115 Of The Greatest Inspirational Teacher Quotes, Sayings & Proverbs

One of my all-time favorite teacher quotes is “I am not a teacher, but an awakener” by Robert Frost.

Luckily, this is only one of many teacher appreciation quotes and sayings, proverbs, and inspirational quotes that I have researched and compiled in this mega list!

Below, you will find a wide range of short teacher quotes for motivation, admiration, inspiration, and also humor! Also, if you have got your own favorite, please share it in the comment!

115 Inspirational Teacher Quotes, Sayings & Proverbs

1. “If you can read this, thank a teacher.” – Unknown

2. “Children must be taught how to think, not what to think.” – Margaret Mead

3. “In learning, you will teach, and in teaching, you will learn.” – Phil Collins

4. “Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all.” – Aristotle

5. “It’s the teacher that makes the difference, not the classroom.” – Michael Morpurgo

6. “Teaching is the one profession that creates all other professions.” – Unknown

7. “Good teaching is 1/4 preparation and 3/4 theatre.” – Gail Godwin

8. “The art of teaching is the art of assisting discovery.” – Mark Van Doren

9. “A truly amazing teacher is hard to find, difficult to part with, and impossible to forget.” – Unknown

10. “A good teacher is like a candle – it consumes itself to light the way of others.” – Mustafa Kemal

11. “Your worst enemy is your best teacher.” – Buddha

12. “Good teaching is more a giving of right questions than a giving of right answers.” – Josef Albers

13. “It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.” – Albert Einstein

14. “Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.” – Benjamin Franklin

15. “If you have to put someone on a pedestal, put teachers. They are society’s heroes.” – Guy Kawasaki

16. “The influence of a good teacher can never be erased.” – Proverb

17. “Who dares to teach must never cease to learn.” – John C. Dana

18. “A teacher who is attempting to teach without inspiring the pupil with a desire to learn is hammering on cold iron.” – Horace Mann

19. “To teach is to learn twice over.” – Joseph Joubert

20. “The children you teach may not always remember you when they get older, but they will always have a part of you inside them. The part that gave them hope and love and taught them to believe in themselves.” – Marilyn Applebaum

21. “What a teacher is, is more important than what he teachers.” – Karl Menninger

22. “The teacher’s task is to initiate the learning process and then get out of the way.” – John Warren

23. “Teaching is a very noble profession that shapes the character, caliber, and future of the individual. If the people remember me as a good teacher, that will be the biggest honor for me.” – APJ Abdul Kalam

24. “One child, one teacher, one pen can change the world.” – Malala Yousafazi

25. “Teaching is not a lost art, but the regard for it is a lost tradition.” – Jacques Barzun

26. “Teachers encourage minds to think, hands to create, and hearts to love.” – Unknown

27. “Without teachers, life would have no class.” – Unknown

28. “Teaching kids to count is fine, but teaching them what counts is best.” – Bob Talbert

29. “Most of us end up with no more than five or six people who remember us. Teachers have thousands of people who remember them for the rest of their lives.” – Andy Rooney

30. “I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think.” – Socrates

31. “The greatest use of a life is to spend it for something that will outlast it.” – William James

32. “Education breeds confidence. Confidence breeds hope. Hope breeds peace.” – Confucius

33. “The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires.” – William Ward

34. “Better than a thousand days of diligent study is one day with a great teacher.” – Japanese Proverb

35. “Teaching is not a lost art, but the regard for it is a lost tradition.” – Jacques Barzun

36. “The job of an educator is to teach students to see vitality in themselves.” – Joseph Campbell

37. “To the world, you may be just a teacher but to your students, you are a hero.” – Unknown

38. “The best teachers are those who show you where to look, but don’t tell you what to see.” – Proverb

39. “A good teacher can inspire hope, ignite the imagination, and instill a love of learning.” – Brad Henry

40. “Students don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” – Unknown

41. “To this end, the greatest asset of a school is the personality of the teacher.” – John Strachan

42. “I am not a teacher, but an awakener.” – Robert Frost

43. “Being able to help someone learn something is a talent.” – Margaret Riel

44. “Every child deserves a champion – a teacher you will never give up on them, who understands the power of connection and insists that they become the best they can possibly be.” – Rita Pierson

45. “I am a teacher born and bred, and I believe in the advocacy of teachers. It’s a calling. We want our students to feel impassioned and empowered.” – Erin Gruwell

46. “Teachers can change lives with just the right mix of chalk and challenges.” – Joyce Meyer

47. “Teachers help tiny seeds grow into mighty trees.” – Proverb

48. “Those who know, do. Those that understand, teach.” –Aristotle

49. “The greatest sign of success for a teacher is to be able to say, ‘The children are now working as if I did not exist.” – Maria Montessori

50. “Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.” – John Dewey

51. “If a child can’t learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach the way they learn.” – Ignacio ‘Nacho’ Estrada

52. “Teachers encourage minds to think, hands to create, and hearts to love.” – Unknown

53. “Teachers have three loves: love of learning, love of learners, and the love of bringing the first two loves together.” – Scott Hayden

