Discipline in the home/school (teens, child, students, high school)
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Very well said. Related to your point, the line separating the world of adults from the world of children needs to be retraced with a bright color.
Also, a clear sense of hierarchy linking these two worlds needs to be reclaimed in the best interest of both children and adults.
Children are not equals of adults, neither are adults buddies of children. Adults should get back their mentor hats while handing back the disciple hat to the child.
We would all be better of for it.
Absolutely. But that doesn't need to be done via spanking or paddling, and surely not via soap in the mouth.
My youngest are middle-school-aged, which is not exactly known as a time when children are at their most charming. But they manage to be respectful to the adults at co-op, to their grandparents, to our adult neighbors and random grocery store acquaintances (including the whole "ma'am/sir" thing and typically formal Southern forms of address) without having been smacked whenever they've been out of line.
"That Look", applied properly and especially in combination with "That Voice", is more effective than a thousand beatings.
I absolutely do not think a teacher should lay hands on a student. Ever. And if the coach wants to install discipline then bench him or let him run stadiums.
I believe in discipline and correction and instruction. All of which can be done without corporal punishment.
Ha ha. My son's coach told the kids that if they showed up to practice with their game jerseys on he would make them run until it fell off. My kids are super well behaved (others comment on it) and we don't hit them.
When I was in school throughout the early 70's to early 80's discipline was a fact of life. When at home, if I did something wrong, my father would punish me; usually with a belt. It worked. When attending school, especially high school, the coaches did most of the disciplining. Big intimidating paddles were not uncommon and was pretty much the norm. Any kind of foul language out on the football field got your mouth washed out with a bar of soap. Not fun, but effective.
Should we bring this type of discipline back?
Absolutely not....kids are human beings, not a piece of meat or a wild animal. It IS possible to raise good kids, and to use discipline when necessary WITHOUT physical punishment.
There should be boundaries and consequences when raising kids, but in my opinion, hitting a child should be treated the same way as hitting anyone else: a CRIME. Why is it illegal for me to hit another adult, but its not illegal to hit a child?
Personally, if I ever saw an adult hitting a child with a belt, that adult would need a trip to the hospital to have that belt sugically removed from their bodies. I have no tolerance for people who hit children.
Id be for it. Thats the way it was when I went to school also. No one was worse for it either. Apparently whatever is going on now isnt working.
What's going on now has nothing to do with whether or not kids are hit....it has everything to do with the breakdown of the family. Past generations had families....today's kids more and more have divorced parents, never-married single parents, they're passed from parent to parent to daycare center...there's no stability in kids' homes these days....
Oh, how I wish the boys across the street and my nephew's kid were urban legends!
Are they the ONLY ones you are talking about? Your original statement made it seem that the vast majority of kids these days are "uncontrollable monsters". That has not been my experience and my kids bring lots of team mates and and band mates home with them.
Yesterday I had 5 kids in my house. 4 HS football players who were REALLY REALLY hungry and my 11 year old son. The kids sat at the table and ate (alot). They brought their dishes to the sink. They said "Thank you for the lunch Mrs. Momma_Bear." Then they went out to the pool where they played pool basketball. They were loud, as would be expected from 16-18 year old boys playing competitively. They dried themselves off, had some drinks, changed and went off to their second practice of the day.
If they had been uncontrollable monsters I certainly wasn't going to be able to control them. The largest of the boys is 17 years old, 6'5" tall and around 250 lb. Then there were 3 others (including mine).
I understand that if you come in contact with kids who are uncontrollable monsters that they are frustrating. However, I do not think that MOST kids are uncontrollable monsters.
When I was teaching high school (at a school with 2,500 students) I saw 210 kids per day. I had 2 who were uncontrollable monsters. That equates to less than 1% of the kids that I saw. The others were not all perfect kids but they would not qualify as uncontrollable monsters.
Are they the ONLY ones you are talking about? Your original statement made it seem that the vast majority of kids these days are "uncontrollable monsters". That has not been my experience and my kids bring lots of team mates and and band mates home with them.
