Quotes for the Classroom

There is nothing that I love more than a good quote.  I often use quotes as a way to introduce a lesson or spark a morning check-in.  Enjoy.

Here are a few of my favourites on the topics under the umbrella of literacy!

“The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.”
― Dr. Seuss, I Can Read With My Eyes Shut!

“The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame.”
― Oscar Wilde

“If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.”
― Stephen King

“Let us read, and let us dance; these two amusements will never do any harm to the world.”
― Voltaire

“Books are mirrors: you only see in them what you already have inside you.”
― Carlos Ruiz Zafón, The Shadow of the Wind

“Today a reader, tomorrow a leader.”
― Margaret Fuller

“Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.”
― Frederick Douglass

“Reading without reflecting is like eating without digesting.”

– Edmund Burke

“My bursting heart must find vent at my pen.”
― Abigail Adams

“No two persons ever read the same book.”

– Edmund Wilson

“After nourishment, shelter and companionship, stories are the thing we need most in the world.”
― Philip Pullman

“Writing is a way of talking without being interrupted.”
― Jules Renard

“Half of writing history is hiding the truth.”
― Joss Whedon

“But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.”
― George Orwell, 1984

“The limits of my language means the limits of my world.”
― Ludwig Wittgenstein

“It’s only words… unless they’re true.”
― David Mamet

“Any fool can know. The point is to understand.”
― Albert Einstein

“The more I read, the more I acquire, the more certain I am that I know nothing.”
― Voltaire

“Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.”
― Socrates

Ken Robinson has got it right…

I am an avid Stumbler and was fortunate enough to stumble upon Ken Robinson’s talk at a TED conference in 2006 titled, “Ken Robinson says schools kill creativity“.   His particular talk is one of the most popular talks on TED.com with 7,775,295 views.  He is fantastically witty and his ideas on our current school systems are ones that I share (along with 7 million other viewers).

I enjoyed his talk so much I looked Ken Robinson up online and discovered he is the author of The Element: How Finding Our Passion Changes Everything and Out of Our Minds: Learning to be Creative.  This summer I had the pleasure of reading The Element.

The book is full of anecdotal examples of wildly successful people who were, at one point in their lives, on a path that would have led them astray from their ‘element’.  Like his Ted talk, he links problematic structures within our school systems to the hindrances faced by the men and women discussed throughout the book.

The most powerful idea for me was in the final chapter when Ken Robinson discusses how our changed economy and relationship with technology both have radical implications for our education systems.  Are the past structures of the industrial era really preparing the next generations to be successful in their personal and working lives? Did it ever really best serve the youth who graduated the system?  Ken Robinson would argue no, which is something which resonates me.

I look forward to reading Out of Our Minds in the near future.  Have you read his books or heard his talk on TED.com?  What are your thoughts?

The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything by Ken Robinson