Alfie Quotes & Sayings

All rewards have the same effect," one writer declares. "They dilute the pure joy that comes from success itself. — Alfie Kohn

Unconditional parents want to know how to do something other than threaten and punish. They don't see their relationship with their children as adversarial, so their goal is to avoid battles, not win them. — Alfie Kohn

She wouldn't understand, and he couldn't explain. How bad it felt to be a shock. To be an idea people had to get used to. To be a moment of hesitation. A flinch when someone touched you. A wariness in their eyes. — Alexis Hall

We tell them how good they are and they light up, eager to please, and try to please us some more. These are the children we should really worry about. — Alfie Kohn

The more we want our children to be (1) lifelong learners, genuinely excited about words and numbers and ideas, (2) avoid sticking with what's easy and safe, and (3) become sophisticated thinkers, the more we should do everything possible to help them forget about grades. — Alfie Kohn

Most children seem eager, even desperate, to please those in authority, reluctant to rock the boat even when the boat clearly needs rocking. In a way, an occasional roll-your-eyes story of excess in the other direction marks the exception that proves the rule. And the rule is a silent epidemic of obedience. For every kid who is slapped with the label "Oppositional Defiant Disorder," hundreds suffer from what one educator has mischievously called Compliance Acquiescent Disorder. The symptoms of CAD, he explained, include the following: "defers to authority," "actively obeys rules," "fails to argue back," "knuckles under instead of mobilizing others in support," and "stays restrained when outrage is warranted. — Alfie Kohn

Obviously, things work best when parents and teachers are helping kids to become good people - and, better yet, when they're actively supporting one another's efforts. — Alfie Kohn

In outstanding classrooms, teachers do more listening than talking, and students do more talking than listening. Terrific teachers often have teeth marks on their tongues. — Alfie Kohn

The late W. Edwards Deming, guru of Quality management, once declared, 'The most important things we need to manage can't be measured.' If that's true of what we need to manage, it should be even more obvious that it's true of what we need to teach. — Alfie Kohn

In a word, learning is decontextualized. We break ideas down into tiny pieces that bear no relation to the whole. We give students a brick of information, followed by another brick, followed by another brick, until they are graduated, at which point we assume they have a house. What they have is a pile of bricks, and they don't have it for long. — Alfie Kohn

But as I mastered the material, homework ceased to be necessary. A no homework policy is a challenge to me," he adds. "I am forced to create lessons that are so good no further drilling is required when the lessons are completed. — Alfie Kohn

To feel controlled is to lose interest. — Alfie Kohn

Thomas Gordon said it well: "Children sometimes know better than parents when they are sleepy or hungry; know better the qualities of their friends, their own aspirations and goals, how their various teachers treat them; know better the urges and needs within their bodies, whom they love and whom they don't, what they value and what they don't."4 In any case, we can't always assume that because we're more mature we necessarily have more insight into our children than they have into themselves. — Alfie Kohn

Sometimes the alternative to black and white isn't gray; it's, say, orange. — Alfie Kohn

To control students is to force them to accommodate to a preestablished curriculum. — Alfie Kohn

Whoever said there's no such thing as a stupid question never looked carefully at a standardized test. — Alfie Kohn

Trying to do well and trying to beat others are two different things. Excellence and victory are conceptually distinct ... and are experienced differently. — Alfie Kohn

With learning lines, before I had Alfie, I'd put it off and think, 'Oh, I'll just have a glass of wine and then do it later,' but when you've finally got a child to bed and you know you've only got an hour, then you achieve so much. — Lesley Manville

S. Neill put it, promising a reward for an activity is "tantamount to declaring that the activity is not worth doing for its own sake."26 Thus, a parent who says to a child, "If you finish your math homework, you may watch an hour of TV" is teaching the child to think of math as something that isn't much fun. — Alfie Kohn

We ought to love children, as my friend Deborah says, 'for no good reason.' Furthermore, what counts is not that we believe we love them unconditionally, but that they feel loved in that way. — Alfie Kohn

