher counted.
My father had also instituted a rule that if I were paddled at school, I would also be spanked at home, so the principal would then call my father to report the number of swats and I would get the same after dinner at home.
This went on from the end of Christmas Break until school finally got out in June. Every single day. It was not effective, but it did lead me to my first suicide attempt just after my 9th birthday, I heard that someone had died after they swallowed a lot of pills. The only pills I could find were some aspirin, and I could not swallow them whole, so I chewed them up and swallowed them down, hoping that my miserable existance would finally be over. I vomited them back up, and my mother allowed me to stay home because of something being wrong with my tummy-she did not know that I had swallowed all those pills. I didn't tell anyone for years.
In 4th grade, my parents were asked by the new principal to take me to a psycologist to see if perhaps I was mentally retarded. The diagnosis was that I was highly intelligent but also "hyperkinetic". No suggestions were given because this psychologist was not a school or educational psychologistan he just did the testing. Unfortunately, this did not help things for me, it meant that I had been given great gifts and I was squandering them, I was not being grateful for these gifts from God. I clearly was on the wrong path and needed to be taught what was right.
My 5t grade teacher alerted my parents to some of the horrors of my daily life. The other students continued to abuse (yes, "abuse" is the word) me and took pleasure in hurting me. 5th grade was not as bad because my teacher protected me as much as she could. I was not paddled once that year. I did not flourish, I was in survival mode, but I did see that not everyone was out to hurt me.
6th grade had a teacher that did not get involved and intervene in the relationships of students. When shopping for Easter dresses my mother happened to see the welts from beatings that I had been enduring from other students. I knew that I deserved to be beaten because I was such an awful person and the students had told me if I told on them it would only get worse, so I refused to answer. My mother, because of the 5th grade teacher's warnings abut the other kids, started checking things out closer. She happened to come by one day and looked in the window of the classroom door when the teacher was out of the classroom and saw me sitting with my desk in the corner surrounded by some students. I was removed from the school the following day.
I continued to struggle all through middle and high school. I survived it. I was never paddled again. When I was in my mid 20s, I was finally diagnosed with adult ADHD. All 13 years of school had report cards (saved by my mother) with teachers saying the exact same things, it was a very clear case and the psychologist who had a background on educational psychology, said that it was one of the easiest diagnoses he had ever made. The testing results left no doubt at all.
I now take a little pill every morning and suddenly my world works right. Paddling me did nothing, you can't paddle a person's neurological system to make it suddenly start working properly. You can, however, take a person with an undetected problem and destroy their world by beating on them.
Those who got a single swat once or twice and "learned their lesson" or mended their ways or whatever, great, good for you. But, when this kind of thing is permitted, it can be abused and children must be protected.
If you are concerned that teachers do not have the tools they need to be able to control their classrooms without resorting to beating on kids, then volunteer to help out in your child's classroom and provide additional support to the teacher, raise money so that schools can afford to hire specialists that can get kids that have issues or even disabilities the help that they need, help to set up the kinds of programs that provide parents that are unable to provide their children with all of the discipline they need the support and or education that they need in order to be more effective parents, work with your PTA to support parents and teachers in their joint mission of raising and educating our next generation! It takes the underpinnings of a strong society to effectively shape a generation and sitting around in your chair saying that teachers need to be able to take a board and hit a child in order to solve the problems with our educational system is shockingly simplistic, and wrongheaded. Ohio can't even figure out how to fund our schools in a way that is constitutional! Adults hitting kids is not going to help, but it WILL, I repeat, it will cause harm.
Nov 5th, 2009 at 6:23am
When I was in third grade my parents put me into a "private" school in an effort to improve my education. Sadly, my parents believed that the more expensive something is the better it must be. They learned that this is not necessarily so. I had been struggling since kindergarten with "daydreaming" and my teachers reported that I was disorganized and failed to pay attention.
So, perhaps smaller class sizes would help, and this so-called "Christian" school was given the responsibility to help me. So the nightmare began.
