The Professor took the old practices and studied them, worked out their mechanical principles and then devised a graded scientific set of tricks, but is based on the elementary laws of mechanics, a study of the equilibrium of the human body, the ways in which it is disturbed, how to recover your own and take advantage of the shifting of the center of gravity of the other person. The first thing that is taught is how to fall down without being hurt, that alone is worth the price of admission and ought to be taught in all our gyms.

One of the saddest things about US education is that the wisdom of our most successful teachers is lost to the profession when they retire.

To savages it would seem preposterous to seek out a place where nothing but learning was going on in order that one might learn.

Since a democratic society repudiates the principle of external authority, it must find a substitute in voluntary disposition and interest; these can be created only by education.

Experience alone cannot deliver to us necessary truths; truths completely demonstrated by reason. Its conclusions are particular, not universal.

As a society becomes more enlightened, it realizes that it is responsible not to transmit and conserve the whole of its existing achievements, but only such as make for a better future society. The school is its chief agency for the accomplishment of this end.

The interaction of knowledge and skills with experience is key to learning.