Quotes about Teaching
Here's a roundup of "quotable quotes" about the teaching profession for possible use in Teacher Day speeches or materials.
- "A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops."
--Henry Brooks Adams - "Teachers, I believe, are the most responsible and important members of society because their professional efforts affect the fate of the earth."
--Helen Caldicott, author and peace activist - "The dream begins, most of the time, with a teacher who believes in you, who tugs and pushes and leads you on to the next plateau, sometimes poking you with a sharp stick called truth."--Dan Rather
- "Teachers teach because they care. Teaching young people is what they do best. It requires long hours, patience, and care."
--Horace Mann - "Compassionate teachers fill a void left by working parents who aren't able to devote enough attention to their children. Teachers don't just teach; they can be vital personalities who help young people to mature, to understand the world and to understand themselves. A good education consists of much more than useful facts and marketable skills."
--Charles Platt - "The future of the world is in my classroom today, a future with the potential for good or bad... Several future presidents are learning from me today; so are the great writers of the next decades, and so are all the so-called ordinary people who will make the decisions in a democracy. I must never forget these same young people could be the thieves and murderers of the future. Only a teacher? Thank God I have a calling to the greatest profession of all! I must be vigilant every day, lest I lose one fragile opportunity to improve tomorrow."
--Ivan Welton Fitzwater - "There's no word in the language I revere more than 'teacher.' My heart sings when a kid refers to me as his teacher, and it always has. I've honored myself and the entire family of man by becoming a teacher."
--Pat Conroy, Prince of Tides - "The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires."
--William Arthur Ward - "The art of teaching is the art of assisting discovery."
--Mark Van Doren - "If you plan for a year, plant a seed. If for ten years, plant a tree. If for a hundred years, teach the people. When you sow a seed once, you will reap a single harvest. When you teach the people, you will reap a hundred harvests."
--Kuan Chung - "There is an old saying that the course of civilization is a race between catastrophe and education. In a democracy such as ours, we must make sure that education wins the race."
--John F. Kennedy - "Better than a thousand days of diligent study is one day with a great teacher."
--Japanese proverb - "The whole art of teaching is only the art of awakening the natural curiosity of young minds for the purpose of satisfying it afterwards."
--Anatole France - "Information is the currency of democracy."
--Ralph Nader - "Above all things I hope the education of the common people will be attended to; convinced that on their good sense we may rely with most security for the preservation of a due degree of liberty."
--Thomas Jefferson - "Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young."
--Henry Ford - "One looks back with appreciation to the brilliant teachers, but with gratitude to those who touched our human feelings. The curriculum is so much necessary raw material, but warmth is the vital element for the growing plant and for the soul of the child."
--Carl Jung - "Education is light, lack of it darkness."
--Russian proverb - "Whoever first coined the phrase 'you're the wind beneath my wings' most assuredly was reflecting on the sublime influence of a very special teacher."
--Frank Trujillo - "In a completely rational society, the best of us would be teachers and the rest of us would have to settle for something less."
--Lee Iacocca - "Be all that you can be. Find your future--as a teacher."
--Madeline Fuchs Holzer
