Parker Palmer Quotes

Education of youth is not a bow for every man to shoot in that counts himself a teacher; but will require sinews almost equal to those which Homer gave to Ulysses.

In every story I have heard, good teachers share one trait: a strong sense of personal identity infuses their work.

Teachers may think they are stuffing minds, but all they are ever affecting is the memory. Nothing can ever be forced into anyone's mind except by brainwashing, which is the very opposite of genuine teaching.

Of all the excellent teachers of college English whom I have known I have never discovered one who knew precisely what he was doing. Therein have lain their power and their charm.

Teaching is more difficult than learning because what teaching calls for is this: to let learn. The real teacher, in fact, lets nothing else be learned than learning. His conduct, therefore, often produces the impression that we properly learn nothing from him, if by "learning" we now suddenly understand merely the procurement of useful information.

...being an effective teacher is a high calling.

To be a teacher does not mean simply to affirm that such a thing is so, or to deliver a lecture, etc.

There is no recipe to be a great teacher, that's what is unique about them.

Kids' views are often just as valid as the teachers'. The best teachers are the ones that know that.

I cannot emphasize enough the importance of a good teacher.

I count myself well educated, for the admirable woman at the head of the school which I attended from the age of four and a half till I was thirteen and a half, was a born teacher in advance of her own times.

I don’t believe curriculums are the key to education, I believe teachers are.

Teachers must learn how to teach ... they need only to be taught more effective ways of teaching.

I'm always an entrepreneur, but I'd probably be a teacher. I like teaching kids, whether that's tennis on the courts or history in the classroom.

... there is no valid teaching from which there does not emerge something learned and through which the learner does not become capable of recreating and remaking what has been taught.

I care not what subject is taught, if only it be taught well.

We think it's about little techniques and tricks, but techniques only take you so far. We need teachers who care about kids, who care about what they teach, and who can communicate with kids.

Don't try to fix the students, fix ourselves first. The good teacher makes the poor student good and the good student superior. When our students fail, we, as teachers, too, have failed.

The good teacher makes the poor student good and the good student superior.

All practical teachers know that education is a patient process of mastery of details, minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day.

Teaching may be compared to selling commodities. No one can sell unless somebody buys.

When you study great teachers... you will learn much more from their caring and hard work than from their style.

In learning you will teach, and in teaching you will learn.

No teacher has ever failed from ignorance. That is empiric professional knowledge. Teachers fail because they cannot 'handle the class.' Real education must ultimately be limited to men how INSIST on knowing, the rest is mere sheep-herding.

Teaching, therefore, asks first of all the creation of a space where students and teachers can enter into a fearless communication with each other and allow their respective life experiences to be their primary and most valuable source of growth and maturation. It asks for a mutual trust in which those who teach and those who want to learn can become present to each other, not as opponents, but as those who share in the same struggle and search for the same truth.