Quote by Alice Duer Miller
It is among the commonplaces of education that we often first cut off the living root and then try to replace its natural functions by artificial means. Thus we suppress the child's curiosity and then when he lacks a natural interest in learning he is offered special coaching for his scholastic coaching for his scholastic difficulties.
Summary
This quote suggests that in education, there is often a tendency to stifle children's natural curiosity and interests, and then attempt to compensate for this by providing them with artificial methods of learning. By suppressing a child's innate curiosity, they lose their intrinsic motivation to learn. Consequently, they may struggle academically and need special coaching to overcome their difficulties. This quote highlights the irony of how, in an attempt to enhance education, we sometimes inadvertently undermine it by neglecting the importance of nurturing a child's natural curiosity and interests.