How should children be physically punished?
My mother use to smack me, hit me with slipper, wooden spoon. No lasting damage was ever done. My husband lived in Malaysia for most of his childhood. And it was common for any elder to smack if u had done wrong. He also got the cane at school. He has no grievences against the people that punished him on the whole. However for both of us there have been instances where punishment has gone to far. For instance when my dad left i was 6 and my mum took to slapping me round the face 5 times everyday before school ‘just in case’. With my husband he came home late once to often, which resulted in his mother waiting till he was in the shower and then walking in and beating him black and blue with a coat hanger. I can see the benefits of a slap on the wrist or the bum. However i think and generally believe that if you have to resort to screaming or hitting a child you have no self control and are in no position to be disciplining a child.
I dont think children need physical discipline alot of the time. There are far more effective punishments. My dad used to tailor our punishments. For me, he would take my mobile away- it was like losing a limb! For my brother, it was to stop him doing his fave activities like football, and my sister had a stage where she was a bit anti-social so her punishment was to watch tv in the lounge with the family (she would sit in her room alone reading a book). All of these punishments seemed to work for us! lol. However, now I am a mother of a 14 month old, she has recently started hitting me when she does not get her own way. She is still too young to understand what I am saying to her. When she hits me, she has the back of her hand tapped (enough for her to register it hurts bu not enough to leave any mark whatsoever) Since I started doing this 2 weeks ago, she has stopped hitting all together.
