Occupations

"I am not a teacher: only a fellow-traveller of whom you asked the way. I pointed ahead—ahead of myself as well as of you."

"Delightful task! to rear the tender Thought, To teach the young Idea how to shoot, To pour the fresh Instruction o'er the Mind, To breathe the enlivening Spirit, and to fix The generous urpose in the glowing breast."

"Fas est ab hoste doceri."

"If you be a lover of instruction, you will be well instructed."

"Speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee."

"Whilst that the childe is young, let him be instructed in vertue and lytterature."

"Fingit equum tenera docilem cervice magister Ire viam qua monstret eques."

"A man's scholarship may be perfect, his character admirable, and yet, for want of the power to control subordinates and govern boys, he may be wholly unfit for a schoolmaster."

"Doctrina sed vim promovet insitam."

"One-time member of the school, come here to me, and let me explain to you what my teacher revealed. Like you, I was once a youth and had a mentor. The teacher assigned a task to me -- it was man's work. Like a springing reed, I leapt up and put myself to work. I did not depart from my teacher's instructions, and I did not start doing things on my own initiative. My mentor was delighted with my work on the assignment. He rejoiced that I was humble before him and he spoke in my favour. I just did whatever he outlined for me -- everything was always in its place. Only a fool would have deviated from his instructions. He guided my hand on the clay and kept me on the right path. He made me eloquent with words and gave me advice. He focused my eyes on the rules which guide a man with a task: zeal is proper for a task, time-wasting is taboo; anyone who wastes time on his task is neglecting his task. He did not vaunt his knowledge: his words were modest. If he had vaunted his knowledge, people would have frowned. Do not waste time, do not rest at night -- get on with that work! Do not reject the pleasurable company of a mentor or his assistant: once you have come into contact with such great brains, you will make your own words more worthy. [...] There, I have recited to you what my teacher revealed, and you will not neglect it. You should pay attention -- taking it to heart will be to your benefit!"

"Adde, quod ingenuas didicisse fideliter artes Emollit mores, nec sinit esse fervos."

"The sounding jargon of the schools."

"The twig is so easily bended I have banished the rule and the rod: I have taught them the goodness of knowledge, They have taught me the goodness of God; My heart is the dungeon of darkness, Where I shut them for breaking a rule; My frown is sufficient correction; My love is the law of the school."

"There is no teaching until the pupil is brought into the same state or principle in which you are; a transfusion takes place; he is you, and you are he; there is a teaching; and by no unfriendly chance or bad company can he ever quite lose the benefit."

"Seek to delight, that they may mend mankind, And, while they captivate, inform the mind."

"What's a' your jargon o' your schools, Your Latin names for horns and stools; If honest nature made you fools."

"He is wise who can instruct us and assist us in the business of daily virtuous living."

"Instruction does not prevent waste of time or mistakes; and mistakes themselves are often the best teachers of all."

"You cannot teach old dogs new tricks."

"A secure teacher expects to be a learner all day, every day, and is comfortable with the ambiguity of that role. It’s not so important to be “right” as to be open; it’s not so important to have all the answers as to be hungry for them. A secure teacher leaves school each day with important questions to puzzle about overnight and the belief that each day contains the insights necessary for a more effective tomorrow. A secure teacher believes that having these kinds of insights is professionally challenging and personally satisfying."

"I do not allow a woman to teach or to usurp authority over the man."

"Neither my life in school nor my life away from school is particularly blissful. My car breaks down, I quarrel with my friends, I get sick, and I worry about my children. I have to keep a watch on my moods, needs, biases, weaknesses, and limits in order to see how they are affecting my work. If I can monitor how my emotions are at play in my classroom, I can better put a break on them when they are destructive, and better allow my joyful, level, nurturant side to dominate."

"To teach is to touch the heart and impel it to action."

"The best teachers are those who show you where to look, but don't tell you what to see."

"We must not contradict, but instruct him that contradicts us; for a madman is not cured by another running mad also."

"A boy is better unborn than untaught."

"Each of these private teachers who work for pay, whom the politicians call sophists and regard as their rivals, inculcates nothing else than these opinions of the multitude which they opine when they are assembled and calls this knowledge wisdom. It is as if a man were acquiring the knowledge of the humors and desires of a great strong beast which he had in his keeping, how it is to be approached and touched, and when and by what things it is made most savage or gentle, yes, and the several sounds it is wont to utter on the occasion of each, and again what sounds uttered by another make it tame or fierce, and after mastering this knowledge by living with the creature and by lapse of time should call it wisdom, and should construct thereof a system and art and turn to the teaching of it, knowing nothing in reality about which of these opinions and desires is honorable or base, good or evil, just or unjust, but should apply all these terms to the judgments of the great beast, calling the things that pleased it good, and the things that vexed it bad, having no other account to render of them, but should call what is necessary just and honorable, never having observed how great is the real difference between the necessary and the good, and being incapable of explaining it to another. ... Do you suppose that there is any difference between such a one and the man who thinks that it is wisdom to have learned to know the moods and the pleasures of the motley multitude in their assembly, whether about painting or music or, for that matter, politics?"

