Since implementing Our Household and Discipline Rules, we’ve found that time-out’s just don’t really cut it for the older kids. We wanted something a little more effective when dealing with disobedience and poor behavior. Since our Chore Chart has been received so well, I decided to add in some Discipline cards. These should be things that you really don’t enjoy doing, but that still need to get done.
–> Click here to download the Discipline Cards <–
We use these as a consequence for disobedience, and sometimes bad behavior with our children. If they disobey, they pull a discipline card from a jar. They are expected to complete that discipline, then follow through with whatever they were asked to do originally. If they refuse to complete their discipline card, they get what’s called a motivator, something such as losing TV privileges, or their Nintendo DS or whatever is of value to them at that time.
If one of the children receives a discipline card during they day, it goes behind their name on our Chore Chart once they are finished. This way when Dad comes home, he can see who has had a bad day and choose to discuss it with them if necessary.
I included one card called “Help Mom Cook”. This is our “mercy” card. Most kids like to help cook, and we want to show them how sometimes they receive something they do not deserve. You can choose to remove this card from the stack, or add it to your weekly Chore Chart as well!
I shared these in my 10 Days of Homeschooling Enrichment series, but here are our House Rules: while we still do time-out for our younger ones, we’ve replaced time-outs for the older kids, with “pull from the Discipline Jar”.
You can read more on implementation of this idea, discipline and the Chore Chart here:
- Chore Chart
- Our Household and Discipline Rules
- One Another Bible Study
- Train Up A Child
- Super Mom vs Abiding Mom
Thanks for reading, and hope these bless your family! {Or at least you} The kids might not see it as such a blessing, but really in the long run, it will be a blessing for them. We are simply doing what God has called us to, training them in righteousness (Prov. 22-6)! If you can keep the long term in perspective it will make things go much smoother ;o)
Previous poster said: “Do we really want our children to learn that “work” is ‘bad’?”
I share the same concerns. I like the idea of consequences being different from “motivators” but I’m a bit stuck for consequences that don’t involve turning household responsibilities into something to be dreaded. I’m trying to teach my kids to see housework as a positive thing – something we work on together as a team with a cheerful spirit to create a home that is safe, pleasant, and functional.
I’d love to see some consequence ideas that don’t involve housework.
Aside from that, I LOVE the chore chart and the essential ideas behind your household rules and discipline chart. I’m in the process of creating our own charts based on your ideas. I’m really excited about how they’re going to help improve things around here. Thanks for putting so much effort into your blog site.
Thank you so much for this!!!! My kids are excited to start and I’m excited too!!!!
Did you make the pockets to put all the chore cards in, or can you buy those somewhere?
I got my pocket charts at Target in the Dollar Spot last year around this time. They were only $1 each, so I got about 6 of them. 🙂 I only wish there had been more than just blue ones.
THIS IS AWESOME!! JUST WHAT I’VE BEEN IN SEARCH OF!! THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR SHARING!!
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You are amazing! Thank you fr sharing so many amazing ideas and using your talents for Gods glory! Thank you for helping me a newbie homeschool mom with so many great
Ideas!
For those of you concerned about using chores as punishment, an idea: my mom used to make us write a letter or an essay explaining why what we did was wrong and outlining what other/better choices we could have made in the same situation, and what we planned to do next time we were faced with a similar problem. If someone was hurt by our choices, we also had to write an apology note. When we were young (8-10 years old) only a paragraph or so was expected. As we got older, it was a page. We even looked up bible verses to cite. It worked fantastically, and I plan to use the same method when my children are older.
Good Morning – I have a question for you about the printable cards used for discipline. I am teaching a parenting class at a battered women’s shelter and I would like to use your cards in my material. We sell nothing. We are just teaching these moms and trying to help them put some order in their lives and the lives of their children.
Hi Valerie,
You’re welcome to use any of my free materials with your group.
I really love this chart. I like some of the examples you used as discipline, but when you click on link to see remaining areas of correction (hitting/being mean, lying, unkind words/language, and sibling conflict) it only leads you to the blank pdf version. I would love to see what you used as discipline for these areas as a guide. Thank you so much for sharing all of your wonderful ideas.
Hi Cheryl,
I don’t share our actual consequences just because they will vary between kids. We do our best to make the consequence relatable to the offense. So for example if they’re riding their bike without a helmet, their consequence is no bike the rest of the day. Or if they don’t get off of a video game when I ask them to, the consequence is no video game the next day. Things like that. I also use whatever currency is appropriate for my kids like taking away playdates, or sports if grades aren’t good. Things like that. SO they will be different for your family. One thing for hitting/biting/being mean to siblings is separation from the family area. If they can’t respect the others in the home, they get to go to their room for room time and not be able to participate in family fun. SO really the consequences are a fluid/changing thing as far as how old they are and what they’ve done.
Do you have a print out or examples of pull from discipline jar
I’m sorry I don’t, I think that’s kind of personal to your own family. But we tend to do things like extra chores we don’t do on a daily basis.