Punished by Rewards: The Trouble with Gold Stars, Incentive Plans, A's, Praise, and Other Bribes BY ALFIE KOHN — Daniel H. Pink

Alfie Dawlish. Invented all sorts of imaginary ailments for the family at the Manor so he could rob them and treat the village for nothing. It was his primitive version of the Health Service — John Mortimer

Rewards usually improve performance only at extremely simple - indeed, mindless - tasks, and even then they improve only quantitative performance. — Alfie Kohn

One thing I would say is that I think in any environment that you work in, there's always going to be one or two people who you don't like. But there just wasn't that on 'Games Of Thrones'. I know it sounds cheesy and cliched, but it was like a big family. — Alfie Allen

If children feel safe, they can take risks, ask questions, make mistakes, learn to trust, share their feelings, and grow. — Alfie Kohn

We complain loudly about such things as the sagging productivity of our workplaces, the crisis of our schools, and the warped values of our children. But the very strategy we use to solve those problems - dangling rewards like incentive plans and grades and candy bars in front of people - is partly responsible for the fix we're in. We are a society of loyal Skinnerians, unable to think our way out of the box we have reinforced ourselves into. — Alfie Kohn

If faculty would relax their emphasis on grades, this might serve not to lower standards but to encourage an orientation toward learning. — Alfie Kohn

a grade can be regarded only as an inadequate report of an inaccurate judgment by a biased and variable judge of the extent to which a student has attained an undefined level of mastery of an unknown proportion of an indefinite amount of material. — Alfie Kohn

If I offered you a thousand dollars to take off your shoes, you'd very likely accept
and then I could triumphantly announce that 'rewards work.' But as with punishments, they can never help someone develop a *commitment* to a task or action, a reason to keep doing it when there's no longer a payoff. — Alfie Kohn

Where did this disposition come from? And what are our long-term goals for people - particularly children - with respect to motivation? — Alfie Kohn

Similarly, parents who want to teach the importance of honesty make it a practice never to lie to their children, even when it would be easier just to claim that there are no cookies left rather than to explain why they can't have another one. — Alfie Kohn

We learn most readily, most naturally, most effectively, when we start with the big picture - precisely when the basics don't come first. — Alfie Kohn

Educators remind us that what counts in a classroom is not what the teacher teaches; it's what the learner learns. — Alfie Kohn

Contingent on what, though? Some bases for feeling good about oneself may be worse than others. Jennifer Crocker, a psychologist at Ohio State University, and her colleagues have shown that the prognosis is particularly bad when self-esteem hinges on outdoing others (competitive success), approval by others, physical appearance, or academic achievement.47 Consider the last of those. When children's self-esteem rises or falls with how well they do at school, achievement can resemble an addiction, "requiring ever greater success to avoid feelings of worthlessness." And if it looks as though success is unlikely, kids may "disengage from the task, deciding it doesn't matter, rather than suffer the loss of self-esteem that accompanies failure. — Alfie Kohn

My mother maintained a sense of loving connection with me even during our worst conflicts" or "When my dad disagrees with me, I know that he still loves me."13 So, how would you like your children to answer that sort of question in five or ten or fifteen years - and how do you think they will answer it? — Alfie Kohn

But my point is not just that the psychological theory is inadequate; it is that the practice is unproductive. If we do not address the ultimate cause of a problem, the problem will not get solved. This is not to say — Alfie Kohn

The point isn't just whether children know what to expect; it's whether what they've come to expect makes sense. — Alfie Kohn

John Dewey reminded us that the value of what students do 'resides in its connection with a stimulation of greater thoughtfulness, not in the greater strain it imposes. — Alfie Kohn

No one paid much attention when he left. They continued to eat and drink and talk and laugh over their suffering, and occasionally run to the bathroom to be ill. It was this way more or less every night and every morning. Strangers appeared in his hotel room, always a wreck after the previous night. In the morning, they stuck themselves back together again. They rubbed at raccoon-eyed faces full of smeared makeup, looked for lost hats and feathers and beads and phone numbers and shoes and hours. It wasn't a bad life. It wouldn't last, but nothing ever did.
They would all be like Alfie in the end, crying on his sofa at dawn and regretting it all. Which was why Magnus stayed away from those kinds of problems. Keep moving. Keep dancing. — Cassandra Clare

