This article presents a study on lack of discipline in Basic Education, seeking to analyze a set of challenges highlighted following a series of observations carried in a group of public and private elementary and secondary schools, over the last fi ve years. The issues analyzed here are the result of a process of qualitative exploratory inquiry, carried out through participant observation using an open approach which focused on the way matters of indiscipline are dealt with in the daily routine of the schools studied. The observations carried out resulted in a set of fi ve issues, analyzed here as challenges to be overcome in schools. These are: the absence of a shared vision; inversion of priorities; sensitivity to incidents; partial actions replacing strategies for change; and absence of systematic knowledge of lack of discipline in the schools.