54. “A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where it stops.” – Henry Adams

55. “I never teach my pupils; I only attempt to provide the conditions in which they can learn.” – Albert Einstein

56. “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” – Nelson Mandela

57. “If you are planning for a year, sow rice. If you are planning for a decade, plant trees. If you are planning for a lifetime, teach people.” – Chinese Proverb

58. “Teachers teach more by what they are than by what they say.” – Unknown

59. “The great teacher is not the man who supplies the most facts, but the one in whose presence we become different people.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

60. “A teacher is a person who never says anything once.” – Howard Nemerou

61. “Every student can learn, just not on the same day or at the same time.” – George Evans

62. “The meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away.” – Pablo Picasso

63. “What you teach today may someday light the world.” – L.W. Fox

64. “Teachers are people who start things they never see finished, and for which they never get thanks until it is too late.” – Max Forman

65. “If we teach today’s students as we taught yesterday’s, we rob them of tomorrow.” – John Dewy

66. “When we strive to become better teachers than we are, everyone in our classroom becomes better too.” – Robert John Meehan

67. “A teacher is a compass that activates the magnets of curiosity, knowledge, and wisdom in the pupils.” – Ever Garrison

68. “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” – Maya Angelou

69. “Great teachers empathize with kids, respect them, and believe that each one has something special that can be built upon.” – Ann Lieberman

70. “The future of the world is in my classroom today.” – Ivan Fitzgerald

71. “Teaching is not just a job. It is a human service, and it must be thought of as a mission.” – Dr. Ralph Tyler

72. “Your work is not to drag the world kicking and screaming into a new awareness. Your job is to simply do your work… sacredly, secretly, silently … and those with “eyes to see and ears to hear’ will respond.” – The Arturians

73. “Minds are like parachutes. They only function when open.” – Thomas Dewar

74. “The secret in education lies in respecting the student.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

75. “When you teach what you love and share what you know, you open eyes, minds, hearts, and souls to unexplored worlds.” – Unknown

76. “The influence of teachers extends beyond the classroom, well into the future.” – F. Jose

77. “Summer vacation is the time when parents realize teachers are grossly underpaid.” – Unknown

78. “Proper teaching is recognized with ease. You can know it without fail because it awakens within you that sensation which tells you this is something you have always known.” – Frank Herbert

79. “Teachers, I believe are the most responsible and important members of society because their professional efforts affect the fate of the earth.” – Helen Caldicott

80. “The best teachers teach from the heart, not from the book.” – Unknown

90. “The more that you read, the more things you know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.” – Dr. Seuss

91. “Your heart is slightly bigger than the average human heart, but that’s because you’re a teacher.” – Aaron Bacall

92. “It takes a big heart to help shape little minds.” – Unknown

93. “Teachers open the door, but you must enter yourself.” – Chinese Proverb

94. “It is not our job to toughen our children up to face a cruel and heartless world. It’s our job to raise children who will make the world a little less cruel and heartless.” – L.R. Knost

95. “Wisdom begins in wonder.” – Socrates

96. “Don’t judge a teacher until you’ve walked a mile in their shoes.” – Unknown

97. “The best teachers are the ones that change their minds.” – Terry Heick

98. “The teacher who is indeed wise does not bid you enter the house of his wisdom but rather leads you to the threshold of your mind.” – Khalil Gibran

99. “Education is not learning of facts, but the training of the mind to think.” – Albert Einstein

100. “Good teachers know how to bring out the best in students.” – Charles Kuralt

101. “You can teach a person all you know, but only experience will convince him that what you say is true.” – Richelle E. Goodrich

102. “A teacher’s job is to take a bunch of live wires and see that they are well-grounded.” – D. Martin

103. “Proper teaching is recognized with ease. You can know it without fail because it awakens within you that sensation which tells you this is something you have always known.” – Frank Herbert

104. “Strive for progress, not perfection.” – Unknown

105.  “A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops.” – Henry Adams

106. “The whole art of teaching is only the art of awakening the natural curiosity of young minds for the purpose of satisfying it afterwards.” – Anatole France

107. “Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.” – William Butler Yeats

108. “I like a teacher who gives you something to take home to think about besides homework.” – Lily Tomlin

109. “Teachers are the one and only people who save nations.” – Mustafa Kemal Atatürk

110. “The true teacher defends his pupils against his own personal influence. He inspires self-trust.” – Amos Bronson Alcott

111. “Teaching is the greatest act of optimism” – Colleen Wilcox

112. “The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires.” – William Arthur Ward

113. “One looks back with appreciation to the brilliant teachers, but with gratitude to those who touched our human feelings.” – Carl Jung

114. “The dream begins with a teacher who believes in you, who tugs and pushes and leads you to the next plateau, sometimes poking you with a sharp stick called ‘truth’.” – Dan Rather

115. “One child, one teacher, one book, one pen can change the world.” – Malala Yousafzai

That rounds up my huge list of the top teaching quotes! If you want to see more, also check out my posts on education quotes & learning quotes!