What's it all about Alfie, is it just the moment we live? — Dionne Warwick

Educational success should be measured by how strong your desire is to keep learning. — Alfie Kohn

I think our challenge as parents is to rise above that preference for the child of least resistance and to think beyond short-term success as a criterion - particularly if success is defined by conventional and insipid standards. Don't we want our kids to be inspiring rather than spend their lives just collecting tokens (grades, money, approval)? Don't we want them to think in the plural rather than focusing only on what will benefit them personally? Don't we want them to appraise traditions with fresh eyes and raise questions about what seems silly or self-defeating or oppressive, rather than doing what has always been done just because it's always been done? — Alfie Kohn

When you stand by and let bad things happen, your child experiences the twin disappointments that something went wrong and you did not seem to care enough about her to lift a finger to help prevent the mishap. — Alfie Kohn

What provokes particular outrage and ridicule is the idea that children might feel good about themselves in the absence of impressive accomplishments, even though, as I'll show, studies find that unconditional self-esteem is a key component of psychological health. — Alfie Kohn

After all, if we want a child to grow into a genuinely compassionate person, then it's not enough to know whether he just did something helpful. We'd want to know why. — Alfie Kohn

Historians have shown that "parents in the Middle Ages worried about their kids no less than we worry about ours today," and by the nineteenth century there is evidence of bars being placed on windows to protect toddlers from falling out as well as "leading strings
so that young children wouldn't wander off during walks. — Alfie Kohn

Contrary to what you think, your company will be a lot more productive if you refuse to tolerate competition among your employees. — Alfie Kohn

Children aren't helped to become caring members of a community, or ethical decision-makers, or critical thinkers, so much as they're simply trained to follow directions. — Alfie Kohn

It's not just that humiliating people, of any age, is a nasty and disrespectful way of treating them. It's that humiliation, like other forms of punishment, is counterproducti ve. 'Doing to' strategies
as opposed to those that might be described as 'working with'
can never achieve any result beyond temporary compliance, and it does so at a disturbing cost. — Alfie Kohn

I'd love kids. I'm obsessed with babies. Of course I've thought about baby names. A million times. I like Alfie for a little boy. — Cheryl Cole

Those who know they're valued irrespective of their accomplishments often end up accomplishing quite a lot. It's the experience of being accepted without conditions that helps people develop a healthy confidence in themselves, a belief that it's safe to take risks and try new things. — Alfie Kohn

Empowered kids are in the best position to deal constructively with disempowering circumstances. And we, as parents, are in the best position to empower them - as long as we're willing to limit our use of power over them. — Alfie Kohn

You have to give them unconditional love. They need to know that even if they screw up, you love them. You don't want them to grow up and resent you or, even worse, parent the way you parented them. — Alfie Kohn

Few parents have the courage and independence to care more for their children's happiness than for their success. — Alfie Kohn

Do we really want to condemn as excessive the use of safety helmets, car seats, playgrounds designed so kids will be less likely to crack their skulls, childproof medicine bottles, and baby gates at the top of stairs? One writer criticizes "the inappropriateness of excessive concern in low-risk environments," but of course reasonable people disagree about what constitutes both "excessive" and "low risk." Even if, as this writer asserts, "a young person growing up in a Western middle-class family is safer today than at any time in modern history," the relevance of that relative definition of safety isn't clear. Just because fewer people die of disease today than in medieval times doesn't mean it's silly to be immunized. And perhaps young people are safer today because of the precautions that some critics ridicule. — Alfie Kohn

For the anthropomorphic view of the rat, American psychology substituted a rattomorphic view of man. - Arthur Koestler, The Act of Creation — Alfie Kohn

You are a pawn and a tool," he said. "But you're the right one for the job. For that, I am sorry. — Jamie Wyman

What can we surmise about the likelihood of someone's being caring and generous, loving and helpful, just from knowing that they are a believer? Virtually nothing, say psychologists, sociologists, and others who have studied that question for decade — Alfie Kohn

