Josh Rodeback

“It is among the commonplaces of education that we often first cut off the living root and then try to replace its natural functions by artificial means. Thus we suppress the child's curiosity and then when he lacks a natural interest in learning he is offered special coaching for his scholastic coaching for his scholastic difficulties.”
― Alice Duer Miller

“We destroy the love of learning in children, which is so strong when they are small, by encouraging and compelling them to work for petty and contemptible rewards, gold stars, or papers marked 100 and tacked to the wall, or A's on report cards, or honor rolls, or dean's lists, or Phi Beta Kappa keys, in short, for the ignoble satisfaction of feeling that they are better than someone else.”
― John Holt

“To trust children we must first learn to trust ourselves...and most of us were taught as children that we could not be trusted.
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― John Holt

“To a very great degree, school is a place where children learn to be stupid.”
― John Holt