Quotes from The Gattegno effect
"'What makes you so excited about teaching children to read?' She replied: 'Because they all learn!'"
Dr. Katherine A. Mitchell
"It was like my search for a box of matches had led me to a volcano."
Yoko Yasuda, President of the Rainbow Laboratory, Tokyo
Mon travail est de déclencher en chacun d’eux les prises de conscience nécessaires pour les transformer en meilleurs mathématiciens.
Brendan Marcus
"What I prize most from Gattegno is his belief in the inherent genius of human beings. It is a belief that I have tried to make the foundation of my own practice as an educator. It is what has kept me in the field, and has kept teaching fascinating."
Dr. Paula Hajar, Professional Development Specialist in Mathematics at the Bronx Charter School for Better Learning, NY
" . . . there was no denying the effect it had on the students. They were on the edge of their seats . . . the approach freed me to be more observant and responsive to the always changing needs of students."
Donald Cherry, English Teacher at Hiroshima International University
"He fiercely contested pre-conceived ideas and fought courageously for what he knew to be valid."
Michael J. Hollyfield, Director of the Cuisenaire Company of the UK
The work done in this workshop and subsequent ones triggered in me a desire to reflect on how to invite my students to mobilize their own attention, awareness, and awareness of awareness to engage in game-like activities so that they can build mathematical ideas for themselves.
Dr. Arthur Powell, Professor, Rutgers University
‘Gattegno había nacido antes de tiempo y que su pedagogía era demasiado adelantada para esos momentos’
Laura Guajardo
"The most precious thing we had was self-awareness, the capacity to think about ourselves and what we were doing in a detached way, and that we should never let go of it."
Jim Reed, retired Instructor of Modern Languages and Literature at Oxford University
"Listening to him (Dr. Gattegno) speak was an act of discovery . . . "
Bill Bernhardt, Professor of English, City University of New York (CUNY)
Gattegno calls on teachers to become scientists of education in their classrooms by using the tool of watchfulness."
Alf Coles, Senior Lecturer in Education (Mathematics), University of Bristol
“'Patience is not a virtue in education,' he would remind us often, 'it is a necessity!'”
Dr. Jane Orton, Director of the Chinese Teacher Training Center, University of Melbourne
"J’ai un rêve : que tous les pays d’Afrique découvrent et pratiquent La Lecture en Couleurs et l’approche pédagogique initiée par Caleb Gattegno."
Geneviève Godard
" . . . it was an intense, stimulating, and exciting time during which we had the luxury of exploring a reconceptualization of language education with some of the best minds of the time."
Dr. Alvino Fantini, Professor Emeritus at World Learning’s School for International Training in Brattleboro, Vermont, and currently serves as an International Consultant
"I hear his voice saying, 'Don't take anything for granted!'"
Fusako Allard, Teacher in Japan
“ . . . his work is all encompassing; his Science of Education is in fact a Science of Life."
Dr. Caroline Brandt, Communications Skills Instructor, Abu Dhabi, UAE
"What I saw was hard for me to believe: a way of teaching that had more respect for people’s intelligence than anything I had experienced."
Lindsay Pearson, ESL Instructor at the Riverside Language Program
"Dr. G: 'You're boring them. You don't vary the activities enough. You have to learn how to play their games the way they do.'"
Allen Rozelle, Teacher, Santa Cruz, California
"The idea of subordinating teaching to learning is essentially humbling in its spirit . . . "
Dr. Caroline Brandt, Communications Skills Instructor, Abu Dhabi, UAE
"Short-cutting the learning process, offering false praise, or praise at all, is no match for the delight that comes from doing one’s own work and making one’s own learning discoveries."
Dr. Leslie Turpin, Managing Director of Sandglass Theater in Putney, Vermont
"My lessons became far more dynamic and lively and soon everybody realized that working in a group was a great advantage."
Dr. Cecilia Bartoli
"教師の「沈黙」は言うまでもなく、教師が言語を「教えていない」ことを目の当たりにし、あらためて目を見開いた。"
Etsuko Nagasawa, working at the Center for Learning in Osaka, Japan
"'Don’t you really think these children have reached their ceiling?' Silence followed then, in hesitation I finally replied, 'No. Actually I don’t really think they have looked up yet.'"
Edna Shaw
"The promise of Gattegno’s methods was not just that children would perform at grade level, but that they would perform at levels beyond expectations, and so close or prevent what we now refer to as 'the achievement gap.'"
Dr. Marilyn Maye, Assistant Professor in the Department of Educational Leadership at New Jersey City University and a Mathematics Education Consultant for state and national organizations
"Somehow students feel the difference in your attitude: their work often becomes far more imaginative and efficient and results come as a by-product."
Dr. Cecilia Bartoli
"The children were delighted. Their allotted classroom soon became a hive of anticipation, even joy."
Edna Shaw
"Simple economics would say that it is baffling this is not applied in most schools."
Luigi Magnano, Educator and Entrepreneur
"Dr. Mataira: 'At the end of the 20 minute session I was elated. I had actually composed a number of sentences and I knew exactly what the function of each word was without any explanation.'"
Te Ataarangi
Dr. Mataira won the 2009 UNESCO Linguipax Award for her work reviving the Maori language in New Zealand . Details here
"After premising that he had never said this to anyone before, he shared with us in a seminar that his overall view was that, 'Life is a grand experiment.'"
