As a former teacher, I can say with 100% confidence that unless you’ve spent a year of your life educating a group of students who quickly become your ‘kids,’ you can’t understand the life of an educator. Unfortunately, the ever-increasing demands on teachers can make the job feel thankless at times.
You’ll have days where you feel unappreciated by your students, their parents, and your administrators. I can’t change that, but I can remind you that your role as an educator will have a lifelong impact on every child that enters your classroom. You’re shaping our future with every student-teacher interaction, and your students see that.
When you need a little encouragement to finish the day strong, remember all of the people who see and value your work as an educator, and check out these quotes about teaching that remind why you do what you do.
20 Inspiring quotes for teachers
Let’s be clear, we’re staying miles away from any quotes that equate teaching with martyrdom. If someone truly believes “a good teacher is like a candle—it consumes itself to light the way for others,” they can’t sit with us.
Here are 20 inspirational quotes for teachers. Let them encourage and empower you as you continue to make a difference within your classroom and your school.
1. “One child, one teacher, one book, one pen can change the world.” — Malala Yousafzai
Malala believed in the power of education so strongly that she was willing to risk her life for the chance to attend school. As an educator, you have the power to make ripples that impact your students, their families, and your community.
2. “Your heart is slightly bigger than the average human heart, but that’s because you’re a teacher.” — Aaron Bacall
Teacher hearts are the opposite of the Grinch heart— two sizes too big instead of two sizes too small. That oversized heart is what allows you to pour into your students day after day. It’s why you invest in those relationships, create experiential learning opportunities, and do whatever you can to help each student reach their full potential.
3. “The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character – that is the goal of true education.” — Martin Luther King Jr.
Dr. King understood that the purpose of teaching is more than helping students memorize facts and figures. Good teachers equip students with academic knowledge and the knowledge they need to navigate the world outside of the classroom.
4. “Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.” — John Dewey
Learning doesn’t end when students graduate from school. You are equipping your students with the curiosity and drive to become lifelong learners.
5. “You can’t stop a teacher when they want to do something. They just do it.” — J.D. Salinger
Nothing rivals the tenacity of a teacher. Whether they’re facing school politics, copy restrictions, or outrageous parent demands, teachers can find a creative workaround and continue to meet each student’s unique needs.
6. “Anyone who does anything to help a child in his life is a hero.” — Fred Rogers
Mr. Rogers knows better than anyone else that supporting children is heroic work. Even the smallest act of care betters the lives of your students.
7. “Education is not the learning of facts, but the training of the mind to think.” — Albert Einstein
Teaching is about so much more than filling your students’ minds with facts. You are developing critical thinking skills that will carry your students through the rest of their lives.
8. “The beautiful thing about learning is that no one can take it away from you.” — B.B. King
Knowledge is empowerment. You can’t protect your students from the difficulties they’re going to face throughout their lifetime, but you are equipping them with the confidence and intelligence they need to successfully navigate each challenge.
9. “In learning you will teach, and in teaching you will learn.” — Phil Collins
How could we skip out on lyrics from this Tarzan anthem? It can be a cliche and be true— you learn just as much from your students as they learn from you.
10. “Teachers, I believe, are the most responsible and important members of society because their professional efforts affect the fate of the earth.” — Helen Caldicott
Your classroom is filled with the next generation of scientists, doctors, authors, and artists. You could be nurturing the next Steve Wozniak, Tracy Chou, Florence Nightingale. Over the course of your teaching career, you will teach hundreds of children who will grow up to change the world in both big and small ways.
11. “Good teaching is more a giving of right questions than a giving of right answers.” — Josef Albers
Good teachers know that asking thoughtful questions encourages deeper learning than simply providing answers. You’re cultivating a deep curiosity in your students so they grow up to become independent thinkers who never stop learning.
12. “If kids come to us from strong, healthy, functioning families, it makes our job easier. Our job is more critical if they do not come to us from strong, healthy, functioning families.” — Barbara Colorose
For some students, your classroom is the safest place they can be. It’s often those children who make your job more difficult but also more meaningful. They are the ones who need you more than they can put into words.
13. “Teaching is not a lost art, but the regard for it is a lost tradition.” — Jacques Barzun
The world is full of incredible teachers. Unfortunately, what we often lack is the appreciation for those teachers. Your job is important and valuable, and you should often be reminded of that fact.
14. “Everyone who remembers his own education remembers teachers, not methods and techniques. The teacher is the heart of the education system.” — Sidney Hook
I don’t remember how my fourth-grade teacher taught me to write a short story, but I do remember listening to James Taylor during our writing block each day. I don’t remember what method she used to teach text structure, but I remember her attending my high school graduation and wedding.
You are what makes your students eager to come to school each day– not your math manipulatives or graphic organizers.
15. “Teaching isn’t just a job. It’s a human service, and it must be thought of as a mission.” — Dr. Ralph Tyler
The truth of Dr. Tyler’s words lies in the fact that you think of your students long after the end of the school day. A teacher’s job doesn’t end at 3:30pm, because you can never turn off your concern for your students.
16. “Teachers can make such a profound impact on our lives and should be honored as heroes.” — Rainn Wilson
Dwight Rainn knows exactly what he’s talking about, and this quote is even more meaningful because he doesn’t just talk the talk. Rainn co-founded the Lidè Haiti Foundation, which empowers adolescent girls through the arts.
17. “There is no higher calling in terms of a career than teaching children and investing in them as they are our future.” — Maggie Gallagher
You and I could instantly name a hundred different jobs that pay more than teaching— but none of them are quite as impactful. Sometimes, the value of a job is in the difference it makes.
18. “Teaching is the greatest act of optimism.” — Colleen Wilcox
Teachers are the embodiment of hope. You are investing in a future that you trust will bloom, even if you’re not around to witness it.
19. “If a doctor, lawyer, or dentist had 40 people in his office at one time, all of whom had different needs, and some of whom didn’t want to be there and were causing trouble, and the doctor, lawyer, or dentist, without assistance, had to treat them all with professional excellence for nine months, then he might have some conception of the classroom teacher’s job.” — Donald D. Quinn
Give yourself a gift and spend 15 seconds imagining this exact scenario. How hard did you laugh?
It’s rare that teachers get the credit they deserve for the complex task of educating and managing a class of 25 children.
20. “What we want is to see the child in pursuit of knowledge, and not knowledge in pursuit of the child.” — George Bernard Shaw
Helping your students develop the intrinsic motivation necessary to pursue learning is at the heart of teaching. Good teachers don’t develop passive learners; they set students on a never-ending quest for knowledge.
Conclusion
As the school year winds to a close, your motivation may be waning. Encourage yourself and your teammates by inserting your favorite quote into your email signature or printing it on a poster to hang in the teacher’s lounge.
Your chance to rest and refresh before another school year is just a few weeks away. In the meantime, remember that you are doing critical work that will change the life of each of your students.
