Children grow up and learn from their mistakes, but how do they learn what is right and wrong? The oldest method used for the disciplining of children would have to be corporal punishment, meaning through seemingly blatant abuse, by spanking or smacking, attempting to discourage a child from doing a certain activity, or even acting a certain way.
There are two conflicting sides to this age-old argument; one being that spanking a child, as punishment is a necessary part of child rearing. There are so many different sides as to whether this kind of "barbaric" punishment should still be used today on children. Some people maintain that it is out of date. If you were to try and raise the child even with the right morals, and standards, they would still sometimes act up, it is what children do. You can only say "no" and "stop" so many times, before they all but lose their meaning in a young child's vocabulary. But not many people stop to think how that kind of treatment will affect the child in later years, or even if it is even necessary. .
Corporal Punishment usually begins when a child is very young, even as young as infancy. Steadily, as the child begins to be able to think and process what goes on around him or her, abuse will climb, in the attempt to teach them those morals and standards. Statistically most toddlers are hit several times a week. How is hitting supposed to help them learn anything, when their brains are just beginning to recognize the significance of things around them? The average child doesn't begin to actually think for itself and have fully voluntary movements until approximately age two. Until that time, children's movements are purely from thoughts that have to be acted out because of their brain's inability to keep the thoughts inside, essentially the child has to "think out loud".
"Even in their late teens (ages 15 to 17), about a quarter of American children still experience some sort of a corporal punishment.
