Were Jesus, Mary and Joseph really Jewish?

One of the most certain biographical details that we know about Jesus of Nazareth is that he was Jewish, born of Jewish parents. The Jewish identity of the Messiah is such an important aspect of the Jews' expectation of the Messiah that it is unthinkable that anyone other than a Jew should have been recognized by his contemporaries as the Messiah. The genealogy of Jesus that is given in Matthew's Gospel may contain certain historical inaccuracies (it has clearly been carefully constructed by Matthew to make his theological point), but it is beyond dispute that such a document only makes sense if Jesus and both of his parents were in fact Jews--and recognized as such by their contemporaries.

Did Mary and Joseph ever have to punish Jesus?

Children have a natural and very healthy curiosity about the childhood of Jesus. They wish to identify with him and want to know details about his life that simply are not available to us from the Gospels or other historical records. In their own way, children who ask such questions are grappling with the doctrine of the Incarnation, trying to understand what it means that Jesus was fully divine and yet fully human. In answering such questions it is important not to make up stories as if they were fact. We should admit our lack of knowledge, but then we can offer an answer based on our reasonable assumptions about the full humanity of Jesus. For example, we might say that Mary and Joseph surely never had to punish Jesus for being bad, but they might well have had to discipline him so that he could learn proper behavior as a young Jewish boy.