Passion for Education!

This week I chose to learn more about Lyndon B Johnson, the founder president of Head Start and Jean Marc Gaspard Itard who was said to be considered the founder of special education.  I was able to find a quote from Johnson, but as there weren't any quotes from Itard, I selected a passage from his book "An Historical Account of the Discovery and Education of a Savage Man" which is a book about Victor who sparked his interest in this field to begin with. 

Below are two very powerful quotes from Lyndon B. Johnson in regards to education.  I agree with a lot of his ideas, it was extremely hard settling on only two quotes.  We have to be better as a whole, find out how kids learn and continue to enhance the education system so that it can benefit everyone.

"Books and ideas are the most effective weapons against intolerance and ignorance"
-Lyndon B. Johnson

"But more classrooms and more teachers are not enough. We must seek an educational system which grows in excellence as it grows in size. This means better training for our teachers. It means preparing youth to enjoy their hours of leisure as well as their hours of labor. It means exploring new techniques of teaching, to find new ways to stimulate the love of learning and the capacity for creation."

-Lyndon B. Johnson


Below is an exerpt from Jean Marc Gaspard Itard's book "An Historical Account of the Discovery and Education of a Savage Man" which is a book about what drew him to Victor, a naked 12 year old deemed idiotic found wandering naked in the woods, and what kept him trying to help Victor as opposed to dismiss him as everyone else had done.

“I did not assent to this unfavorable opinion; and, in spite of the truth of the picture, and the justness of the representations, I conceived some hopes, which were grounded on the two- fold consideration of the cause, and the possibility of curing this apparent idiot-ism. I could not proceed Without stopping an instant to dwell upon these two considerations. They still bear on the present moment; they result from a series of facts which I am going to relate, and in which I shall be obliged to mix frequently my own reflections”.

- Jean Marc Gaspard Itard

Both of the above tie in with how I try to teach and continue learning how to teach.  You have to want to learn how each individual child learns.  Teaching isn't a 9-5 job that you drop at the door, late nights and early mornings researching different ways to get messages across to children who may not grasp it is the only way to be efficient.  When the problem is deeper than simply not being able to understand something you need to be willing to find out the next steps necessary to help the child.  That's what drives my passion for education and the people I chose to learn more about!