Photo credit: the Punch
Thank God some of my elementary school mates, juniors and seniors are on Facebook.
I attended Methodist Primary School, 13 Subuola Street, Surulere, in Lagos State. We knew the security personnel there as ‘Baba elegba’.
Roughly interpreted into English, it means the man who usually held a cane!
Unfortunately, the translation is not sufficient. That’s because the man wasn’t only holding a cane; he used canes a lot.
Who did he use canes on?
Pupils, of course!
Even teachers did not use canes on pupils as much as Baba Elegba.
Indeed, we were a lot troublesome then. But, if it had been today, would he have had that right?
In the past, there was this belief that cane didn’t kill children. And, in any case, who were we going to report to?
But these days, even secondary school teachers do not have the right to cane pupils. Only the Principal is allowed to. The principal may, however, assign teachers the responsibility of caning erring pupils.
But, when we look at it, is caning worth it?
We have seen several cases of pupils dying while or immediately after being caned.
Second, several researchers have concluded that rather than correcting behaviour, caning hardens the recipients.
They would know it’s not more than caning when they commit the gravest of offences.
The other dimension is that of parents. They are getting more enlightened now, and quite a few object to their children’s caning.
We’ve had cases of parents going to their wards’ schools and fighting teachers who had earlier caned their children. Some of them would even use canes on the poor teachers.
I would instead let the child see what they had done wrong. After that, counselling will follow. At the very worst, the children should be punished, preventing them from enjoying their favourite pastimes.
Play!
I’ve been in situations where the children had to beg me to beat them instead of denying them from burning their energies.
Corporal punishment is a thing of the past!
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