| Quotations |
|---|
| Custom will reconcile people to any atrocity. -George Bernard Shaw |
| "Birds fly, fish swim, man thinks and learns.Therefore, we do not need to motivate children into learning by wheedling, bribing or bullying. We do not need to keep picking away at their minds to make sure they are learning. What we need to do, and all we need to do, is bring as much of the world as we can into the school and classroom (in our case, into their lives); give children as much help and guidance as they ask for; listen respectfully when they feel like talking; and then get out of the way. We can trust them to do the rest." J. Holt from How Children Learn |
| Thou hast most traitorously corrupted the youth of the realm in erecting a grammar school. - -William Shakespeare , King Henry VI, pt. 2, act 4, sc. 7 |
| "Schools are artificial man-made institutions in contrast to the home, which is a natural setting. There have always been many cultures with no schools, but none without homes. Learning at home, in fact, was the original education system, and school has become the substitute. Until the last century, children didn’t usually even begin formal school until age twelve or older. " Marnie Larsen Ko |
| Certainly the failure rate among schoolchildren is far higher than homeschoolers. If 'failure to educate' means child neglect or even child abuse, well then, I'll tell you what, plenty of our schools are in big trouble. - David Guterson: Family Matters: Why Homeschooling Makes Sense |
| Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught. |
| We destroy the love of learning in children, which is so strong when they are small, by encouraging and compelling them to work for petty rewards--gold stars, or papers marked 100 and tacked to the wall, or A's on report cards, or honor rolls, or dean's lists or Phi Beta Kappa keys--in short, for the ignoble satisfaction of feeling that they are better than someone else. - John Holt |
| I have never let my schooling interfere with my education. - Mark Twain |
| If you have a favourite quote on an education theme, please send it . |
| In dwelling, live close to the ground. In thinking, keep to the simple. In conflict, be fair and generous. In governing, don't try to control. In work, do what you enjoy. In family life, be completely present. -- Lao-tzu |
| If it is determined that the 'Home Instruction Program' is not in
compliance, the child must be enrolled in school and the parent will
no longer be eligible to conduct a Home Education Program for the child.
In the name of consistency - as my father suggested to my writing students
- Seneca Valley should also stipulate that a child who fails in its regular
classrooms "must be enrolled in a homeschool, and the classroom teacher
will no longer be eligible to
conduct a Conventional Education Program for that child." - David Guterson: Family Matters: Why Homeschooling Makes Sense |
| In the first place God made idiots. This was for practice. Then He made School Boards. |
| While children's perceptions of the world and opportunities for genuine spontaneity and creativity are being systematically eliminated from the kindergarten, unquestioned obedience to authority and rote learning of meaningless material are being encouraged. - Harry L. Gracey, sociologist, "Learning the Student Role: Kindergarten as Academic Boot Camp" in H. Stub (ed.)The Sociology of Education: A Sourcebook (1975) |
| Believe nothing, O monks, merely because you have been told it . . . or because it is traditional, or because you yourselves have imagined it. Do not believe what your teacher tells you merely out of respect for the teacher. But whatsoever, after due examination and analysis, you find to be conductive to the good, the benefit, the welfare of all beings - that doctrine believe and cling to, and take it as your guide. - Gautama Buddha |
| You cannot teach a man anything; you can only help him to find it within himself. --Galileo |
| What we want is to see the child in pursuit of knowledge, and not knowledge in pursuit of the child. --George Bernard Shaw |
| "I quit college and enrolled as a student at the University of Planet Earth, the world's oldest and largest educational institution. It has billions of professors, tens of millions of books, and unlimited course offerings. Tuition is free, and everybody designs his or her own major." - William Upski Wimsatt, in Utne Reader, May/June, 1998 |
| "Here's my curriculum: Live in a different city every year. Attend
a different place of worship every week. Seek out hundreds of mentors to
help me find answers to my thousands of questions. Spend the rest of the
time in the library and on the Internet. Create lists, make charts, and
undertake the most ambitious projects I can think of. Create my own personal
bible, almanac, and telephone books. Live in the poorest neighborhoods
in order to learn how to get along in the world and to save money, so I
can travel to a different continent each year. I'm doing this for five
years as a freshman survey course. Then I'll have a better idea of what
to pursue as a sophomore."
William Upski Wimsatt, in Utne Reader, May/June, 1998 |
| The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn. -Alvin Toffler |
| Our "Tell'em-and-test'em" way of teaching leaves most students increasingly
confused, aware that their academic success rests on shaky foundations,
and convinced that school is mainly a place where you follow meaningless
procedures to get meaningless answers to meaningless questions....
We destroy the disinterested (I do not mean uninterested) love of learning in children, which is so strong when they are small, by encouraging and compelling them to work for petty and contemptible rewards -- gold stars, or papers marked 100 and tacked to the wall, or A's on report cards... in short, for the ignoble satisfaction of feeling that they are better than someone else.... We kill, not only their curiosity, but their feeling that it is a good and admirable thing to be curious, so that by the age of ten most of them will not ask questions, and will show a good deal of scorn for the few who do. John Holt, How Children Fail |
| And for those of you who have come to the bottom of this list, an internet source of quotes on education and learning that is truly awesome! |