Here is a random selection of some quotes that I’ve been collecting. This collection is one example of why I focus my efforts on informal learning rather than more formalised education.
“… curriculum is a solution to a problem we created.” —Brian Alger
“No generation in history has ever been so thoroughly prepared for the industrial age.” —David Warlick
“The claim is that if educators invested a fraction of the energy on stimulating the students’ enjoyment of learning that they now spend in trying to transmit information we could achieve much better results.” —Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
“I never teach my pupils; I only attempt to provide the conditions in which they can learn.” —Albert Einstein
“Play is ever more important to skill development and professional competence. Yet our schools do not tolerate, much less teach, play.” —Nine Shift
“After a long life, and thirty years in the public school trenches, I’ve concluded that genius is as common as dirt. We suppress our genius only because we haven’t yet figured out how to manage a population of educated men and women. The solution, I think, is simple and glorious. Let them manage themselves.” —John Taylor Gatto
I loved these quotes and look forward to some others. There is so much simple truth behind and all around them!
Quite often we are blinded by our own perceptions and by what we «know» and «have learned» to be «the» way to do or to teach… which is why too often we don’t get to reach our students, who are the reality in front of our existence as teachers or instructors.
As Mr. Einstein, why not just attempt to provide them with the environnement or conditions in which they can learn… then again… must we not examine closely what we may consider as the «proper environnement and conditions»? 🙂