Maintaining Discipline in Homeschooling

When the child stays at home all day, and mommy is the teacher,
there are certain issues of discipline at stake. It is easy for he 
child to misconstrue the freedom he has at home and feel that 
homeschooling is just a long summer holiday. This is a potential 
landmine and children need to be disciplined right at the start.

Homeschooling gives you and your child a truly immense amount of 
flexibility. You and your child decide where to learn, how much to 
learn and when to learn. But,these should be decisions made at 
the beginning stages. If your child is too little to take an 
active part in the decision, chart out a few hours of the day for 
the various activities, and stick to it. When there is no outside 
agency to supervise and no exams to answer, it is easy to get 
sidetracked. If your child is old enough, consult him and find out 
when he wants to learn. Apply your parental discretion and come up 
with a timetable.

Homework is also a part of homeschooling. What this means is that 
once lessons have been taught, the child should be asked to do 
some part of the course work by himself without your guidance. You 
will need to make sure that your child sits willingly and finishes 
his work.

Courtesy, manners and punctuality are some of the various facets 
of discipline that a child has to imbibe in the early years of his 
life. The school where he interacts with his peers, his seniors 
and juniors and his teachers mould these values quite 
automatically. At homeschool, the child should be taught the 
importance of speaking and behaving in a proper manner and 
appropriate corrections need to be meted out if behavior is 
unsatisfactory.

It is advisable to keep aside a particular room or a part of the 
room for your homeschool. The child should be expected to reach 
his desk at the appointed time, in proper attire with all the 
necessary material. It is easy to allow the school to become an 
extension of play if these ground rules are not laid out and 
followed. As the teacher, supervisor, principal and janitor rolled 
into one, you should also approach the study area with a cool 
professionalism. 

Homeschooling is doomed to fail without patience. In spite of all 
the precautions and steps one takes, it is easy for a child to get 
familiar' at homeschool. At such times, it may be difficult to 
discipline the child and get him to listen to you attentively. 
When this happens, switch to something new. Allow the child to 
take a breather and enjoy a break yourself. 

Homeschooling is not easy. It requires a lot of hard work and 
patience. The very informality of the whole procedure sometimes 
works against it by making it too easy. If you take steps to 
establish rules at the very beginning and adhere to these rules, 
your homeschooling experience will be a huge success.


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