I so enjoy being old because for the first time I don’t have to do anything-work, teach, study. I feel very good about myself-and at my age I can say no to anything now if I don’t want to do it. What a liberating word.
BEL KAUFMANThe clerical work is par for the course. “Keep on file in numerical order” means throw in wastebasket. You’ll soon learn the language.
More Bel Kaufman Quotes
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“Language Arts Dept.” is the English office; “literature based on child’s reading level and experiential background” means that’s all they’ve got in the Book Room; “non-academic-minded” is a delinquent; and “It has come to my attention” means you’re in trouble.
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Teachers try to make us feel lower than themselves, maybe because this is because they feel lower than outside people. One teacher told me to get out of the room and never come back, which I did.
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… good teachers, like Tolstoy’s happy families, are alike everywhere.
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Best marks go to cheaters and memorizers. Marks depend on memorizing and not on real knowledge. When you cram into your head for a test you may get a high mark but forget it the next day. That’s not an education.
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I’ll never retire as long as I live—that’s like retiring from life! I’ll never stop writing, teaching, lecturing. If you’re in good health, living is exciting on its own.
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My mother, for example, has the pleasant notion that my day consists of nodding graciously to the rustle of starched curtsies and a chorus of respectful voices bidding me good morning.
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Education can’t make us all leaders, but it can teach us which leader to follow.
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I had used my sense of humor; I had called it proportion, perspective. But perspective is distance.
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I like the word OLD. Not senior, that’s for proms. Older? Older than whom? ‘Old’ is honorable and ripe
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Education is not a product: mark, diploma, job, money-in that order; it is a process, a never-ending one.
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A teacher is frequently the only adult in the pupil’s environment who treats him with respect.
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And that’s it; that’s why I want to teach; that’s the one and only compensation: to make a permanent difference in the life of a child.
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When giving comes directly from the heart, it can never disappoint or embarrass.
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The heart has its reasons; it’s the mind that’s suspect.
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Never mind the cream; it will always rise to the top. It’s the skim milk that needs good teachers.
BEL KAUFMAN