We learn most readily, most naturally, most effectively, when we start with the big picture - precisely when the basics don't come first.

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

Learning is something students do, NOT something done to students.

People will typically be more enthusiastic where they feel a sense of belonging and see themselves as part of a community than they will in a workplace in which each person is left to his own devices

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

Assessments should compare the performance of students to a set of expectations, never to the performance of other students.

Standardized testing has swelled and mutated, like a creature in one of those old horror movies, to the point that it now threatens to swallow our schools whole.