Yesterday I had 5 kids in my house. 4 HS football players who were REALLY REALLY hungry and my 11 year old son. The kids sat at the table and ate (alot). They brought their dishes to the sink. They said "Thank you for the lunch Mrs. Momma_Bear." Then they went out to the pool where they played pool basketball. They were loud, as would be expected from 16-18 year old boys playing competitively. They dried themselves off, had some drinks, changed and went off to their second practice of the day.
If they had been uncontrollable monsters I certainly wasn't going to be able to control them. The largest of the boys is 17 years old, 6'5" tall and around 250 lb. Then there were 3 others (including mine).
I understand that if you come in contact with kids who are uncontrollable monsters that they are frustrating. However, I do not think that MOST kids are uncontrollable monsters.
When I was teaching high school (at a school with 2,500 students) I saw 210 kids per day. I had 2 who were uncontrollable monsters. That equates to less than 1% of the kids that I saw. The others were not all perfect kids but they would not qualify as uncontrollable monsters.
I'd have to agree with this. My kids are in HS and college. Over the years I've seen a lot of kids between volunteering in the classroom (a lot), sports teams and friends. Some of them have been what I would call "a handful", very few of them were what I would consider "uncontrollable monsters". IME, most kids are pretty good..not angels but pretty good.
What's going on now has nothing to do with whether or not kids are hit....it has everything to do with the breakdown of the family. Past generations had families....today's kids more and more have divorced parents, never-married single parents, they're passed from parent to parent to daycare center...there's no stability in kids' homes these days....
Im not necessarily saying hitting, but discipline in general. I agree that broken families contribute to undisciplined children to a point, but I also know that past generations disciplined children including spanking where it is far less common today within families, and you saw well behaved respectful children. Now days, I see young children talking back to their parents, interrupting adults, ignoring direction and totally disregarding rules with no consequences. I have actually seen parents that think that behavior is cute. When I grew up we were taught better and knew better, if we had a lapse in memory a slap would definitely refresh our memory.
I live in the burbs. Hardly any crime, and the little we do get is *usually* petty stuff like growing a few pot plants in the living room, and an old woman who moved her shifter too far and drove forward into the ice cream shop instead of backing up into the parking lot.
The worst of the crime comes from the kids. M-80's not just on the 4th, but some kid living 3 doors away has been setting one off every saturday between 9pm and 11pm for the past month. Then there's the kids who drive those ATVs (which are illegal to drive anywhere in this town except on your own property) through the public parks, creating tire-sized ditches in the grass that the P&R has to fix so that the little kids can play. These ATV kids actually cut the chain to the fence section that opens, which exists just so the P&R can mow the lawn every week.
Then, there's the kids on skateboards who have decided that busy supermarket parking lots and gas station parking lots are the most awesome place to practice their spins and flips - even though we have an actual skateboard park that's free for them to use 2 blocks away.
Then there's the older kids in high school, who have decided since no one else is using that free skateboard park we spent a fortune to build for the kids who think gas station parking lots are better, they'll use it for their favorite spot to shoot up whatever the current injectable flavor of the month happens to be and leave their syringes all over the park.
The ONLY people who are committing these crimes, causing this kind of disturbance, behaving so thoroughly horribly and monstrous - are the kids. Not all the kids, but exclusively the kids.
Oh the point - the point is, it's the parents who are buying these kids their ATVs. It's the parents who have chosen not to discipline their kids when the gas station owner tells them to keep a closer eye on what their kids are doing. It's the parents who have raised their children to believe that it's okay to use public property built for the use of children to play, as the location of their drug parties. And of course, as long as Junior is shooting off illegal bombs in the back yard and not in the neighbor's yard, he's safe and watched and loved...
The ONLY people who are committing these crimes, causing this kind of disturbance, behaving so thoroughly horribly and monstrous - are the kids. Not all the kids, but exclusively the kids.
Well, I can just as easily say that the ONLY people committing securities fraud and tax evasion are adults. Does that mean all, or even a majority, of adults commit securities fraud and tax evasion?
ETA Adults have been responsible for some pretty horrendous things in history (much much worse than the monstrous crimes you've shared) but they've also been responsible for some pretty good thing too. How about this? We start judging people by their individual behavior instead of painting a group of people with a broad brush?
Last edited by maciesmom; 08-17-2010 at 08:19 AM..
How about we don't, and put the blame where it belongs; the parents.
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