August 24, 2007

Today's Quote

The philosophy behind the program is basically simple. We say in effect, “Kid, it doesn’t matter how miserably your environment has failed to teach you the basic concepts that an average five-year-old has long since mastered. We’re not going to fail you. We’re not going to discriminate against you, or give up on you, regardless of how unready you may be according to traditional standards.

We are not going to label you with a handle such as dyslexic or disadvantaged or brain damaged and feel that we have now exonerated ourselves from the responsibility of teaching you. We’re not going to punish you by requiring you to do things you can’t do.

We’re not going to talk about your difficulties to learn. Rather, we will take you where you are, and we will teach you. And the extent to which we fail is our failure, not yours. We will not cop out by saying, “He can’t learn.” Rather we will say, “I failed to teach him. So I better take a good look at what I did and try to figure out a better way.”


--Zig Engelmann

(I've posted this quote before, but you really can't post this one enough. Especially since the sentiments behind the quote don't appear to be sinking in.)

1 comment:

Bridget Magnus said...

Right on! This attitude is what I loved about Mr. Englemann from the first time I was exposed to his thinking.

I assume you have seen the Canadian study that says boys who have female reading tutors *feel better* about their reading skills? Heaven forbid anyone should figure out whether they actually *do* read better. Clearly crazy talk! ;-)