I'd teach them to read and to dream and to look at the stars and wonder. I'd teach them the value of imagination. I'd teach them to play every bit as hard as they worked. And I'd teach them that all the brains in the world can't compensate for love.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of imagination, balance in life, and the irreplaceable value of love over intellect.
In this quote, Karen Marie Moning expresses a profound educational philosophy that goes beyond mere academic learning. She stresses the significance of nurturing imagination and curiosity in children, encouraging them to dream and explore the world around them. Moning also highlights the importance of a balanced life, where play is as crucial as hard work, and ultimately asserts that emotional connections and love are paramount—far surpassing intellectual achievements alone.
In practice
During a speech at a graduation ceremony to inspire young minds.
All my life, up until that moment, I'd had a warm, protective blanket wrapped around me, knitted of aunts and uncles, purled of first and second and third cousins, knot-tied with grandmas and grandpas and greats. That blanket had just dropped from my shoulders. I felt cold, lost and alone.
One day you do meet a man who kisses you and you can’t breathe around it and you realize you don’t need air. Oxygen is trivial. Desire makes life happen. Makes it matter. Makes everything worth it. Desire is life. Hunger to see the next sunrise or sunset. To touch the one you love. To try again.
I wasn't prepared for death. Nobody is. You lose someone you love more than you love yourself, and you get a crash course in mortality. You lie awake night after night, wondering if you really believe in heaven and hell and finding all kinds of reasons to cling to faith, because you can't bear to believe they aren't out there somewhere, a few whispered words of a prayer away.
I dream for a world which is free of child labour, a world in which every child goes to school. A world in which every child gets his rights.
In teaching you cannot see the fruit of a day's work. It is invisible and remains so, maybe for twenty years.
Free the child's potential, and you will transform him into the world.
Let there be nothing harmonious about our children's playthings, lest they grow up expecting peace and order, and be eaten alive.
Children should be allowed to express themselves in whatever way they wish without anybody judging them because it is an important part of their growth... Society always has something to learn when it comes to the way we judge each other, label each other. We have far to go.
Bureaucratic solutions to problems of practice will always fail because effective teaching is not routine, students are not passive, and questions of practice are not simple, predictable, or standardized. Consequently, instructional decisions cannot be formulated on high then packaged and handed down to teachers.
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