With better vision, we sacrifice for students for whom that sacrifice will most likely pay off. I'm sorry to say this, but there are times when even superhuman effort will not save a child from his environment or himself. It's not the job of the teacher to save a child's soul; it is the teachers' job to provide an opportunity for the child to save his own soul.
Interpretation
Teachers provide opportunities for students to grow, but ultimately, students must take responsibility for their own futures.
This quote highlights the essential role of educators in creating opportunities for their students, suggesting that while teachers can offer support and resources, the ultimate responsibility for personal success lies with the students themselves. It acknowledges the challenges that some students face in their environments and emphasizes that teachers cannot rescue every child but can equip them to navigate their own paths toward success.
In practice
During a keynote speech at a teacher's conference to inspire educators to motivate their students.
Never compare one student's test score to another's. Always measure a child's progress against her past performance. There will always be a better reader, mathematician, or baseball player. Our goal is to help each student become as special as she can be as an individual--not to be more special than the kid sitting next to her.
The earth flourishes, or is overrun with noxious weeds and brambles, as we apply or withhold the cultivating hand. So fares it with the intellectual system of man.
In Britain, we need to start presenting the option of being a writer in front of black women. We need to present the idea of being a writer into poorer communities because the majority of black people in this country are working class. We need to let working-class people know that their voices are important.
write what readers want to read, which isn’t necessarily what you want to write.
A book is a machine to think with.
Whoever educates himself and improves his own morals & character is superior to the man who tries to teach & train others.
I grew up hearing stories about my grandmother - my mother's mother - who used to go to villages in India in her little VW bug. My grandmother would take a bullhorn and make sure women in these villages knew how to access birth control.
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