Right: A popular method of disicipline is the "time-out" method, but even this is considered by some to be unnecessary. Kevin Donnelly has said that "time-out" can also be used by children to avoid work!
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Arguments in favour of corporal punishment within Australian schools
1. There are significant discipline problems in Australians schools
It has been claimed that Australian schools are experiencing significant problems in attempting to regulate the behaviour of their students.
As an indication of this problem, students in New South Wales are being suspended or expelled from public schools at record rates, with the latest figures revealing a 35 per cent rise in the number of times students have been sent home for misbehaving over the past five years.
Data from the New South Wales Department of Education shows there were 18,186 long suspensions in 2012, 1300 more than in 2011 and 4780 more than in 2007. In 2012, there were 12,922 students sent home for more than four days.
An analysis of the data from the Riverina area revealed that most students were being suspended for physical violence and persistent misbehaviour.
In an article published in The Courier Mail in July 2012, it was claimed that the education of well behaved students was being hampered by the behaviour of the unruly. Speaking in his role as a Queensland Teachers Union representative, high school teacher, Paul Cavanagh, claimed that politicians and parents needed to know the degree of the learning problem affecting well-behaved pupils.
Mr Cavanagh stated, 'You get these lovely, quiet wonderful kids who are interested, who want to learn, and as a teacher it is heartbreaking to think that I can't spend more time helping those kids get from good to better because I am trying to get these uncontrollable kids to learn a bit of discipline.'
Mr Cavanagh's claims were supported by the QTU (Queensland Teachers' Union), Queensland Association of State School Principals and the Queensland Secondary Principals Association all agreed that behaviour was a critical and daily issue confronting staff.
In October 2013 it was reported that Australian schools were ranked 34th out of 65 countries in an OECD survey that asked 15-year-old students to describe the levels of noise and disorder, the time it takes them to start working, whether they are able to work uninterrupted and whether they listen to the teacher.
The survey found that Australian classrooms, compared with those in places that achieve the best results in international tests, such as South Korea, Singapore, Japan and Shanghai, are noisier and more disruptive and more time is wasted as teachers try to establish control.
2. Disciplinary procedures such as 'time-out' are not always adequate
It has been claimed that the principal disciplinary procedures employed in Australian schools, primarily exclusion techniques involving 'time-out', suspension and expulsion are not effective.
Educational theorist, Megan Pilkington, has stated, 'students who are frequently sent to 'time-out', suspended or expelled do not necessarily change their behaviour as a result of the implementation of the discipline policy as is evidenced by the repeat appearance of particular students in this process. My observation is that these students become more isolated and are eventually excluded from access to education and academic success as a result of their behaviour and the response to it by teachers, other students, parents and eventually the community; and they may end up in the juvenile justice system.'
Pilkington further states, 'The Adelaide Declaration on the National Goals for Schooling in the Twenty-First Century recognises the role of schools in providing a foundation for the intellectual, physical, social, moral and spiritual development of young Australians. I believe that a discipline policy that may result in the suspension or expulsion of a student does not assist in the achievement of these goals because students are excluded from access to education in response to their behaviour.'
In an interview conducted on 2UE on July 16, 2014, educational commentator Kevin Donnelly stated that policies such as time-out are ineffective because students 'loved it because they could get out of class work ... they could just relax and meditate for a while.' He also commented on suspension, claiming it only allows students to avoid work and should be used as a last resort.
Dr Donnelly made similar observations an opinion piece published in News Weekly on October 16, 2010, where he stated, 'Schools need to have strict policies about acceptable and unacceptable behaviour and immediate consequences for breaking those rules.
Forget the time-out room and psychobabble about punishment being bad for a child's self-esteem.'
3. School communities should be able to employ the disciplinary procedures they believe are likely to be effective for them
There are some commentators who have argued that corporal punishment can be effective and that school communities who wish to employ it should be able to do so.
In an interview conducted on 2UE on July 16, 2014, educational commentator Kevin Donnelly has referred favourably to an earlier period when corporal punishment was more generally used and has argued that such methods were successful.
Dr Donnelly stated, 'I grew up in Broadmeadows, a housing commission estate in Melbourne, and we had a Scottish phys-ed teacher. Whenever there were any discipline problems he would actually take the boy behind the shed and say, "We can either talk about this or you can throw the first punch".
That teacher would probably lose his job now but it was very effective. He only had to do it once and the kids were pretty well behaved for the rest of the year.'
Dr Donnelly made similar observations in an opinion piece published in News Weekly on October 16, 2010, where he stated, 'I'll always remember teaching in Melbourne's western suburbs and being told by Greek and Italian parents that it was okay to give their boys a clip over the ear if they caused trouble.'
Dr Donnelly has further argued that the decision as to what form of discipline they use should be made by a school community. In his July 2014 interview he stated, 'There are one or two schools around Australia that I know where it actually is approved of and they do it... If the school community is in favour of it then I've got no problems...'
Liberal Democrat David Leyonhjelm has also supported the idea, saying 'schools should be free to manage their own affairs.'
WA Education Minister Peter Collier acknowledged it was still used in two private schools in that state. Though he personally does not support corporal punishment he has stated, 'In a free society, parents need to be able to make informed decisions about what they believe to be the best interests of their children.'
4. Many parents and teachers favour access to corporal punishment
There are significant numbers of parents and teachers who support corporal punishment.
In 2008 The Times Educational Supplement surveyed 6,162 teachers across the United Kingdom and found that 22% of secondary school teachers would support the right to use corporal punishment in extreme cases.
In 2011 The Times Educational Supplement surveyed 2000 British parents and found that 49 percent were in favour of a return to corporal punishment. The survey found that 85 per cent of parents believed teachers were now less respected than when they were at school and 83 per cent said they had faced stricter classroom discipline as children.
A similar survey was also administered to 530 British children with the result that 19 percent indicated that they favoured the use of caning or smacking.
As an indicator that similar views may be common among parents in Australia, a poll among Alan Jones 2GB listeners conducted in July 2014 found that 93 percent favoured a return to the use of corporal punishment, such as caning.
In an attitudinal survey of the Victorian public conducted in 2002 it was found that 75 percent of Victorians agreed that: 'Parents should be allowed by law to smack a naughty child who is over five years old.' (For children aged two to five, this reduced to 50 percent and below two to 16 percent).
5. Corporal punishment can be used in a targeted, controlled manner
Supporters of corporal punishment in schools generally argue that it would not be the first option used in any set of student management procedures. Rather, they claim, it would only be used under clearly defined circumstances and usually after other alternatives had been tired.
In an interview conducted on 2UE on July 16, 2014, educational commentator Kevin Donnelly referred favourably to the few schools he is aware of where corporal punishment is employed. Commenting on these schools, Dr Donnelly stated, 'They only do it very rarely. But I think we have to get a balance here.'
A 2002 United States analysis of wide-ranging data on the effectiveness of corporal punishment found that it was most effective in achieving immediate compliance from children. However, the data analysis also noted that the more often and severely such punishments were administered the more likely they were to have adverse consequences - such as child aggression. The analysis notes, 'The more often or more harshly children were hit, the more likely they are to be aggressive or to have mental health problems.'
Thus proponents of corporal punishment in schools argue that it should be used sparingly and in a carefully regulated manner to that it does not become one of the more commonly used means of correcting student behaviour.