Men have gone on to build up vast intellectual schemes, philosophies, and theologies, to prove that ideals are not real as ideals but as antecedently existing actualities. They have failed to see that in converting moral realities into matters of intellectual assent they have evinced lack of moral faith.

I believe that the only true education comes through the stimulation of the child's powers by the demands of the social situations in which he finds himself.

What accumulated knowledge exists in low grade societies is at least put into practice; it is transmuted into character; it exists with the depth of meaning that attaches to its coming within urgent daily interests.

The development occurs through reciprocal give-and-take, the teacher taking but not being afraid also to give.

Language exists only when it is listened to as well as spoken. The hearer is an indispensable partner.

You can teach students to develop the ability to think reflectively, and you can help them understand what this means, but if they are not inclined to do so they never will.

From the standpoint of the child, the great waste in the school comes from his inability to utilize the experiences he gets outside the school in any complete and free way within the school itself; while, on the other hand, he is unable to apply in daily life what he is learning at school. That is the isolation of the school — its isolation from life.