I remember the teacher getting particularly frustrated with me one day and taking me outside the classroom to stand outside the door as she questioned and berated me. One of her questions was about if I had prayed to ask forgiveness for my sin of being slothful. I hesitated and so she asked me if I had been "saved". My additional hesitation (I was terrified) gave her the answer she was looking for and she decided upon a course of action. She dragged me into the classroom and stood me in front of the class and told my 3rd grade classmates that I was a sinner who had not yet been convinced of the error of my ways and that I was continuing to commit mortal sins, including this sin of slothfulness. She then gave my classmates permission to do what they wanted to "help" me to understand that I was in need of changing my awful ways and turning from the devil to Jesus so that he could save me.
My classmates accepted this duty with relish and over the next 3.75 years I suffered at their hands.
This teacher was not done, though. By Christmas, she was disgusted with me and after discussing the situation with the principal they caame up with a plan that would be more efficient since they already knew how this evil child that I was did things. They explained to my parents that "spare the rod, spoil the child" was a sacred duty and that the only thing to do was to use the "rod" in order to save the child. My parents did not know what else to do, these "experts" in child education were telling them this is the only way, so they allowed it.
Every morning, just after morning announcements, my classmates would be given some work to do in a workbook and the teacher and I would head to the principal's office for my punishment of what I would do later that day (not paying attention, not completing my work, not being prepared, and not being organized). I would stand and hold on to the arm of my teacher's chair and I would be given 3-5 swats as my teacher counted.
My father had also instituted a rule that if I were paddled at school, I would also be spanked at home, so the principal would then call my father to report the number of swats and I would get the same after dinner at home.
This went on from the end of Christmas Break until school finally got out in June. Every single day. It was not effective, but it did lead me to my first suicide attempt just after my 9th birthday, I heard that someone had died after they swallowed a lot of pills. The only pills I could find were some aspirin, and I could not swallow them whole, so I chewed them up and swallowed them down, hoping that my miserable existance would finally be over. I vomited them back up, and my mother allowed me to stay home because of something being wrong with my tummy-she did not know that I had swallowed all those pills. I didn't tell anyone for years.
In 4th grade, my parents were asked by the new principal to take me to a psycologist to see if perhaps I was mentally retarded. The diagnosis was that I was highly intelligent but also "hyperkinetic". No suggestions were given because this psychologist was not a school or educational psychologistan he just did the testing. Unfortunately, this did not help things for me, it meant that I had been given great gifts and I was squandering them, I was not being grateful for these gifts from God. I clearly was on the wrong path and needed to be taught what was right.
My 5t grade teacher alerted my parents to some of the horrors of my daily life. The other students continued to abuse (yes, "abuse" is the word) me and took pleasure in hurting me. 5th grade was not as bad because my teacher protected me as much as she could. I was not paddled once that year. I did not flourish, I was in survival mode, but I did see that not everyone was out to hurt me.
6th grade had a teacher that did not get involved and intervene in the relationships of students. When shopping for Easter dresses my mother happened to see the welts from beatings that I had been enduring from other students. I knew that I deserved to be beaten because I was such an awful person and the students had told me if I told on them it would only get worse, so I refused to answer. My mother, because of the 5th grade teacher's warnings abut the other kids, started checking things out closer. She happened to come by one day and looked in the window of the classroom door when the teacher was out of the classroom and saw me sitting with my desk in the corner surrounded by some students. I was removed from the school the following day.
I continued to struggle all through middle and high school. I survived it. I was never paddled again. When I was in my mid 20s, I was finally diagnosed with adult ADHD. All 13 years of school had report cards (saved by my mother) with teachers saying the exact same things, it was a very clear case and the psychologist who had a background on educational psychology, said that it was one of the easiest diagnoses he had ever made. The testing results left no doubt at all.
I now take a little pill every morning and suddenly my world works right. Paddling me did nothing, you can't paddle a person's neurological system to make it suddenly start working properly. You can, however, take a person with an undetected problem and destroy their world by beating on them.
Those who got a single swat once or twice and "learned their lesson" or mended their ways or whatever, great, good for you. But, when this kind of thing is permitted, it can be abused and children must be protected.