Robert P. Echter, Special Education Teacher with Kindergarten to Grade 8 students in New Haven, Connecticut
"I was fascinated by the quiet concentration in the room, and the tangible focus by even those who had no interest whatsoever in this unusual language."
Dr. Patricia Benstein, Teacher
"Although I could not quite figure how my emotions had gotten so involved, I knew that if I were going to teach, it would have to be the sort of teaching that would engage my students to the heightened degree that I had found myself . . . "
Daniel Tamulonis, Kindergarten Teacher at the Bronx Charter School for Better Learning, NY
"It is the teacher’s responsibility to create an atmosphere in class where mistakes are encouraged."
Phyllis Berman, Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director RLP (Riverside Language Program)
"Everyone else, even my graduate school professors, seemed like fluff after Gattegno."
Dr. Paula Hajar, Professional Development Specialist in Mathematics at the Bronx Charter School for Better Learning, NY
"His approach was often teasing, provocative, designed to unsettle your assumptions and prejudges, very much like the Socratic Method..."
Jim Reed, retired Instructor of Modern Languages and Literature at Oxford University
"This descent of awareness into one person, and from him to others, and then to all, is another fact of awareness which is increasingly becoming collective every day."
Excerpt from On Humanism in Language Teaching: Critical Perspectives, Dr. Earl Stevick, Oxford University Press, 1990.
"We had feedback sessions regularly, many of which were filled with long silences, sighs and stares. Ultimately, these sessions became a part of the day we all anticipated."
Daniel Tamulonis, Kindergarten Teacher at the Bronx Charter School for Better Learning, NY
"Challenges set the right context for all of us to become producers of knowledge and skill rather than a consumer and memorizer of other people’s knowledge."
Eaton Donald, President of Educational Solutions Worldwide Inc.
"Gattegno m’a permis de découvrir les potentiels de chaque apprenant et il a déclenché en moi le désir d’accompagner ce petit être selon son rythme . . . "
Raymonde Rocourt
"One of Dr. Gattegno’s legacies has been to produce a system teachers can use to transform what they do, and continually improve on what they do."
Andrew Weiler, Teacher of the Silent Way since 1978, currently working on a book that combines applications of the Science of Education with what learners can do for themselves
"I was at last more present to the pupils than to the clock."
Christiane Rozet, Secretary of association Une Education Pour Demain (An Education for the Future)
"Caleb Gattegno’s ideas are still very inspiring and to have met him was a remarkable experience in my life."
Dr. Ubiratan D'Ambrosio, Emeritus Professor of Mathematics at the State University of Campinas in São Paulo, Brazil
"After four days of being challenged to rethink their teaching methods, the teachers and administrators seemed to have concluded that the potential violence surrounding Aristide’s return was outweighed by their need to complete the training."
Esaie Pierre, Senior Research Scientist for an international pharmaceutical company
"I choose to work in a different way where I try to set up a paradoxical place of safety that sits right on an edge of discomfort."
Chris Breen, Independent Consultant/Teacher/Emeritus Associate Professor of the School of Education at the University of Cape Town (UCT)
"I was shocked to find that a 45 minute language lesson could trigger such an intense inner experience in the learner."
Dr. Masayuki Onishi, Senior Researcher at RIHN (Research Institute for Humanity and Nature), in Kyoto, Japan/regularly teaches Japanese, Bengali, and English, and occasionally conducts Silent Way workshops
"As Dr. G said, learning is contagious and perhaps also bigger than us."
Adrian Underhill, International Enhanced Language Training (ELT) Consultant and Trainer
"Were there any skills a child had taught himself in the acquisition of learning to talk that might be able to be used to teach him to read?"
Janice Mattina, Founder and Teacher at Center Montessori School in Bradenton, Florida
"It is the tragedy of his life that he will probably never again find himself with a man like Gattegno, who knows, as few teachers do, that it is his business to put himself into contact with the intelligence of his students, wherever and whatever that may be . . . "
Excerpt from How Children Fail, by John Holt, 1959
"I tried to observe the teachers closely so that I could use their experience as the starting point for triggering an awareness of the vast potential for learning in their classrooms . . . "
Dr. Kathleen Graves, Associate Professor of Education practice at the School of Education, University of Michigan
"As a teacher, I learned what to look at and how to find ways to help in particular situations, as well as how to stay out of the way."
Dr. Barbara Villez, Professor of Didactics, Law, and Media Studies at the University of Paris
"My son immediately started to play with rods, and a box of Cuisenaire Rods and a green book titled Arithmestics was his companion for the rest of our travels."
Dr. Masayuki Onishi, Senior Researcher at RIHN (Research Institute for Humanity and Nature), in Kyoto, Japan
"The most powerful thing for me about Gattegno's work is that clearly he was able to teach in 18 months what most mathematics teachers work on for many years with their students."
Laurinda Brown, Teacher Educator at the University of Bristol, Graduate School of Education
"He talks about awareness and mathematics and then asks us to do some work. It is not a soothing experience as he keeps each one of us on edge with provocative and challenging questions. But we work and there are many 'Aha!' moments in the room."
Chris Breen, Independent Consultant/Teacher/Emeritus Associate Professor of the School of Education at the University of Cape Town (UCT)
"Dr. Gattegno's ideas and publications regarding education go beyond specific methodologies, and provoke questions about the educational process, and interactions between teachers and students."
Dr. Alvino Fantini, Professor Emeritus at World Learning’s School for International Training in Brattleboro, Vermont, and currently serves as an International Consultant