Spanking in Public Schools

I came across this article in the New York Times this morning about how disabled students are spanked more.

I wouldn't necessarily consider myself disabled, but I had an incident as a first grader where my teacher spanked me for no good reason. As a result of my JRA, it is harder for me to sit criss-cross-applesauce as was customary to do in our class. My teachers had been informed on what was going on with my body. Unfortunately, one of my teachers either didn't understand or didn't care.

We came in from recess one day and I was exhausted. Instead of coming in and sitting the customary way on the floor mat, I had my legs to the side of my body, which I could usually get away with in my other class if we sat on the floor. This even hurt, so I laid down on my side on the floor. A classmate tried to warn me to sit the right way, but I told her how much it hurt and that I just couldn't do it. Then the teacher came in. She was a middle-aged woman from Japan who had happily moved to the northwest in order to teach at this Japanese-immersion school. She was very upset that I was not following the rules. I tried to explain to her how painful it was to sit the normal way and how tired and achy my poor little body was. All she seemed to care about was that I was breaking the rules and then being argumentative about it. So she lifted me up by one arm and preceded to spank me in front of my classmates.

She put me down and told me to sit the right way. I was crying so hard between the embarrassment and the pain in my bottom and my knees as I bent them to match the other kids.

For kids who can't follow the rules because of physical limitations or for those who don't quite understand the directions, spanking is a terrifying experience. I was in terrible pain to begin with, but to have to go through being spanked and humiliated in front of my friends as well as having to bend my knees - the thing I was trying to avoid because of the pain - was not only annoying but ridiculous as well. Any sort of physical punishment should be outlawed in our schools. Teachers are people too - people who lose their temper or misunderstand situations. We should be able to put a certain amount of trust in them, but trusting them to physically punish our children correctly is a mistake and one that can scar someone for life.