Madeline Levine Quotes & Sayings

Many leading educators and psychologists believe that it is the ability to ask good questions that characterizes both intelligence and creativity. — Madeline Levine

Our children cannot be assumed to follow in our footsteps, assuage our losses, or compensate for our inadequacies. — Madeline Levine

The relatively new field of "adolescent medicine" focuses not only on the traditional medical model of diagnosis and treatment, but, perhaps more than any other subspecialty of medicine, on education and prevention. — Madeline Levine

Empathy is the accurate understanding of another person'ts internal experience. It has nothing to do with agreeing or disagreeing with that experience. Unlike sympathy, it makes no assumptions about how the other person is feeling. — Madeline Levine

Experts recommend two hours of unstructured play for every hour of structured play. While your child is playing take half that time for your own play - a craft project, a good novel (or a bad one), looking at catalogs, sitting outside, dancing. If the very idea of "playing" as an adult confuses you, think back to your own childhood and the things that you spent time on and enjoyed doing. Try them again. As with everything else about children's behavior, there's nothing like a good role model. If you value play, your child will, too. — Madeline Levine

There is no parent more vulnerable to the excesses of overparenting than an unhappy parent. One of the most important things we do for our children is to present them with a version of adult life that is appealing and worth striving for. — Madeline Levine

Adolescents need tremendous support as they go about the task of figuring out their identities, their future selves. Too often what they get is intrusion. Intrusion and support are two fundamentally different processes: support is about the needs of the child, intrusion is about the needs of the parent. — Madeline Levine

I also know two steps forward and one step back is the rule, not the exception, as people work on change. — Madeline Levine

Remember, our very first job is to appropriately monitor our teen's safety. After all, if we're not successful at that, then any discussion of cognitive skills is irrelevant. — Madeline Levine

There's probably no better example of the throttling of creativity than the difference between what we observe in a kindergarten classroom and what we observe in a high school classroom," she writes in Teach Your Children Well. "Take a room full of five-year-olds and you will see creativity in all its forms positively flowing around the room. A decade later you will see these same children passively sitting at their desks, half asleep or trying to decipher what will be on the next test. — Madeline Levine

We need to always deal with the child in front of us, not the child of our fantasies. — Madeline Levine

And it is unstructured play that provides the greatest opportunities for kids to be curious, creative, spontaneous, and collaborative. — Madeline Levine

The best way we can help our children welcome challenges is to encourage them to work just outside their comfort zone, stand by to lend a hand when needed, and model enthusiasm for challenging tasks. — Madeline Levine

Until they enter elementary school most youngsters are motivated by the challenge itself, not by stars or grades or rewards. This is called mastery motivation and is the form of learning most likely to lead to both engagement and persistence, and ultimately to expertise. — Madeline Levine