If you are concerned that teachers do not have the tools they need to be able to control their classrooms without resorting to beating on kids, then volunteer to help out in your child's classroom and provide additional support to the teacher, raise money so that schools can afford to hire specialists that can get kids that have issues or even disabilities the help that they need, help to set up the kinds of programs that provide parents that are unable to provide their children with all of the discipline they need the support and or education that they need in order to be more effective parents, work with your PTA to support parents and teachers in their joint mission of raising and educating our next generation! It takes the underpinnings of a strong society to effectively shape a generation and sitting around in your chair saying that teachers need to be able to take a board and hit a child in order to solve the problems with our educational system is shockingly simplistic, and wrongheaded. Ohio can't even figure out how to fund our schools in a way that is constitutional! Adults hitting kids is not going to help, but it WILL, I repeat, it will cause harm.
Nov 5th, 2009 at 6:26am
When I was in third grade my parents put me into a "private" school in an effort to improve my education. Sadly, my parents believed that the more expensive something is the better it must be. They learned that this is not necessarily so. I had been struggling since kindergarten with "daydreaming" and my teachers reported that I was disorganized and failed to pay attention.
So, perhaps smaller class sizes would help, and this so-called "Christian" school was given the responsibility to help me. So the nightmare began.
I remember the teacher getting particularly frustrated with me one day and taking me outside the classroom to stand outside the door as she questioned and berated me. One of her questions was about if I had prayed to ask forgiveness for my sin of being slothful. I hesitated and so she asked me if I had been "saved". My additional hesitation (I was terrified) gave her the answer she was looking for and she decided upon a course of action. She dragged me into the classroom and stood me in front of the class and told my 3rd grade classmates that I was a sinner who had not yet been convinced of the error of my ways and that I was continuing to commit mortal sins, including this sin of slothfulness. She then gave my classmates permission to do what they wanted to "help" me to understand that I was in need of changing my awful ways and turning from the devil to Jesus so that he could save me.
My classmates accepted this duty with relish and over the next 3.75 years I suffered at their hands.
This teacher was not done, though. By Christmas, she was disgusted with me and after discussing the situation with the principal they caame up with a plan that would be more efficient since they already knew how this evil child that I was did things. They explained to my parents that "spare the rod, spoil the child" was a sacred duty and that the only thing to do was to use the "rod" in order to save the child. My parents did not know what else to do, these "experts" in child education were telling them this is the only way, so they allowed it.
Every morning, just after morning announcements, my classmates would be given some work to do in a workbook and the teacher and I would head to the principal's office for my punishment of what I would do later that day (not paying attention, not completing my work, not being prepared, and not being organized). I would stand and hold on to the arm of my teacher's chair and I would be given 3-5 swats as my teacher counted.
My father had also instituted a rule that if I were paddled at school, I would also be spanked at home, so the principal would then call my father to report the number of swats and I would get the same after dinner at home.
This went on from the end of Christmas Break until school finally got out in June. Every single day. It was not effective, but it did lead me to my first suicide attempt just after my 9th birthday, I heard that someone had died after they swallowed a lot of pills. The only pills I could find were some aspirin, and I could not swallow them whole, so I chewed them up and swallowed them down, hoping that my miserable existance would finally be over. I vomited them back up, and my mother allowed me to stay home because of something being wrong with my tummy-she did not know that I had swallowed all those pills. I didn't tell anyone for years.
In 4th grade, my parents were asked by the new principal to take me to a psycologist to see if perhaps I was mentally retarded. The diagnosis was that I was highly intelligent but also "hyperkinetic". No suggestions were given because this psychologist was not a school or educational psychologistan he just did the testing. Unfortunately, this did not help things for me, it meant that I had been given great gifts and I was squandering them, I was not being grateful for these gifts from God. I clearly was on the wrong path and needed to be taught what was right.
My 5t grade teacher alerted my parents to some of the horrors of my daily life. The other students continued to abuse (yes, "abuse" is the word) me and took pleasure in hurting me. 5th grade was not as bad because my teacher protected me as much as she could. I was not paddled once that year. I did not flourish, I was in survival mode, but I did see that not everyone was out to hurt me.
6th grade had a teacher that did not get involved and intervene in the relationships of students. When shopping for Easter dresses my mother happened to see the welts from beatings that I had been enduring from other students. I knew that I deserved to be beaten because I was such an awful person and the students had told me if I told on them it would only get worse, so I refused to answer. My mother, because of the 5th grade teacher's warnings abut the other kids, started checking things out closer. She happened to come by one day and looked in the window of the classroom door when the teacher was out of the classroom and saw me sitting with my desk in the corner surrounded by some students. I was removed from the school the following day.
