Maria Montessori

"When you have really taught a child, you will find the entire universe in that one human being."

"The world cannot benefit from a system that ignores what the child is trying to tell us."

"Children are human beings to whom respect is due, superior to us in the perfection of their physicalness, and whose future depends on the care we give them now."

"Imagination is the beginning of creation."

"The child who has never succeeded is the one who has never tried."

"Our aim is not merely to make the child understand, but to touch his heart."

"The greatest delight of a child is when work becomes play."

"The task of education is to transform the child into a spiritual being, a universal human being."

"We must understand that the small child is someone who has not yet become himself fully."

"The education which serves the progress of civilization aims at fulfilling needs and developing talents."

"The child yearns to understand the world around him, not through our explanations, but through his own activity."

"The inner longing to grow is a natural human impulse that cannot be denied without harm to the personality."

"Learning is not a preparation for life but is life itself."

"The human hand is the instrument of human intelligence and through it the whole world changes."

"I have studied the child; I have given myself to the observation of childhood."

"The great principle which should guide us in all we do with the child is this: that a person's first instinct is toward independence, not toward obedience."

"The formation of man is something so important that it must not be left to chance."

"Without dedication to something beyond yourself, happiness remains hollow."

"The child must come to feel that we are not his masters, but his servants."

"Help me to do it myself."

"We cannot speak of democracy if we have not prepared the coming generation to possess the knowledge essential to their task."

"The environment is a living, changing, breathing entity that shapes the child."

"The capacity to be happy requires the formation of the personality during the impressionable years of childhood."

"To develop fully, children need the freedom to experience consequence."

"The greatest satisfaction a teacher can have is to see that a child has found joy in learning."

"Man is not perfected through instruction, but through work and experience."

"The human being becomes what he experiences, and experience is the basis for all learning."

"Character is formed not by reward and punishment, but through environment and activity."

"The goal of education is not to increase the amount of knowledge but to create the possibilities for a child to invent and discover."

"We are learning continuously throughout our lives, and the most important learning happens before we are six years old."