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1 " I just didn’t get it—even with the teacher holding an orange (the earth) in one handand a lemon (the moon) in the other,her favorite student (the sun) standing behind her with a flashlight.I just couldn’t grasp it—this whole citrus universe, these bumpy planets revolving so slowlyno one could even see themselves moving.I used to think if I could only concentrate hard enoughI could be the one person to feel what no one else could,sense a small tug from the ground, a sky shift, the earth changing gears.Even though I was only one mini-speck on a speck,even though I was merely a pinprick in one goosebump on the orange,I was sure then I was the most specially perceptive, perceptively sensitive.I was sure then my mother was the only mother to snap,“The world doesn’t revolve around you!”The earth was fragile and mostly water,just the way the orange was mostly water if you peeled it,just the way I was mostly water if you peeled me.Looking back on that third grade science demonstration,I can understand why some people gave up on fame or religion or cures—especially people who have an understandingof the excruciating crawl of the world,who have a well-developed sense of spatial reasoningand the tininess that it is to be one of us.But not me—even now I wouldn’t mind being god, the forcewho spins the planets the way I spin a globe, a basketball, a yoyo.I wouldn’t mind being that teacher who chooses the fruit,or that favorite kid who gives the moon its glow. "
2 " People who study the way religions develop have shown that if you have a charismatic teacher, and you don't have an institution develop around that teacher within about a generation to transmit succession within the group, the movement just dies. "
3 " There is a shortage of teachers but the January 2001 schools census showed that teacher numbers were at their highest level than at any time since 1984 - and 11,000 higher than 1997. "
4 " Instead of five hundred thousand average algebra teachers, we need one good algebra teacher. We need that teacher to create software, videotape themselves, answer questions, let your computer or the iPad teach algebra... The hallmark of any good technology is that it destroys jobs. "
