Next, at about 10 years old, was Spencer. We formed a club with rules, and we would spank each other for breaking the rules, using a short thick stick (12 – 18 inches, just long enough to span a boy’s bottom when held at the end). One of the rules was ‘no spanking’, so as […]
School Corporal Punishment History96
Historically, Geelong College has been the smallest of the great schools, and was the last of the six greats to be admitted to that grouping (in 1908). Again, this history is older than I would have liked (1961), and contains very little information on corporal punishment. But what there is may be of interest still. […]
School Corporal Punishment History40
Unabashed by post-Freudian anxieties about physical contact, the old propensity to hit boys was part of a broader enthusiasm for touching which let many masters throw a comradely arm round boys’ shoulders. In primary school boys learnt the ABC from Miss Hay (staff 1862-70) literally sitting on her knew. As late as the 1940s. Gilray […]
School Corporal Punishment History35
In the 1920s Edmunds taught writing to the Junior School with ‘a bunch of keys with which he chastized children’. In the 1930s Charles ‘Chassa’ Pawsey (1908, staff 1922-43) – fearsome in appearance and attitude, unsmiling and overbearing – used a ‘rubber hose to chastise for smallest infringement i.e. not knowing the answer to […]
School Corporal Punishment History34
A long ruler whacked down hard on a desk, and a manner that brooked no weakness, set the tone from the start. With a solid frame established, some mellowing would be possible, and learning could proceed. The military model of learning is said to be that ‘when you fear the instructor more than the task, […]
School Corporal Punishment History33
“Punishment for failing to learn a lesson has several intensities and purposes. It can be done as an example. Adam and Eve received no chance to learn from their mistake. The learning opportunity was for others. It is not by chance that such strong, pre-emptive discipline occurs near the start of the Bible, and many […]