But there is something seductive and the character, Alfie is so charming, and does make you think like you are the most important thing in the world but he's not that nice, is he. — Sienna Miller

However we think about these [long-term] goals, we ought to think about them a lot. They ought to be our touchstone, if only to keep us from being sucked into the quicksand of daily life. — Alfie Kohn

It wasn't the footman she was afraid of - it was those he was parroting. Alfie was the sort of dim-noll who never had his own thoughts but borrowed other people's. — Ellen Renner

In my view, there are two fundamentally different ways one can respond to a child who does something wrong. One is to impose a punitive consequence. Another is to see the situation as a "teachable moment," an opportunity to educate or to solve a problem together. The response here is not "You've misbehaved; now here's what I'm going to do to you" but "Something has gone wrong; what can we do about it? — Alfie Kohn

Although I have fantastic connections, I didn't know as a child what feeling secure meant. — Alfie Allen

The race to win turns us all into losers. — Alfie Kohn

Independence is useful, but caring attitudes and behaviors shrivel up in a culture where each person is responsible only for himself. — Alfie Kohn

In an autobiographical essay published in 1946, Albert Einstein reflected on his days as a student of physics some fifty years earlier. He recalled his teachers with affection but, referring to exams, said, This coercion had such a deterring effect that after I had passed the final examination, I found the consideration of any scientific problems distasteful to me for an entire year. — Alfie Kohn

The value of a book about dealing with children is inversely proportional to the number of times it contains the word behavior. — Alfie Kohn

We're told that parents push their children too hard to excel (by ghostwriting their homework and hiring tutors, and demanding that they triumph over their peers), but also that parents try to protect kids from competition (by giving trophies to everyone), that expectations have declined, that too much attention is paid to making children happy.
Similarly, young adults are described as self-satisfied twits - more pleased with themselves than their accomplishments merit - but also as being so miserable that they're in therapy. Or there's an epidemic of helicopter parenting, even though parents are so focused on their gadgets that they ignore their children. The assumption seems to be that readers will just nod right along, failing to note any inconsistencies, as long as the tone is derogatory and the perspective is traditionalist. — Alfie Kohn

The research suggests that praise may have [a negative, unintended] effect, directing attention away from the task [at hand] and toward your reaction. — Alfie Kohn

Far from helping students to develop into mature, self-reliant, self-motivated individuals, schools seem to do everything they can to keep youngsters in a state of chronic, almost infantile, dependency. The pervasive atmosphere of distrust, together with rules covering the most minute aspects of existence, teach students every day that they are not people of worth, and certainly not individuals capable of regulating their own behavior. — Alfie Kohn

If unconditional love and genuine enthusiasm are present, praise isn't necessary. If they're absent, praise won't help. — Alfie Kohn

Many of our elected officials have virtually handed the keys to our schools over to corporate interests. Presidential commissions on education are commonly chaired by the executives of large companies. — Alfie Kohn

I'm so computer illiterate, I barely know how to send an e-mail. I mean, I have a laptop and Gmail, but I don't really look at it much. — Alfie Allen

Alfie was the first time I was above the title; the first time I became a star in America. — Michael Caine

Most of us would protest that of course we love our children without any strings attached. But what counts is how things look from the perspective of the children — Alfie Kohn

We can't value only what is easy to measure; measurable outcomes may be the least important results of learning. — Alfie Kohn

Social psychology has found the more you reward people for doing something, the more they tend to lose interest in whatever they had to do to get the reward. — Alfie Kohn

Children don't just need to be loved; they need to know that nothing they do will change the fact that they're loved. — Alfie Kohn

Punishment and reward proceed from basically the same psychological model, one that conceives of motivation as nothing more than the manipulation of behavior. — Alfie Kohn

