Hey, I believe in corporal punishment - controlled, regulated, corporal punishment. I was caned myself at school - including a couple of extremely severe canings - and as a teacher, when it was allowed in my school, I used it on a handful of occasions.
But I also believe teachers have to stay within the law. You can’t expect students to follow the rules, unless you do yourself.
And doing something to a child that causes them lasting injury - except in defence of your own or anothers safety - does go well beyond what I think is reasonable.
Yeah. I understand. If you are a member of society, you must stay within the boundaries of the law, and there is no excuse for this.
Too bad about the kid.
Hopefully, he won’t be terrorizing anyone in the rest of the school or out on the street.
Yes. I was paddled in front of the class on two occasions for talking in class and clowning around in class.
I stopped clowning around in class after that. I will admit, I was lucky I didn’t get a dumbell to the head, just a swat to the rear. And not a gentle one, either. A full fledged swing from the baseball coach with what probably was a cricket bat.
I had a shop teacher put my fingers in a vice (we were putting fountain pen cartridges in the vise and squishing them) and he tightened it down pretty tight. I never made fun or personally ridiculed my teachers, and the disruptions I engaged in were things like talking out of turn and such. It was nothing like what this kid did, but maybe in that day, it was viewed that way, particularly in a DoD school.
The point is, all three of these teachers let us know on day one what they expected. And they openly advertised the penalties (Except for Mr. Stauffer...he didn’t tell anyone he would put their fingers in a vise) They let us know up front what would happen, and they backed it up.
You know what? I stopped disrupting class after that. And to this day, I respect all of those teachers. And they know it, even though I have never seen or spoken to them again.