A Quote a Day

Today for the Weekly Geeks challenge I've chosen three quotes from John Holt. The first two are from How Children Learn and the last is from Freedom and Beyond.

By nature people are learning animals. Birds fly; fish swim; humans think and learn. Therefore, we do not need to motivate children into learning by wheedling, bribing, or bullying. We do not need to keep picking away at their minds to make sure they are learning. What we need to do - and all we need to do - is to give children as much help and guidance as they need and ask for, listen respectfully when they feel like talking, and then get out of the way. We can trust them to do the rest.'

'Little children love the world. That is why they are so good at learning about it. For it is love, not tricks and techniques of thought, that lies at the heart of all true learning. Can we bring ourselves to let children learn and grow through that love?'

'If I had to make a general rule for living and working with children, it might be this: be wary of saying or doing anything to a child that you would not do to another adult,whose good opinion and affection you valued.'