spanking special needs kids

Post Reply New Topic

why is it such a consoverl topic, on spanking special need kids, ( not just austic kids)
people say they dont ubderstand what a lie

I got spanked when I was younger, and I can attest to the fact that it does work.

It may not work for every child, but you shouldnt go overly easy on their punishments either.

If you subscribe to the school of Operant Conditioning, there are basically three methods to modify a behavior: Positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, and punishment.

While prevailing wisdom and current studies seem to support the idea that punishment is an ineffective tool to modify the behavior of autistic youth, I can understand why some parents might be tempted to try it if other methods have failed. All children are different, and there may be an instance where punishment is effective, but for the majority of cases these parents will note the lack of results and move on to other methods. Failing to do so indicates either a lack of understanding of behavioral dynamics or a cruel soul. The former is far more likely than the latter considering we are biologically driven to love our offspring, but this does not preclude its occurrence.

If I may address the question more directly, then: It is controversial because we (society) view special needs kids as already suffering hardship and even a form of punishment by having a special need in the first place. Adding corporal punishment to that seems (to most) to be adding extra punishment to an already "punished person", if you will.

The parents are somewhat caught in between here, being unable to successfully modify the behavior of their child using what they know, they resort to their "last resort" and are viewed negatively for it. For this reason, social services and special programs exist to educate parents as to what methods will be more successful in dealing with their child whether their affliction is autism or a different mental or physical handicap.

Spanking stops the behavior, but it doesn't always teach appropriate behaviors to take the place of whatever the child did. For my child, I don't see for example how to teach a child not to hit by hitting them. Just like you can't scream at your child to calm down. To me it makes no sense and it probably makes no sense to them either. Not only that, I don't want my child to listen to me because he is afraid of me, I want him to listen because he respects me and what I teach him. I don't think spanking facilitates respect or learning at all. I think it's a quick and easy fix to the problem at hand, but beyond that I don't think it's really effective at teaching your child what he/she needs to learn. i.e. they don't "understand"

Personally, spanking never worked for me. It just made me more careful not to get caught. I learned nothing.

Ask yourself this... If you broke the law, or did something innapropriate as an adult would a spanking be appropriate for you? If your boss told you not to make personal phone calls at work, and you continued to do it, would a spanking be the way to correct the problem, even if you were written up a few times for it? Our law says it's physical assault. Why is it different for children? They have the same right not to be physically assaulted as adults do.

I do not judge people who spank, but there are many other ways to discipline your child. Where I get frustrated is when "time out" is considered inappropriate.

I don't think spanking is useful very often. It seems to make more sense to teach what you are supposed to do instead. I think I might spank a child who ran out into the road or something similarly deadly, but I've never been a parent so I don't know.

As a child, I had trouble connecting actions to consequences if the consequences didn't make sense. Being spanked for stealing a dollar from my sister didn't make much sense; having to return the dollar, apologize, and clean her room for her to make up for it would have made a lot more sense.

I don't know how many autistic people had problems with that as kids. What complicated it for me was that the misbehavior I knew was against the rules and chose to do anyway was all mixed up with the misbehavior I couldn't help, and the misbehavior I didn't even know was against the vague set of social rules I had no clue existed. So punishments seemed very random; and later on they were random when they came from a couple of stepdads who just punished me for no reason when they got angry. Eventually I just developed my own internal moral framework, and followed that; but that took until I was almost a teenager. It was easiest for me to obey rules when they were written down, and the consequences for breaking them were written next to them.

I do think that discipline for special needs kids needs to be tailored especially closely to how the child thinks. It's no guarantee that they can make the connection between punishment and misdeed even when a typical child their age can. It does no good to judge them by typical standards.

Almost unable to reply here because I'm shocked. Shocked that anyone still thinks it's "OK" for an adult to hit a child - any child - for any reason.

Where's the logic? Substitute "employee" or "significant other" for "child" - how would it go if you became frustrated with your assistant at work, or with your spouse, and reacted by hitting or slapping or pinching or spanking the person "to teach them" proper behavior?

Do you think people on this board would even be debating such a question if we weren't talking about children?

Does it matter if your husband is special needs or not, when you decide whether you will "discipline" him violently, or use another approach? Is it OK to hit someone you supervise at work who comes back late from lunch repeatedly - even though they've been told to come on time? Does it matter if the person has mental retardation or not?

I grew up in the 1950s-60s and hitting/slapping/grabbing/punching/hairpulling were all part of my mom's strategy.

It did not "work" for me and more importantly, it just isn't right. Which is why I don't use physical punishment as a means of controlling my children's behavior.

Golden rule anyone?

I don't think spanking is effective with any kids, whether they're "special" or not. I could go into detail, but I really don't want to.

Violance breeds Violance, the cycle is obvious to anyone who chooses to look

I'm with Hermier and Gramirez. It is wrong to strike anyone, much less a child. It isn't appropriate or necessary in any circumstances. There are appropriate ways to discipline a child which do not include physical violence of any kind. Teach and discipline your children in civilized ways, please.

I am against physical violence; that said, I don't consider spanking to always be a form of abuse. That is not to say it is without potential for it, or should be encouraged... but I look at nature. The mother dog/wolf snarls and nips at her little ones to keep them in line; the lesson learned by burning one's hand on the stove is always more deeply learned than the warnings against doing so in the first place. It is rarely appropriate, but I think we go too far in the opposite direction in the name of protection, that we throw the baby out with the bathwater.


M.

I voted that I don't hit kids.

I was smacked on an almost daily basis, sometimes several times in a day, as a child even until I was 12, with being smacked 4 or five times for one 'punishment' being the norm. It didn't help me understand what I had done wrong, it just made me scared and upset. I used to go and hide under my bed and cry most times. As an adult I still don't understand what I was smacked for for a lot of the time.

I couldn't ever do that to any child of mine knowing that all it would do is confuse and hurt. I would much rather the child understood what they had done wrong and why it was wrong. There are methods of making children behave other than violence.

This whole poll misses the point. Discipline involves nuances that the poll doesn't even begin to address. Clearly, the poll was designed to make a single point: special needs kids are not stupid. Well, duh, every parent here already knows that. But as information on discipline methods? Useless.

The reason spanking is not effective with AS is not because they don't understand but because it can send the wrong message and/or have the absolute opposite effect of what was intended. The root of an AS child's behavior issues are often sensory, so you're going to add another sensory overload to it? Good luck with that. It can also enforce the message that parents are arbitrary, and that violence is the way the world accomplishes its goals. None of the above will accomplish what the parent wants.

For the record, I don't believe in physical punishment for anyone, but I also know that parents who do have discovered what I noted above: it doesn't work well with most AS kids.

You can't put discipline questions into a sound bite poll, and the attempt to do so is insulting to OUR intelligence, as parents.

Sorry for being so harsh. I must be in a grumpy mood this morning. Better to take that out on a poll than on my wonderful children, right?

^Yay!! !

I was spanked as a child. Never out of anger, never without an explaination. It did me a world of good and it wasn't at all damaging. It is not violence, it us a form of correction and I've never personally seen an example where it didn't work.

However, since Billy is not my son, I will always follow his mother's lead and not spank.

I am an example that it doesn't work. It crushed and destroyed me as a person.