I continued to struggle all through middle and high school. I survived it. I was never paddled again. When I was in my mid 20s, I was finally diagnosed with adult ADHD. All 13 years of school had report cards (saved by my mother) with teachers saying the exact same things, it was a very clear case and the psychologist who had a background on educational psychology, said that it was one of the easiest diagnoses he had ever made. The testing results left no doubt at all.
I now take a little pill every morning and suddenly my world works right. Paddling me did nothing, you can't paddle a person's neurological system to make it suddenly start working properly. You can, however, take a person with an undetected problem and destroy their world by beating on them.
Those who got a single swat once or twice and "learned their lesson" or mended their ways or whatever, great, good for you. But, when this kind of thing is permitted, it can be abused and children must be protected.
If you are concerned that teachers do not have the tools they need to be able to control their classrooms without resorting to beating on kids, then volunteer to help out in your child's classroom and provide additional support to the teacher, raise money so that schools can afford to hire specialists that can get kids that have issues or even disabilities the help that they need, help to set up the kinds of programs that provide parents that are unable to provide their children with all of the discipline they need the support and or education that they need in order to be more effective parents, work with your PTA to support parents and teachers in their joint mission of raising and educating our next generation! It takes the underpinnings of a strong society to effectively shape a generation and sitting around in your chair saying that teachers need to be able to take a board and hit a child in order to solve the problems with our educational system is shockingly simplistic, and wrongheaded. Ohio can't even figure out how to fund our schools in a way that is constitutional! Adults hitting kids is not going to help, but it WILL, I repeat, it will cause harm.
Nov 5th, 2009 at 9:04am
When I was in third grade my parents put me into a "private" school in an effort to improve my education. Sadly, my parents believed that the more expensive something is the better it must be. They learned that this is not necessarily so. I had been struggling since kindergarten with "daydreaming" and my teachers reported that I was disorganized and failed to pay attention.
So, perhaps smaller class sizes would help, and this so-called "Christian" school was given the responsibility to help me. So the nightmare began.
I remember the teacher getting particularly frustrated with me one day and taking me outside the classroom to stand outside the door as she questioned and berated me. One of her questions was about if I had prayed to ask forgiveness for my sin of being slothful. I hesitated and so she asked me if I had been "saved". My additional hesitation (I was terrified) gave her the answer she was looking for and she decided upon a course of action. She dragged me into the classroom and stood me in front of the class and told my 3rd grade classmates that I was a sinner who had not yet been convinced of the error of my ways and that I was continuing to commit mortal sins, including this sin of slothfulness. She then gave my classmates permission to do what they wanted to "help" me to understand that I was in need of changing my awful ways and turning from the devil to Jesus so that he could save me.
My classmates accepted this duty with relish and over the next 3.75 years I suffered at their hands.
This teacher was not done, though. By Christmas, she was disgusted with me and after discussing the situation with the principal they caame up with a plan that would be more efficient since they already knew how this evil child that I was did things. They explained to my parents that "spare the rod, spoil the child" was a sacred duty and that the only thing to do was to use the "rod" in order to save the child. My parents did not know what else to do, these "experts" in child education were telling them this is the only way, so they allowed it.
Every morning, just after morning announcements, my classmates would be given some work to do in a workbook and the teacher and I would head to the principal's office for my punishment of what I would do later that day (not paying attention, not completing my work, not being prepared, and not being organized). I would stand and hold on to the arm of my teacher's chair and I would be given 3-5 swats as my teacher counted.
My father had also instituted a rule that if I were paddled at school, I would also be spanked at home, so the principal would then call my father to report the number of swats and I would get the same after dinner at home.
This went on from the end of Christmas Break until school finally got out in June. Every single day. It was not effective, but it did lead me to my first suicide attempt just after my 9th birthday, I heard that someone had died after they swallowed a lot of pills. The only pills I could find were some aspirin, and I could not swallow them whole, so I chewed them up and swallowed them down, hoping that my miserable existance would finally be over. I vomited them back up, and my mother allowed me to stay home because of something being wrong with my tummy-she did not know that I had swallowed all those pills. I didn't tell anyone for years.
