ABSTRACT
Just as the New England Primer helped to define the methods of reading instruction for nearly two hundred years during America's colonial period, the infamous whipping posts of New England schoolhouses symbolized the severity of student discipline during the 1600s and 1700s. In fact, this corporal approach to discipline had a long history and reflected generally accepted attitudes toward children. As those entrenched attitudes changed in the context of America's educational transitions, however, the common forms of discipline also began to change.
