OUTLINE GUIDES TO DISCIPLINE

This book is addressed, in part, to that vital aspect of raising healthy, responsible, respectful children. The topics are compiled to provide illustrative materials in any easy- to-use handy book for teachers, parents, students, workers, counselors, preachers, psychologists, etc as an invaluable aid.
In these days, pleasure seems to be actively promoted as the main object of life. People consider the highest good to be pleasure. Discipline is discouraged. But whatever society says, there is no doubt about what society needs, discipline must be pursued. The person who likes excitement tends to throw off-self-restraint. Society needs self-disciplined people. Only those in command of themselves can command others.
The goal of most parents and teachers is to get children to act and behave in socially, acceptable and appropriate ways. Since this goal is never really fully achieved, we should view discipline as a process of learning by doing. A child cannot learn to discipline himself by being told to sit still and have. Just as no one learns to ride a bicycle by reading a book on the subject, children do not learn to discipline themselves by being told. Maria Montessori often remarked that ‘Discipline is not telling’. Children must be shown and taught through precept and example. Children need encouragement and opportunities to practice self-discipline as practiced by their teachers and peers.