In 4th grade, my parents were asked by the new principal to take me to a psycologist to see if perhaps I was mentally retarded. The diagnosis was that I was highly intelligent but also "hyperkinetic". No suggestions were given because this psychologist was not a school or educational psychologistan he just did the testing. Unfortunately, this did not help things for me, it meant that I had been given great gifts and I was squandering them, I was not being grateful for these gifts from God. I clearly was on the wrong path and needed to be taught what was right.
My 5t grade teacher alerted my parents to some of the horrors of my daily life. The other students continued to abuse (yes, "abuse" is the word) me and took pleasure in hurting me. 5th grade was not as bad because my teacher protected me as much as she could. I was not paddled once that year. I did not flourish, I was in survival mode, but I did see that not everyone was out to hurt me.
6th grade had a teacher that did not get involved and intervene in the relationships of students. When shopping for Easter dresses my mother happened to see the welts from beatings that I had been enduring from other students. I knew that I deserved to be beaten because I was such an awful person and the students had told me if I told on them it would only get worse, so I refused to answer. My mother, because of the 5th grade teacher's warnings abut the other kids, started checking things out closer. She happened to come by one day and looked in the window of the classroom door when the teacher was out of the classroom and saw me sitting with my desk in the corner surrounded by some students. I was removed from the school the following day.
I continued to struggle all through middle and high school. I survived it. I was never paddled again. When I was in my mid 20s, I was finally diagnosed with adult ADHD. All 13 years of school had report cards (saved by my mother) with teachers saying the exact same things, it was a very clear case and the psychologist who had a background on educational psychology, said that it was one of the easiest diagnoses he had ever made. The testing results left no doubt at all.
I now take a little pill every morning and suddenly my world works right. Paddling me did nothing, you can't paddle a person's neurological system to make it suddenly start working properly. You can, however, take a person with an undetected problem and destroy their world by beating on them.
Those who got a single swat once or twice and "learned their lesson" or mended their ways or whatever, great, good for you. But, when this kind of thing is permitted, it can be abused and children must be protected.
If you are concerned that teachers do not have the tools they need to be able to control their classrooms without resorting to beating on kids, then volunteer to help out in your child's classroom and provide additional support to the teacher, raise money so that schools can afford to hire specialists that can get kids that have issues or even disabilities the help that they need, help to set up the kinds of programs that provide parents that are unable to provide their children with all of the discipline they need the support and or education that they need in order to be more effective parents, work with your PTA to support parents and teachers in their joint mission of raising and educating our next generation! It takes the underpinnings of a strong society to effectively shape a generation and sitting around in your chair saying that teachers need to be able to take a board and hit a child in order to solve the problems with our educational system is shockingly simplistic, and wrongheaded. Ohio can't even figure out how to fund our schools in a way that is constitutional! Adults hitting kids is not going to help, but it WILL, I repeat, it will cause harm.
Nov 5th, 2009 at 9:09am
When I was in third grade my parents put me into a "private" school in an effort to improve my education. Sadly, my parents believed that the more expensive something is the better it must be. They learned that this is not necessarily so. I had been struggling since kindergarten with "daydreaming" and my teachers reported that I was disorganized and failed to pay attention.
So, perhaps smaller class sizes would help, and this so-called "Christian" school was given the responsibility to help me. So the nightmare began.
I remember the teacher getting particularly frustrated with me one day and taking me outside the classroom to stand outside the door as she questioned and berated me. One of her questions was about if I had prayed to ask forgiveness for my sin of being slothful. I hesitated and so she asked me if I had been "saved". My additional hesitation (I was terrified) gave her the answer she was looking for and she decided upon a course of action. She dragged me into the classroom and stood me in front of the class and told my 3rd grade classmates that I was a sinner who had not yet been convinced of the error of my ways and that I was continuing to commit mortal sins, including this sin of slothfulness. She then gave my classmates permission to do what they wanted to "help" me to understand that I was in need of changing my awful ways and turning from the devil to Jesus so that he could save me.
My classmates accepted this duty with relish and over the next 3.75 years I suffered at their hands.
