16/12/2025
๐๐ค๐ข๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ง๐๐๐ฃ๐จ, ๐ค๐ง ๐ฅ๐๐ค๐ฅ๐ก๐ ๐๐ฃ ๐๐๐ฃ๐๐ง๐๐ก, ๐ฌ๐๐ค ๐๐๐ซ๐ ๐๐๐๐ฃ raised in a rather ruthless way often struggle with understanding other methods of correcting children.
They often confuse the role of talking when juxtaposed with flogging or caning in this matter of raising children. They mock those who choose to do more talking than flogging.
They make sarcastic comments like: "we can see the result of all the talking," when they notice that the child repeated a behavior that was previously talked about.
They hate to admit that flogging is not a solution to all problems, especially when a child is not constantly recalcitrant or perpetually notorious.
Their method and idea of discipline is primarily flogging, mostly because that's exactly how they were raised.
And while they don't want to let go of it, they try to tear down talking or positive reinforcement as methods of correction or maintaining discipline in children.
They say flogging has an immediate effect (which has proven mostly to be temporary in matters that involve a child's academics and emotions).
They say flogging immediately makes a child behave better. So when they oppose talking, they do so based on the premise that it doesn't cause an immediate change in expected behavior.
They really expect it to have an immediate positive result simply because it is said to be better than flogging.
Talking to a child, like any other method of discipline, may or may not work once or immediately.
It all depends on the child involved, the offense, and a lot of other circumstances.
Parents should understand that talking has a lot of emotional intelligence attached to it.
It's not just opening your mouth to say that the child should change their behavior. It's not yelling and yanking at the child's ear. It's not shaming or saying demeaning words.
It is communicating the child's offense in an emotionally intelligent way. This leads to finding out the cause or reason behind the child's actions, understanding the child's thought process, teaching the child to regulate their emotions, and teaching the child a better way to behave before deciding if the behavior is worthy of punishment or any other physical action.
Sigh! That's a mouthful. But that has a more long-term positive effect than flogging!
I will NEVER support flogging once there's a better way to correct a child.
Meanwhile, there's a thin line between flogging, or caning, and beating a child as an outlet for your outbursts, which in turn gives birth to brutalization or physical abuse.
It easily becomes a slippery slope because most Nigerian parents really don't flog in a regulated way. Once you flog a child and your intention is to exact your anger and make the child feel so much or too much pain, you've crossed the line.
I always take this stance. Paint this scenario with me. I'm an educator, and if I argued that I needed a cane to do my work, I would be expected to regulate my usage.
If I ever used that cane on any child and the child returned with injuries, marks, welts, and swellings, what would anyone say, especially if the child were younger than 13?
I could be sued for physical assault and abuse and pay a huge sum for damages. This is just to show you how much of a crime that would be.
Now as a parent, if you're willing to self-destruct by not getting your emotions together, the government in some other climes is willing to take your child from you so that you don't inflict the child with all your woes.
So what exactly is the problem? Flogging, as we all know, is not a solution to all problems or offenses from children. So why become an ambassador of such a method? I'm sensing something that borders on mental and emotional laziness.
Once you begin to flog a child with all your adult strength and anger against the โabominable atrocityโ they committed; once you cause huge welts and marks and pain that linger for days or weeks or a lifetime; once you begin to flog a child not just with a cane but whatever hard objects you can find; once you inflict internal or external injuries on a child's body and emotions, you have not only failed to regulate your so-called discipline, but you are heavily guilty of a CRIME.
Once flogging a child is done in anger, there's no discipline there anymore. There's only rage: raw, unfettered, sprawling rage!
The child learns nothing but fear. Eventually, all that rage will teach the child to adapt to such brutality and thereby cause them to normalize it.
You then create a vicious cycle in society, but let's not even go there for today.
The point remains that if you must flog a child, then it must be done very reasonably and in a regulated wayโa few strokes of cane on the palms or buttocks and nowhere else.
Now that feels ineffective for older children, and that is why other methods of correction exist.
Do your research and come up with the best method to maintain discipline and correct wrongdoing as it applies to your childโs personality and the type of offense committed.
Flogging has been used for what it's not meant for. Parents, it's time to focus on the real issues.
ยฉ๏ธ Tutor Precious
๐๏ธ The Premium English Educator
