96 Teacher Appreciation Quotes Celebrating the Impact of Educators

These teacher appreciation quotes will help you recognize the value of educators and show them a little love.

Whether it’s Teacher Appreciation Week or not, as you read this, teachers always deserve our appreciation!

Teachers play an important role in the lives of our children and in shaping society.

Tell us about your favorite teacher in the comment section below.

How to say ‘thank you’ to a teacher

The importance of teachers in society can’t be underestimated.

They take on the responsibility of shaping young minds and improving their lives.

Teachers are one of the biggest role models for students.

They inspire them to push themselves to accomplish their goals.

Besides, they guide students on everything, from academic interests to issues related to their personal lives.

These teacher appreciation quotes will:

• give you the perfect words to say thank you
• help you understand the bond between teacher and student
• give you a better understanding of what teachers do

Teaching is one of the hardest jobs in the world, and we ought to honor educators, not only this week but every week.

To help you celebrate and thank the teachers in your or your child’s life, below is our collection of inspirational, empowering, and heart-touching teacher appreciation quotes and sayings, collected from various sources over the years.

What is a good message to appreciate a teacher?

These quotes are great messages to use to show your teacher how much you appreciate them.

1. “I am indebted to my father for living, but to my teacher for living well.” — Alexander the Great

2. “A good teacher is like a candle — it consumes itself to light the way for others.” — Mustafa Kemal Ataturk

3. “Teaching is a very noble profession that shapes the character, caliber, and future of the individual. If the people remember me as a good teacher, that will be the biggest honor for me.” — A. P. J. Abdul Kalam

4. “It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.” — Albert Einstein

5. “The art of teaching is the art of assisting discovery.” — Mark Van Doren

6. “If you have to put someone on a pedestal, put teachers. They are society’s heroes.” — Guy Kawasaki

7. “He who opens a school door, closes a prison.” — Victor Hugo

8. “In teaching, you cannot see the fruit of a day’s work. It is invisible and remains so, maybe for twenty years.” — Jacques Barzun

9. “Education is the key to success in life, and teachers make a lasting impact in the lives of their students.” — Solomon Ortiz

10. “One good teacher in a lifetime may sometimes change a delinquent into a solid citizen.” — Philip Wylie

Teacher appreciation quotes for educators developing the next generation

If you’re looking for the right words to express the impact teachers have, the following quotes will help.

Teachers are amazing role models, and these Teacher’s Day quotes will help you find the words to tell them how much they mean to you!

11. “A good teacher can inspire hope, ignite the imagination, and instill a love of learning.” — Brad Henry

12. “Teachers teach because they care. Teaching young people is what they do best. It requires long hours, patience, and care.” — Horace Mann

13. “Teaching is the profession that teaches all the other professions.” — Author Unknown

14. “Free the child’s potential, and you will transform him into the world.” — Maria Montessori

15. “One child, one teacher, one book, one pen can change the world.” — Malala Yousafzai

16. “Anyone who does anything to help a child in his life is a hero to me.” — Fred Rogers

17. “Not all superheroes have capes; some have Teaching Degrees.” — Author Unknown

18. “The direction in which education starts a man will determine his future life.” — Plato

19. “The dream begins with a teacher who believes in you, who tugs and pushes and leads you to the next plateau, sometimes poking you with a sharp stick called “truth.” — Dan Rather

20. “I was lucky that I met the right mentors and teachers at the right moment.” — James Levine

Teacher appreciation quotes that honor and respect all educators

These quotes are a great place to start if you are trying to find the perfect message for a special teacher in your life.

21. “A teacher takes a hand, opens a mind, and touches a heart.” — Unknown Author

22. “Everyone who remembers his own education remembers teachers, not methods and techniques. The teacher is the heart of the educational system.” — Sidney Hook

23. “A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops.” — Henry Adams

24. “Education breeds confidence. Confidence breeds hope. Hope breeds peace.” — Confucius

25. “Teacher appreciation makes the world of education go around.” — Helen Peters

26. “What a teacher writes on the blackboard of life can never be erased.” — Unknown Author

27. “Who dares to teach must never cease to learn.” — John C. Dana

28. “What the teacher is is more important than what he teaches.” — Karl Menninger

29. “Good teachers know how to bring out the best in students.” — Charles Kuralt

30. “The influence of teachers extends beyond the classroom, well into the future.” — F. Sionil Jose

Homeschool teacher appreciation quotes

These quotes highlight the importance of parents’ role as teachers, too.