This teacher was not done, though. By Christmas, she was disgusted with me and after discussing the situation with the principal they caame up with a plan that would be more efficient since they already knew how this evil child that I was did things. They explained to my parents that "spare the rod, spoil the child" was a sacred duty and that the only thing to do was to use the "rod" in order to save the child. My parents did not know what else to do, these "experts" in child education were telling them this is the only way, so they allowed it.
Every morning, just after morning announcements, my classmates would be given some work to do in a workbook and the teacher and I would head to the principal's office for my punishment of what I would do later that day (not paying attention, not completing my work, not being prepared, and not being organized). I would stand and hold on to the arm of my teacher's chair and I would be given 3-5 swats as my teacher counted.
My father had also instituted a rule that if I were paddled at school, I would also be spanked at home, so the principal would then call my father to report the number of swats and I would get the same after dinner at home.
This went on from the end of Christmas Break until school finally got out in June. Every single day. It was not effective, but it did lead me to my first suicide attempt just after my 9th birthday, I heard that someone had died after they swallowed a lot of pills. The only pills I could find were some aspirin, and I could not swallow them whole, so I chewed them up and swallowed them down, hoping that my miserable existance would finally be over. I vomited them back up, and my mother allowed me to stay home because of something being wrong with my tummy-she did not know that I had swallowed all those pills. I didn't tell anyone for years.
In 4th grade, my parents were asked by the new principal to take me to a psycologist to see if perhaps I was mentally retarded. The diagnosis was that I was highly intelligent but also "hyperkinetic". No suggestions were given because this psychologist was not a school or educational psychologistan he just did the testing. Unfortunately, this did not help things for me, it meant that I had been given great gifts and I was squandering them, I was not being grateful for these gifts from God. I clearly was on the wrong path and needed to be taught what was right.
My 5t grade teacher alerted my parents to some of the horrors of my daily life. The other students continued to abuse (yes, "abuse" is the word) me and took pleasure in hurting me. 5th grade was not as bad because my teacher protected me as much as she could. I was not paddled once that year. I did not flourish, I was in survival mode, but I did see that not everyone was out to hurt me.
6th grade had a teacher that did not get involved and intervene in the relationships of students. When shopping for Easter dresses my mother happened to see the welts from beatings that I had been enduring from other students. I knew that I deserved to be beaten because I was such an awful person and the students had told me if I told on them it would only get worse, so I refused to answer. My mother, because of the 5th grade teacher's warnings abut the other kids, started checking things out closer. She happened to come by one day and looked in the window of the classroom door when the teacher was out of the classroom and saw me sitting with my desk in the corner surrounded by some students. I was removed from the school the following day.
I continued to struggle all through middle and high school. I survived it. I was never paddled again. When I was in my mid 20s, I was finally diagnosed with adult ADHD. All 13 years of school had report cards (saved by my mother) with teachers saying the exact same things, it was a very clear case and the psychologist who had a background on educational psychology, said that it was one of the easiest diagnoses he had ever made. The testing results left no doubt at all.
I now take a little pill every morning and suddenly my world works right. Paddling me did nothing, you can't paddle a person's neurological system to make it suddenly start working properly. You can, however, take a person with an undetected problem and destroy their world by beating on them.
Those who got a single swat once or twice and "learned their lesson" or mended their ways or whatever, great, good for you. But, when this kind of thing is permitted, it can be abused and children must be protected.
If you are concerned that teachers do not have the tools they need to be able to control their classrooms without resorting to beating on kids, then volunteer to help out in your child's classroom and provide additional support to the teacher, raise money so that schools can afford to hire specialists that can get kids that have issues or even disabilities the help that they need, help to set up the kinds of programs that provide parents that are unable to provide their children with all of the discipline they need the support and or education that they need in order to be more effective parents, work with your PTA to support parents and teachers in their joint mission of raising and educating our next generation! It takes the underpinnings of a strong society to effectively shape a generation and sitting around in your chair saying that teachers need to be able to take a board and hit a child in order to solve the problems with our educational system is shockingly simplistic, and wrongheaded. Ohio can't even figure out how to fund our schools in a way that is constitutional! Adults hitting kids is not going to help, but it WILL, I repeat, it will cause harm.