Ginott Quotes & Sayings

It is essential that a child's life not be ruled by the adult's need for efficiency. Efficiency is the enemy of infancy. It is too costly in terms of the child's emotional economy. It drains the child's resources, prevents growth, stifles interests, and may lead to emotional meltdowns. Children need opportunities to experiment, struggle, and learn without being rushed or insulted. Anxiety — Haim G. Ginott

In adopting these attitudes and practices, a parent will accomplish a large part of educating a child for responsibility. And yet, example alone is not enough. A sense of responsibility is attained by each child through his or her own efforts and experience. While the parents' example creates the favorable attitude and climate for learning, specific experiences consolidate the learning to make it part of the child's character. Therefore, it is important to give specific responsibilities to children matched to their different levels of maturity. In most homes children present problems, but parents find the solutions. If children are to mature, they must be given the opportunity to solve their own problems. — Haim G. Ginott

The world talks to the mind. Parents speak more intimately; they talk to the heart. — Hain Ginott

When a child hits a child, we call it aggression.
When a child hits an adult, we call it hostility.
When an adult hits an adult, we call it assault.
When an adult hits a child, we call it discipline. — Haim G. Ginott

Children become frustrated and resentful when they view their parents as not being interested in how they feel and in their point of view. — Haim G. Ginott

Creating the Weather in the Classroom As Haim Ginott suggests, teachers "create the weather" in the classroom: I have come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element in the classroom. It is my personal approach that creates the climate. It's my daily mood that makes the weather. As a teacher, I possess a tremendous power to make a child's life miserable or joyous. I can be a tool of torture, or an instrument of inspiration. I can humiliate, or humor, hurt or heal. In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis will be escalated or de-escalated and a child is humanized or dehumanized [p. x]. — John Shindler

If you want your children to improve, let them overhear the nice things you say about them to others. — Haim G. Ginott

Parental criticism is unhelpful. It creates anger and resentment. Even worse, children who are regularly criticized learn to condemn themselves and others. They learn to doubt their own worth and to belittle the value of others. They learn to suspect people and to expect personal doom. — Haim G. Ginott

Teenagers crave independence. The more self-suf-ficient we make them feel, the less hostile they are toward us. — Haim Ginott

Wise parents know that fighting a teenager, like fighting a riptide, is inviting doom. — Haim Ginott

Treat a child as though he already is the person he's capable of becoming. — Haim Ginott

Misbehavior and punishment are not opposites that cancel each other - on the contrary they breed and reinforce each other. — Haim G. Ginott

To sense when a teenager needs understanding and when misunderstanding is a difficult and delicate task. The sad truth is that no matter how wise we are, we cannot be right for any length of time in our teenagers' eyes. — Haim Ginott

I have great faith in 'ordinary parents.' Who has a child's welfare more at heart than his ordinary parent? It's been my experience that when parents are given the skills to be more helpful, not only are they able to use these skills, but they infuse them with a warmth and a style that is uniquely their own. — Haim Ginott

I've come to a frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element in the classroom. It's my personal approach that creates the climate. It's my daily mood that makes the weather. As a teacher, I possess a tremendous power to make a child's life miserable or joyous. I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration. I can humiliate or heal. In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis will be escalated or de-escalated and a child humanized or dehumanized. — Haim G. Ginott

Each of us carries within himself a collection of instant insults. — Haim Ginott

What do we say to a guest who forgets her umbrella? Do we run after her and say "What is the matter with you? Every time you come to visit you forget something. If it's not one thing it's another. Why can't you be like your sister? When she comes to visit, she knows how to behave. You're forty-four years old! Will you never learn? I'm not a slave to pick up after you! I bet you'd forget your head if it weren't attached to your shoulders." That's not what we say to a guest. We say "Here's your umbrella, Alice," without adding "scatterbrain."
Parents need to learn to respond to their children as they do to guests. — Haim G. Ginott

To be himself, one neeeds to be free from the pressure of evaluative praise — Haim Ginott

Many teenagers are tormented by terrors they deem private and personal. They do not know that their anxieties and doubts are universal. — Haim Ginott

Adolescence can be a time of turmoil and turbulence, of stress and storm. Rebellion against authority and against convention is to be expected and tolerated for the sake of learning and growth. — Haim Ginott

Responsibility is fostered by allowing children a voice and wherever indicated a choice in matters that affect them. — Haim Ginott

Parents often talk about the younger generation as if they didn't have anything to do with it. — Haim Ginott

A modern teacher educates children to value their emotions. — Haim Ginott

The search for a personal identity is the life task of a teenager. — Haim Ginott

When gentle persuasion [of children] falls on deaf ears, we resort to ridicule and rebuke. Then we return to threats and punishment. This is the modus operandi of a mutual frustration society. — Haim Ginott

How can we help a child change from undependable to dependable, from a mediocre student to a capable student, from someone who won't amount to very much to someone who will count for something. The answer is at once both simple and complicated: We treat a child as if he already is what we would like him to become. — Haim Ginott

I've come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element in the classroom. It's my personal approach that creates the climate. It's my daily mood that makes the weather. As a teacher, I possess tremendous power to make a student's life miserable or joyous. I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration. I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal. In all situations it is my response that decides whether a crisis will be escalated or de-escalated and a student humanized or de-humanized. — Haim Ginott

While parents possess the original key to their offspring's experience, teachers have a spare key. They, too, can open or close the minds and hearts of children. — Haim G. Ginott

Only if a child feels right can he think right. — Haim Ginott

Teachers are expected to reach unattainable goals with inadequate tools. The miracle is that at times they accomplish this impossible task. — Haim Ginott

When children feel understood, their loneliness and hurt diminish. When children are understood, their love for their parent is deepened. A parent's sympathy serves as emotional first aid for bruised feelings. When we genuinely acknowledge a child's plight and voice her disappointment, she often gathers the strength to face reality. — Haim Ginott

Whenever I hear about a child needing something, I ask myself, 'Is it what he needs or what he wants?' It isn't always easy to distinguish between the two. A child has many real needs which can and should be satisfied. His wants are a bottomless pit. He wants, for example, to sleep with his parents. He needs to be in his own bed. At Christmas he wants every toy advertised on television. He needs only one or two. — Haim Ginott