“A teacher's major contribution may pop out anonymously in the life of some ex-student's grandchild. A teacher, finally, has nothing to go on but faith, a student nothing to offer in return but testimony.”

“Through dialogue, the teacher-of-the-students and the students-of-the-teacher cease to exist and a new term emerges: teacher-student with students-teachers.”

“Teachers should prepare the student for the student's future, not for the teacher's past.”

“The ideal teacher student relationship exists when the student is better than the teacher.”

“I have nothing to teach you that will help you to make a living. [as art teacher, advising his students]”

“Education must begin with the solution of the teacher-student contradiction, by reconciling the poles of the contradiction so that both are simultaneously teachers and students.”

“The task of the teacher has come to an end and it is the right time for the student to outshine the master.”

“Many instructional arrangements seem "contrived", but there is nothing wrong with that. It is the teacher's function to contrive conditions under which students learn. Their relevance to a future usefulness need not be obvious.
It is a difficult assignment. The conditions the teacher arranges must be powerful enough to compete with those under which the student tends to behave in distracting ways.”

“As all born teachers, he was primarily a student.”

“In order to be a teacher you've got to be a student first”