"We'll set thee to school to an ant, to teach thee there's no labouring i' the winter."

"Schoolmasters will I keep within my house, Fit to instruct her youth. * * * * * * To cunning men I will be very kind, and liberal To mine own children in good bringing up."

"I do present you with a man of mine, Cunning in music and the mathematics, To instruct her fully in those sciences."

"When I am forgotten, as I shall be, And sleep in dull cold marble, * * * * Say, I taught thee."

"He who can, does. He who cannot, teaches."

"Teaching is unbounded by the classroom. Just as love is unbounded by time."

"Whoever enters the Way without a guide will take a hundred years to travel a two-day journey. The Prophet said "In this way you have no more faithful companion than your works." How can these works and this earning in the way of righteousness be accomplished without a master, O father? Can you practice the meanest profession in the world without a master's guidance? Whoever undertakes a profession without a master becomes the laughingstock of city and town."

"Beautiful indeed and of great importance is the vocation of all those who aid parents in fulfilling their duties and who, as representatives of the human community, undertake the task of education in schools. This vocation demands special qualities of mind and heart, very careful preparation, and continuing readiness to renew and to adapt."

"Grave is the Master's look; his forehead wears Thick rows of wrinkles, prints of worrying cares: Uneasy lies the heads of all that rule, His worst of all whose kingdom is a school. Supreme he sits; before the awful frown That binds his brows the boldest eye goes down; Not more submissive Israel heard and saw At Sinai's foot the Giver of the Law."

"What strikes me most when I remember Paula's teaching is her presence as much as the content of her teachings. I think in this country we have an obsession with content and curriculum, all the while devaluing presence and proximity, which are teaching values hard to describe or quantify (or, indeed, teach). Paula has a tremendous gaze, a tremendous listening power, and the most intelligent curiosity of anyone I have ever met. She took me seriously."

"One thing that I really like about teaching is that you have to work very hard not to lose the respect of your students."

"There are two kinds of people in this world: those who, when faced with a window two floors up, will immediately accept the limitations it places upon them; and those who instantly look for a way to subvert both the height and the threatened effects of gravity. This room is full of the latter. It’s one of the reasons I love teaching; the opportunity to find those who would chance a fall in the attempt to fly, rather than stay safely within bounds."

"It is always the teacher who must learn the most … or else nothing real has happened in the exchange."

"In a democratic state the schoolmaster is afraid of his pupils and flatters them, and the pupils despise both schoolmaster and pedagogues. The young expect the same treatment as the old, and contradict them and quarrel with them. In fact, seniors have to flatter their juniors, in order not to be thought morose old dotards."

"Each of these private teachers who work for pay ... inculcates nothing else than these opinions of the multitude which they opine when they are assembled and calls this knowledge wisdom."

"What's all the noisy jargon of the schools?"

"We need organizers and builders of a new society, we need warriors for a new way of life. Self-government is our most effective educational instrument for producing such organizers, builders, and warriors."

"Since human beings are highly adaptable it may be possible for an individual with any sort of competence to learn, in the end, according to any teaching strategy. But the experiments show, very clearly indeed, that the rate, quality and durability of learning is crucially dependent upon whether or not the teaching strategy is of a sort that suits the individual"

"Because salaries of academics are modest in comparison to those of the more successful members of corporate, legal, and medical lodges, teachers lead sane monetary lives. They plan and budget and rarely snap at the hook of debt camouflaged by creative accounting. Finances make teachers resourceful, and they ferret about finding ways to travel without demolishing their savings. Decades ago, I jettisoned pride, realizing that it was an encumbering, unaffordable luxury. I learned how to write clever, cajoling letters, offering to barter publicity or lectures for complimentary travel."

"What constitutes the teacher is the passion to make scholars, and again and again it happens that the great scholar has no such passion whatever."

"Men must be taught as if you taught them not, And things unknown propos'd as things forgot."

"Ethics could teach us only those purposes and ideals. If the teachers seeks insight into the means by which the aim can be reached, into the facts by which the child can be molded, his way must lead from ethics to psychology. (...) Water flows downhill, anyhow, but to bring the water uphill hydraulic forces are indeed necessary. To overcome nature and instead to prepare for a life of ideals, to inhibit personal desires and instead to learn to serve the higher purposes indeed demands most serious and most systematic efforts. It is the teachers' task to make these efforts with all his best knowledge of mind and body, of social and of cultural values."

"A good teacher does not draw out; he gives out, and what he gives out is love. And by love I mean approval, or if you like, friendliness, good nature. The good teacher not only understands the child: he approves of the child."