Matt Heath: Use time out parents, if you're hard enough

Luckily, my poor behaviour as a child hasn't come back to haunt me, writes Heath. Photo / Thinkstock

I don't smack my kids but I don't have a problem with people who smack theirs. If that's what you're into, go for your life. For me it just doesn't feel right. It's a personal thing.

Not that it would work with my two young sons anyway. Our no-holds-barred wrestling sessions are so full-on they wouldn't even notice they were being smacked. Whack, whack, whack! "Nice move, Dad."

Time out on the other hand drives them mental. Humans under 8 can't handle boredom. To them, 10 minutes in a dark, cold laundry is a lifetime. It's a brutal punishment. When we debate whether to smack or not I think it's important to remember how hardcore the naughty corner actually is.

I know as a child I much preferred smacks - I may have even enjoyed them.

I once punched my sister, Katharine, while we were having a bath. I can't remember what the dispute was over but the punishment was severe. A naked time out. Standing on the doorstep, nude for 20 minutes in the middle of a Dunedin winter was a powerful lesson for a 6-year-old. I would have taken a nice warm wooden spoon over that nudie humiliation any day of the week. It worked too. I never punched my sister in the bath again. Although next time I did purposely pee in her direction.

The following year at Maori Hill primary I spent a day following Mr Henderson around yelling "Hey Hendy, where did you lay your eggs?" There's only so much crap a 60-year-old teacher can take from a 7-year-old.

Eventually, he was forced to throw me over a desk by my hair. Corporal punishment had been banned at that time but you couldn't blame Hendy, he was old-school. Sadly, it didn't work. The next day I was back asking about his eggs. This time he locked me in the resource room for an entire lunchtime. I never asked him where his nest was again.

The naughty corner worked perfectly where Mr Henderson's glamorous desk-chucking method had failed.

Several years later, at Balmacewen Intermediate, I threw molten solder at a friend during metalwork. He got badly burned and I got a ruler round the back of my leg. The next week I did the same thing and got the same punishment. I was fine with it. I got to do what I wanted and all I got was a bruise.

However, when I tipped all the milk into the flour box in home economics I received a vicious punishment - the rest of the term sitting outside the principal's office.

Two days in and I was begging for a smack, the strap, the cane anything to get away from the admin block.

When I was finally allowed back to cooking class I had been transformed into a model student.

All it took to turn me from vandal to teacher's pet was some hard time in time out.

My point is smacking, whacking and caning are wussy punishments compared to time out.

Luckily, my poor behaviour as a child hasn't come back to haunt me. My kids are polite, never talk back, clean up after themselves and brush their teeth at night without being asked. They even made up their own good behaviour rhyme "you get what you get and you don't get upset". I have never so much as threatened the jug cord.

They received serious hard time in the naughty corner early on. A series of brutal stints as 2-year-olds and they don't want to go back. Now all I have to do is point in the general direction of the laundry and they fall in line.

As a Kiwi parent you can hit, smack or slap if you feel the need. You won't get a visit from the cops. That's just talkback scaremongering.

The police are far too busy to deal with the odd wooden spooning. But don't go claiming you are some kind of super tough disciplinarian because you're a whacker.

Time out is what the really hardcore parents use. You smackers are soft.

Matt Heath co-hosts the Radio Hauraki breakfast show with Jeremy Wells and Laura McGoldrick, weekdays 6am-9am.

www.hauraki.co.nz