C. J. Mahaney Quotes

Children pay little attention to their parents' teachings, but reproduce their characters faithfully

Kids learn more from example than from anything you say; I'm convinced they learn very early not to hear anything you say, but to watch what you do.

The child becomes largely what it is taught; hence we must watch what we teach it, and how we live before it.

We begin with the hypothesis that any subject can be taught effectively in some intellectually honest form to any child at any stage of development.

The task is simple. We will organize children and teach them in a perfect way the things their fathers and mothers are doing in an imperfect way.

It is sentimentalism to assume that the teaching of life can always be fitted to the child's interests, just as it is empty formalism to force the child to parrot the formulas of adult society. Interests can be created and stimulated.

But an adult if he is to provide proper guidance, must always be calm and act slowly so that the child who is watching him can clearly see his actions in all their particulars.

Children need parents who model self-discipline rather than preach it. They learn from what their parents are actually willing to do; not from what they say they do.

Children are very quick observers; very quick in seeing through some kinds of hypocrisy, very quick in finding out what you really think and feel, very quick in adopting all your ways and opinions. You will often discover that, as the father is, so is the son.

The prospect of being a father made me ask myself a question. How do you know what kind of adult your child will turn out to be? And how much can you control that?

I think the way kids learn most is not by what you say, but by what you do.

If you are a parent, you have probably already realized that your children are always watching what you do. And just as children watch their parents and emulate their behavior, so do employees who are watching their bosses.

Whatever you want your child to learn, you have to model that every day. There's no more waiting around. Once you have a child, there's no dress rehearsal anymore.

Children learn what they live.

If you have children, you know you're responsible for somebody. You realize you are being imitated; your belief systems and priorities have a direct influence on these children, who are like flowers in a garden.

I wouldn't listen to my parents, but I found out that I absorbed. I never heard what they said - told me - but I did what they did.

Children learn much more from how you act than from what you tell them. There are times this worries me - we parents are rarely the role models we want to be. True for life. True for driving.

Children learn a lot from what their parents say. But they learn a lot more from what their parents do.

Habits are learned. And children learn their habits by watching what we do, not by listening to what we say. So we have to stop talking and teaching and preaching and just go do.

There's no question that aggression can be learned through modeling. When a child sees her parent behave in a particular way, she may be tempted or even rewarded for being that way.

Teaching by precept, without example, is mighty poor teaching.

Infants manners are moulded more by the example of Parents, then by stars at their nativities.

You've got to accept the fact that you are basically not teaching a subject, you are teaching children

Fathers and mothers, do not forget that children learn more by the eye than they do by the ear... Imitation is a far stronger principle with children than memory. What they see has a much stronger effect on their minds than what they are told.

A fig-tree looking on a fig-tree becometh fruitful," says the Arabian proverb. And so it is with children; their first great instructor is example.