Any examination of corporal punishment must consider not only how children were punished, but why.
The survey reveals an extraordinarily broad range of offences.
At one end were matters which might be described as ordinary classroom misbehaviour: talking, running in corridors, incomplete homework and failure to obey instructions.
At the other were fighting, smoking, truancy, theft and persistent defiance.
Yet there was no national scale stating that a particular offence should receive a particular number of strokes.
The decision usually rested with the school and, frequently, with the individual teacher.
Talking in Class
Talking appears repeatedly among the minor offences.
One eleven-year-old boy at St John’s College, Southsea, recalled talking after the class had been ordered to work silently in 1971.
His form teacher administered three strokes with the slipper in front of the class.
The pupil regarded the punishment as effective and stated that he did not repeat the offence.
Another account from a Catholic primary school describes one or two strokes of the cane being given for talking.
According to that contributor, classroom caning was sufficiently common for several pupils to be punished together.
These examples illustrate how an offence which might appear comparatively trivial could nevertheless result in corporal punishment.
Homework and Poor Work
Failure to complete homework was another common disciplinary matter.
Sometimes a warning or detention was sufficient.
Repeated failure could lead to the cane.
The same was true of unsatisfactory work.
A thirteen-year-old boy in 1959 recalled receiving four strokes from a teacher because of the standard of his work. He was surprised because teachers at the school did not normally use the cane.
He stated that he took considerably greater care over his work for the remainder of the year.
In that instance, at least according to his later recollection, the punishment achieved precisely what the teacher intended.
Fighting
Fighting naturally appears in many accounts.
Schools regarded it as both a disciplinary and safety matter.
The punishment could depend upon the seriousness of the fight and the age of those involved.
Sometimes both participants were punished without much attempt to decide who had started the quarrel.
This approach had the advantage of simplicity but created obvious possibilities for injustice.
The victim of an attack might find himself punished alongside the aggressor.
Smoking
Smoking was generally regarded as a more serious offence, particularly among younger pupils.
One twelve-year-old boy punished for smoking in 1969 received six strokes. Other pupils involved were also punished.
He reported that neither he nor his sister smoked again.
In this particular case, therefore, the punishment was remembered as an effective deterrent.
Truancy and Dishonesty
Truancy moved the offence beyond ordinary classroom disorder.
The pupil had deliberately removed himself from the authority of the school.
Dishonesty—whether cheating or theft—could be treated still more seriously.
Several recollections involving such offences resulted in formal punishment by senior staff rather than an immediate classroom slippering.
This suggests the existence of an unofficial hierarchy.
Talking might be dealt with by the teacher.
Persistent homework offences might result in referral to a senior member of staff.
Fighting, smoking, truancy or dishonesty could bring the pupil before the headmaster.
Was the Punishment Proportionate?
This question cannot be answered from the number of strokes alone.
Contemporary school authorities and former pupils did not always agree about what constituted a serious offence.
Nor did different schools.
What one establishment considered deserving of a warning another might regard as sufficiently serious for the cane.
The survey therefore reveals not a single disciplinary code but hundreds of individual decisions.
Behind every recorded punishment stood an adult judgement:
How serious was the offence?
Had the pupil been warned before?
Was this a first offence or part of a pattern?
And what punishment was considered sufficient?
The answers determined what happened next.
