Slightly unusual one this month but bear with me. I will emphasise that this a posed photo using a model and not the real thing. Why did I pick it?
Well all in all I attended six different schools while growing up (parents kept moving - it wasn't me being disruptive!) and each had their own individual discipline policies. School number four was quite interesting because there was a lot of classroom based corporal punishment. The reality, looking back, was that little of it was meant to really hurt, and it was just a way for the teachers to say you were pushing the limits and to encourage you to back off a little. There were only three year groups and two classes per year so six classrooms arranged around a central hallway where we had lockers and so on. The headmaster was class teacher for one of the final year classes and was probably the one who was most frequently seen to administer a "beating" - in reality not much more than a single whack on the behind with a stick that probably caused a small tingle. The "punishment" was the embarrassment at being called out in front of your peers, ordered to touch your toes and then thank him when you were allowed to stand up again to return to your seat. Other teachers had their own little quirks and used corporal punishment more infrequently. Other times they might make someone stand in the corner or stand on your chair or...
...make you leave the classroom and stand outside - often for the remainder of the lesson, so you could be there for some time. Superficially this seemed like a nice option, especially if two managed to get sent out, because so long as they kept it quiet they could chat away and avoid the tedium of the lesson. But there was a twist. If the headmaster had a bit of free time on his hands he might venture out of his room and have a quick wander around the hall and if he found someone who'd been sent out he would deal with them in his favoured fashion.
When I saw this picture I immediately thought of a similar situation but perhaps with a headmistress who takes to prowling the corridors at random with a large plimsoll in her hand. Then anyone found to have been sent out of class for talking or other disruptive behaviour would have nowhere to hide. The headmistress would go over to the miscreant, demand an explanation of why she had been sent out, and depending on the normal behaviour of this pupil and the explanation provided she would instruct the girl to bend over and then deliver one, two or even four heavy whack across the girl's bottom. Everyone in the classroom would hear the sounds and know what was happening. The chances are that the girl would, by now, be very red-faced and crying but the headmistress would knock on the classroom door and tell the class teacher that she wouldn't have any more disruption from the girl in this class so she would be pushed back into the room to suffer the shame of all her friends seeing her.
Every one sent out of class would stand there in fear of hearing footsteps coming along the corridor and even if the headmistress ventured out only rarely, it made the whole thing of being sent out of class much more of a punishment.
