We must help the child to act for himself, will for himself, think for himself; this is the art of those who aspire to serve the spirit.

Discipline must come through liberty.

The teacher’s first duty is to watch over the environment, and this takes precedence over all the rest. It’s influence is indirect, but unless it be well done there will be no effective and permanent results of any kind, physical, intellectual or spiritual.

The instructions of the teacher consist then merely in a hint, a touch-enough to give a start to the child. The rest develops of itself.

A great deal of time and intellectual force are lost in the world, because the false seems great and the truth so small and insignificant.

To teach details is to bring confusion; to establish the relationship between things is to bring knowledge.

Supposing I said there was a planet without schools or teachers, where study was unknown, and yet the inhabitants -- doing nothing but live and walk about -- came to know all things, to carry in their minds the whole of learning; would you not think I was romancing? Well, just this, which seems so fanciful as to be nothing but the invention of a fertile imagination, is a reality. It is the child's way of learning.