Strap will curb unruly students
Published:Thursday | December 17, 2015 | 12:00 AM
THE EDITOR, Sir:
In response to Sashakay Fairclough's article, 'Should school beatings be banned?', in The Gleaner, dated December 16, 2015, I totally agree that teachers need to have some form of handle in the classrooms.
There are only two kinds of punishment - physical and psychological - or both together. Either can be dangerous to a child, if not balanced properly. Everybody is clamouring for a ban on the 'good ol' strapping', and no one is suggesting a suitable alternative. How else will the teachers control those students that Education Minister Ronald Thwaites spoke about and was nearly crucified by the naysayers?
When I was going to school, I loved to play marbles, and if standing in a corner was to be the punishment for continuing when the bell rang, I would play marbles continually, but I always remembered that a leather belt is only nice around the waist, through the loops; but not across the back or in the palm of the hands, using force. Thus, I was never late for class.
I would like to put a scenario forward, and if anyone supply a suitable answer, then I will join the advocacy for a ban on strapping in schools or anywhere, for that matter.
"In a class of 20 kids, the teacher is administering a class test to evaluate her students, and two usually disruptive students sit at the back having their own disruptive party. The teacher tries to speak to them, but her words fall on four deaf ears and the shenanigans continue with knowledge that she cannot lay a finger, let alone a strap, on them, or prison will be the penalty.
The parents are overseas and the poor grandmothers are not even able, let alone willing, to administer discipline. She summons the principal, who tries to resolve the issue, but the
D-average students demonstrate their astute knowledge of physiology, particularly the reproductive and excretory systems, while throwing a few pieces of 'filthy cloth'? What does the principal do? Send them home to plant yam?
I do hope no one will say there are no children like that in schools.
DEVION LINDSAY