Quotes from Alfie Kohn

Many of our elected officials have virtually handed the keys to our schools over to corporate interests. Presidential commissions on education are commonly chaired by the executives of large companies.

John Dewey reminded us that the value of what students do 'resides in its connection with a stimulation of greater thoughtfulness, not in the greater strain it imposes.

When we set children against one another in contests—from spelling bees to awards assemblies to science "fairs" (that are really contests), from dodge ball to honor rolls to prizes for the best painting or the most books read—we teach them to confuse excellence with winning, as if the only way to do something well is to outdo others.

We tell them how good they are and they light up, eager to please, and try to please us some more. These are the children we should really worry about.

Independence is useful, but caring attitudes and behaviors shrivel up in a culture where each person is responsible only for himself.

The dominant problem with parenting in our society isn't permissiveness, but the fear of permissiveness. We're so worried about spoiling kids that we often end up over controlling them.

Again, the most effective (and least destructive) way to help a child succeed—whether she's writing or skiing, playing a trumpet or a computer game—is to do everything possible to help her fall in love with what she's doing, to pay less attention to how successful she was (or is likely to be) and show more interest in the task. That's just another way of saying that we need to encourage more, judge less, and love always.

Think of your goal as giving your child a kind of inoculation, providing him with the unconditional love, respect, trust, and sense of perspective that will serve to immunize him against the most destructive effects of an overcontrolling environment or an unreasonable authority figure.

Children aren't helped to become caring members of a community, or ethical decision-makers, or critical thinkers, so much as they're simply trained to follow directions.

Like any other tool for facilitating the completion of a questionable task, rewards offer a how answer to what is really a why question.

In outstanding classrooms, teachers do more listening than talking, and students do more talking than listening. Terrific teachers often have teeth marks on their tongues.

The overwhelming number of teachers ...are unable to name or describe a theory of learning that underlies what they do.

If unconditional love and genuine enthusiasm are present, praise isn't necessary. If they're absent, praise won't help.

Most of us would protest that of course we love our children without any strings attached. But what counts is how things look from the perspective of the children

If children feel safe, they can take risks, ask questions, make mistakes, learn to trust, share their feelings, and grow.

You have to give them unconditional love. They need to know that even if they screw up, you love them. You don't want them to grow up and resent you or, even worse, parent the way you parented them.

Students should not only be trained to live in a democracy when they grow up; they should have the chance to live in one today.

In education, parody is obsolete.

Trying to do well and trying to beat others are two different things. Excellence and victory are conceptually distinct . . . and are experienced differently.