The punishment of children in primary schools: A study of corporal punishment as a disciplinary method in Trondheim's primary schools 1890 - 1930

In Trondheim, one of the larger Norwegian urban communities, recorded punishment were administered to about 5% of the students in four primary schools in the 1890s. The largest number of violations that the students committed were related to school work, and from the school's point of view they were regarded as behaviour that might generally be characterized as 'sabotage' of school work. From the beginning of the 1890s and until the middle of the 1920s there was a steady decline in the number of punishments, and the drop in the numbers must considered very large. The proportion had already sunk to under 1% before 1920. The decline may be explained in different ways.