Flash Back to the 1970’s

By Georgina, Francesca, Sophie

Do you believe in corporal punishment?If a child is naughty and let’s say, doesn’t bring in their homework, and then the teacher brings out a cane and uses violence as an answer, the child will just resent the teacher even more.

While interviewing people, we found that the majority of people said that violence isn’t even an option.

"We think that if the government brought corporal punishment back, then it would show that schools haven’t improved from old times. We find the subject interesting but not acceptable. We believe that there are other ways in which you could have been punished. For example, detentions or suspensions, though making sure that the child doesn’t do anything they would like at home. This source of punishment would just scare the pupils and not motivate them."

Alice and Louise, Year 11.

"No! I don’t believe in corporal punishment. A firm word or detention will do. I think it is ludicrous, and to be honest, we’ve moved on, and there are other ways to solve the problems. A detention or extra work would act better than corporal punishments. I would complain to my parents and they would be shocked as would I and they would probably sue or take me out of the school!"

Two year 9 girls.

The following interview is from a teacher which has first hand experience with these punishments :

"Corporal punishment is never the answer. It is demeaning and hurtful. It is out of date and is pointless. It makes the pupils scared to learn. If you need to punish a student, then you use affective methods such as, detentions at the end of school, but teachers need strict guidelines to control children. The teachers would feel like bullies."

Mrs Williams, Science teacher.

"I don’t think that resorting to violence is the answer. It doesn’t solve any problems. It teaches the student that violence is okay. I think that we have moved on from the time when it was used and we are far more aware of alternatives such as detentions, lines and phoning parents."

Mr fisher, Maths teacher.

"Corporal punishment is a cruel and out dated source of punishment. Corporal punishment doesn’t really fulfil any of the aims it is supposed to. There are other ways in which you can punish children for miss behaving, such as, a detention or removing privileges. When I went to secondary school corporal punishment was still in place. For the last two years I was at school, I had board rubbers thrown at me and other students were regularly caned. One of my teachers would turn their ring to the inside of his finger and hit you round the head. I don’t think that it really solves anything."

Mr Milner-Smith. Geography teacher. Second head of school.

"If you are a good teacher, you shouldn’t need to resort to violence. I think that behavioural management is a good way to teacher children a lesson. Detentions, internal suspensions and litter picking are all better than violence. If this happened to me, I would never do it again, but to be honest, I never really got any of these harsh punishments. When my brothers were at school, he was caned a number of times, so in the end he would add books to his bum to give him more protection."

Miss Fuller, P.E. teacher.

So overall, everybody disagrees with corporal punishment. If it were to be brought back into schools, a lot of people would have a problem with it. There would be a lot of complaints. All of the children would be scared to go to school. When it was allowed in schools, people didn’t know any better so most people probably didn’t think about it as much, but if it were to be brought back now, it would be thought as wrong, cruel and traumatizing. Corporal punishment should definitely not be brought back!