William James Quotes

What the teacher is, is more important than what he teaches.

To know psychology, therefore, is absolutely no guarantee that we shall be good teacher.

The exercise of voluntary attention in the schoolroom must therefore be counted one of the most important points of training that take place there; and the first-rate teacher, by the keenness of the remoter interests which he is able to awaken, will provide abundant opportunities for its occurrence.

'Educational' refers to the process, not the object. Although, come to think of it, some of my teachers could easily have been replaced by a cheeseburger.

I don't know anybody who said, 'I love that teacher, he or she gave a really good homework set,' or 'Boy, that was the best class I ever took because those exams were awesome.' That's not what people want to talk about. It's not what influences people in one profession or another.

We're not trying to be the only route into teaching. We do put enormous energy into understanding what differentiates the most successful teachers.

That is the difference between good teachers and great teachers: good teachers make the best of a pupil's means; great teachers foresee a pupil's ends.

Good teachers know how to bring out the best in students.

We should be firing bad teachers.

If you look back on all the teachers that you liked, I am sure you will find they were very entertaining.

I was always drawn to teachers who made class interesting. In high school, I enjoyed my American and English literature classes because my teachers, Jeanne Dorsey and Dani Barton, created an environment where interaction was important.

The single most important factor in determining [student] achievement is not the color of skin or where they come from. It is not who their parents are or how much money they have. It is who their teacher is.

The best teacher is very interactive.

I believe our schools will actually get better if layoffs are done carefully, such that only the very worst teachers are let go.

No reception without reaction, no impression without correlative expression, -this is the great maxim which the teacher ought never to forget.

Sometimes a simple, almost insignificant gesture on the part of a teacher can have a profound formative effect on the life of a student.

The most effective teacher will always be biased, for the chief force in teaching is confidence and enthusiasm.

There is no system in the world or any school in the country that is better than its teachers. Teachers are the lifeblood of the success of schools.

You perceive now, my friends, what your general or abstract duty is as teachers. Although you have to generate in your pupils a large stock of ideas, any one of which may be inhibitory, yet you must also see to it that no habitual hesitancy or paralysis of the will ensues, and that the pupil still retains his power of vigorous action.

You can go to a history class with one teacher and want to stick a pencil in your throat, and then go to another teacher who is able to contextualize it or deliver the message in a way that you're riveted.

The best method for a given teacher is the one which is most familiar to the teacher.

Good teachers cost a lot; but, poor teachers cost a lot more.

A top-quartile teacher will increase the performance of their class - based on test scores - by over 10 percent in a single year. ... That means that if the entire U.S., for two years, had top-quartile teachers, the entire difference between us and Asia would go away.

All teachers are good for someone. There are some teachers out there who I cannot stand, for whatever reason. I cannot even bear the sound of one teacher's voice. Yet they are wonderful teachers for other people. They just are not for me.

Teachers who do not take their own education seriously, who do not study, who make little effort to keep abreast of events have no moral authority to coordinate the activities of the classroom.