What are you doing here, anyway? You don't strike me as the speed dating type.'
'I lost a bet with Alfie,' he says. 'You met him at The Cow that day . . .?' Waistcoat Guy, I think, nodding. 'I said to him that if you didn't text me back then I'd try speed dating, because I'm officially the worst single man in London.'
'You're not!' I say. 'I mean, it wasn't a bad date. I was just . . .'
'Don't say you were drunk! It's the biggest post-sex insult ever.'
'. . . drunk, I mean drinking, a bit more than I ought, and I was, uh, cringing at the thought that I'd been a nightmare date.'
'No. You were great,' says Mark/Skinny Jeans.
'Actually, the biggest post-sex insult is "we did?"' says Robert. 'But that's another story. — Gemma Burgess

The legendary statistical consultant W. Edwards Deming, ... has called the system by which merit is appraised and rewarded 'the most powerful inhibitor to quality and productivity in the Western world' ... it is simply unfair to the extent that employees are held responsible for what are, in reality, systemic factors that are beyond their control. — Alfie Kohn

Deferral of gratification may be an effect, not a cause. Just because some children were more effective than others at distracting themselves from [the marshmallow in the famous Marshmallow Test] doesn't mean this capacity was responsible for the impressive results found ten years later. Instead, both of these things may have been due to something about their home environment. If that's true, there's no reason to believe that enhancing children's ability to defer gratification would be beneficial: It was just a marker, not a cause. By way of analogy, teenagers who visit ski resorts over winter break probably have a superior record of being admitted to the Ivy League. Should we therefore hire consultants to teach low-income children how to ski in order to improve the odds that colleges will accept them? — Alfie Kohn

Unconditional parenting: Moving from Rewards and Punishments to Love and Reason — Alfie Kohn

What is wrong with encouraging students to put "how well they're doing" ahead of "what they're doing." An impressive and growing body of research suggests that this emphasis (1) undermines students' interest in learning, (2) makes failure seem overwhelming, (3) leads students to avoid challenging themselves, (4) reduces the quality of learning, and (5) invites students to think about how smart they are instead of how hard they tried. — Alfie Kohn

And who are all these people? There weren't this many when I fell asleep.
Alfie shrugged, indicating that the universe was mysterious and nothing would ever be fully understood. — Cassandra Clare

Maximum difficulty isn't the same as optimal difficulty. — Alfie Kohn

We have so much to cover and so little time to cover it. Howard Gardner refers to curriculum coverage as the single greatest enemy of understanding. Think instead about ideas to be discovered. — Alfie Kohn

The troubling truth is that rewards and punishments are not opposites at all; they are two sides of the same coin. And it is a coin that does not buy very much. — Alfie Kohn

Grades are a subjective rating masquerading as an objective evaluation. — Alfie Kohn

Not to spoil the ending for you, but everything is going to be alright. — Alfie Deyes

Besides, what best prepares children to deal with the challenges of the "real world" is to experience success and joy. People don't get better at coping with unhappiness because they were deliberately made unhappy when they were young. — Alfie Kohn

Learning is something students do, NOT something done to students. — Alfie Kohn

Our main question shouldn't be "How do I get my child to do what I say?" but "What does my child need - and how can I meet those needs?" In my experience, you can predict much of what happens in families just from knowing which of those questions is more important to the parents. You don't even have to know the answers they've found. The questions are what count. — Alfie Kohn

When was the last time you spent the entire day with only 42 year olds? — Alfie Kohn

I'm very lucky because I don't half get some juicy jobs. But I can't tell you the number I've turned down in the past 20 years because I wanted to be at home, looking after my son. There was never any question about that. Alfie and I are dead close. I can't bear it when he's away. — Lesley Manville

The overwhelming number of teachers ... are unable to name or describe a theory of learning that underlies what they do. — Alfie Kohn

When we do things that are controlling, whether intentional or not, we are not going to get those long-term outcomes. — Alfie Kohn

To be well-educated is to have the desire as well as the means to make sure that learning never ends. — Alfie Kohn

A preoccupation with achievement is not only different from, but often detrimental to, a focus on learning. Thoughts and emotions while performing an action are more important in determining subsequent engagement than the actual outcome of that action. — Alfie Kohn

How well you do things should be incidental, not integral, to the way you regard yourself. — Alfie Kohn