“A teacher isn't someone who teaches something, but someone who inspires the student to give of her best in order to discover what she already knows.”

“What is a teacher? I'll tell you: it isn't someone who teaches something, but someone who inspires the student to give of her best in order to discover what she already knows.”

“The best teacher is the one who suggests rather than dogmatizes, and inspires his listener with the wish to teach himself.”

“And then she told me she didn’t want someone who needed her in order to be a better guy. She wanted someone who was better by himself, with or without her.”

“You know what I was thinking? [Ruthie] got so excited when she was spouting this ahistorical countertextual nonsense, and I caught myself thinking, 'What an idiot her teacher must be,' and thinking about her teacher made me realize - the kind of excitement she was showing as she mindlessly spouted back the nonsense she learned in college, that's just like the excitement some of my own students show. And it occurred to me that what we professors think of as a 'brilliant student' is nothing but a student who is enthusiastically converted to whatever idiotic ideas we've been teaching them.""Self-knowledge is a painful thing," said Esther. "To learn that your best students are parrots after all.”

“Teacher: a master who, through personal example, inspires students to rebel against learning.”