up. i know challenger was a giant disaster for the space program. i want to wish the astronauts a good trip. i m sure everyone here is proud of you because you re very special, all of you. reporter: by launch time, the children now nervous with anticipation, gathered outside their school in the shadow of the kennedy space center. three, two, one, blastoff! reporter: as discovery painted a picture-perfect lift-off, children of challenger elementary formed one big pep rally. go, go, go! i knew it would make it. i had no doubt about it. it made it, guys. it made it! reporter: john quinones, abc news, port st. john, florida. really cool to see. yeah. cool side note. the crew up there got the first ever in the history of the space shuttle program live wake-up music on tuesday. that s right. it was from big head todd and the monsters, a big colorado band, but achieved national fame, of course, and they performed a version of blue sky and wrote the song at
launching this website and mobile app which he hopes will allow tens of thousands of young people to bombard lawmakers with e-mails, faxes and phone calls. this is what is actually used? this is a wooden board or a paddle. and this is the kind of divisive choice. reporter: we went to the school superintendent with photos of payton s injuries to get answers. how could this happen? we re doing a story about paddling in the school and we re trying to find out whether you think that this is acceptable. sir, i don t have any comment for you. don t appreciate the way you came in. i think you re highly unprofessional. have a good day. reporter: so, you re not have a good day, sir. reporter: payton s school says it has now stopped paddling. payton and his mom are not satisfied. they are suing. they say their goal is not only to get payton s teacher fired, but also to change the law. you know, you can t even hit a dog. you can t hit a prisoner. but you can hit my child because
he s putting up billboards and launching this website and mobile app which he hopes will allow tens of thousands of young people to bombard lawmakers with e-mails, faxes and phone calls. this is what is actually used? this is a wooden board or a paddle. and this is the kind of divisive choice. reporter: we went to the school superintendent with photos of payton s injuries to get answers. how could this happen? we re doing a story about paddling in the school and we re trying to find out whether you think that this is acceptable. sir, i don t have any comment for you. don t appreciate the way you came in. i think you re highly unprofessional. have a good day. reporter: so, you re not have a good day, sir. reporter: payton s school says it has now stopped paddling. payton and his mom are not satisfied. they are suing. they say their goal is not only to get payton s teacher fired, but also to change the law. you know, you can t even hit a dog. you can t hit a prisoner. but
welcome back, everyone. you might be surprised to know corporal punishment or the beating of children in school is actually still legal in some states. i think that will catch a lot of people by surprise. i had no idea, literally. last year alone, 200,000 children encountered corporal punishment while at school. as dan harris reports, some parents are now demanding an end to a practice they call child abuse. reporter: 13-year-old payton lewis is an honor student and an athlete, but payton says when he failed a science test earlier in this school year, his teacher told him to meet out in the hallway. he said, well, my daddy beat me. i beat my children. that s what i m about to do to y all. reporter: how many times did he hit you? just once. reporter: hard? yes.
makes me crazy. reporter: dan harris, abc news, rainsville, alabama. i think there s a lot of moms out there that probably feel the exact same way and are completely surprised to find out this can go down at school. seems like the parents would want control over who s physically touching any kind of way their child even folks in new mexico, that case moving there, a law gaining momentum. i think it s eroding but shocking how many states in the southern half of the country it s still going on. still going on. also shocking that this is still going on. charlie sheen. of course we have the latest. his latest rant goes on and on and on. we do have interesting details about who might be replacing him. stay tuned for that. while the search is on yeah, about his replacement. right, right. the skinny coming up. ght. the skinny coming up. ming up.