31. “The whole art of teaching is only the art of awakening the natural curiosity of young minds for the purpose of satisfying it afterward.” — Anatole France

32. “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” — W.B. Yeats

33. “A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone when he is fully trained will be like his teacher.” — Luke 6:40 

34. “As parent educators, we need to embrace a new notion of learning… we need to engage the heart in order to effectively educate the child. Our vision of a well-educated child is a child who has a heart for learning, a child who has the tools he needs to continue to learn for a lifetime and a child who has the love to want to do it.” — Elizabeth Foss

35. “There is no school equal to a decent home and no teacher equal to a virtuous parent.” — Mahatma Gandhi

36. “My aim in homeschooling is to give my children the ability to be an adult learning, a skill set that will last the rest of their lives.” — Nancy Pearcey

37. “The longer I homeschool, the harder it is to separate teacher and mommy things I enjoy, and I don’t need to because I am both of those things.” — Tina Robertson

38. “You’re a homeschool mom? You are building something amazing!” — Mary

39. “Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all.” —Aristotle

40. “The most important work you and I will ever do will be within the walls of our own homes.” — Harold B. Lee

Teacher Appreciation Quotes For The Great Job They Do

These quotes will help you tell your teacher about the impact they had on your life.

41. “The teacher… must have a kind of faith that the child will reveal himself through work.” ― Maria Montessori

42. “The job of an educator is to teach students to see vitality in themselves.” ― Joseph Campbell

43. “I think the teaching profession contributes more to the future of our society than any other single profession.” ― John Wooden

44. “A good teacher, like a good entertainer, first must hold his audience’s attention, then he can teach his lesson.” ― John Henrik Clarke

45. “To teach is to learn twice.” ― Joseph Joubert

46. “Teachers appreciate being appreciated, for teacher appreciation is their highest award.” ― William Prince

47. “Good teaching is more a giving of right questions than a giving of right answers.” ― Josef Albers

48. “I like a teacher who gives you something to take home to think about besides homework.” ― Lily Tomlin

49. “Students don’t know how much you know until they know how much you care.” ― John C. Maxwell

50. “Be a wonderful role model because you will be the window through which many children will see their future.” ― Thomas Mckinnon

Teacher Appreciation Quotes For Their Amazing Skill

The role of teachers are irreplaceable in educating our future generations.

51. “The duties of a teacher are neither few nor small, but they elevate the mind and give energy to the character.” ― Dorothea Dix

52. “To this end, the greatest asset of a school is the personality of the teacher.” ― John Strachan

53. “It’s the teacher that makes the difference, not the classroom.” ― Michael Morpurgo

54. “In learning you will teach, and in teaching you will learn.” ― Phil Collins

55. “Teachers have three loves: love of learning, love of learners, and the love of bringing the first two loves together.” ― Scott Hayden

56. “Teaching kids to count is fine, but teaching them what counts is best.” ― Bob Talbert

57. “Great teachers empathize with kids, respect them, and believe that each one has something special that can be built upon.” ― Ann Lieberman

58. “One looks back with appreciation to the brilliant teachers, but with gratitude to those who touched our human feelings.” ― Carl Jung

59. “Teaching is the greatest act of optimism.” ― Colleen Wilcox

60. “The great teacher is not the man who supplies the most facts, but the one in whose presence we become different people.” ― Ralph Waldo Emerson

Teacher Appreciation Quotes to Honour Their Dedication

Teachers work long hours while trying to expand the minds of children.

61. “The greatest gift of life is friendship, and I have received it from teachers.” ― Hubert H. Humphrey

62. “A teacher who is attempting to teach without inspiring the pupil with a desire to learn is hammering on a cold iron.” ― Horace Mann

63. “The best teachers are those who show you where to look but don’t tell you what to see.” ―  Alexandra K. Trenfor

64. “The true teacher defends his pupils against his own personal influence.” ― Amos Bronson Alcott

65. “The job of an educator is to teach students to see vitality in themselves.” ― Joseph Campbell

66. “I never teach my pupils; I only attempt to provide the conditions in which they can learn.” ― Albert Einstein

67. “The best teacher is the one who suggests rather than dogmatizes and inspires his listener with the wish to teach himself.” ― Edward Bulwer-Lytton

68. “A teacher is a compass that activates the magnets of curiosity, knowledge, and wisdom in the pupils.” ― Ever Garrison

69. “Teachers can change lives with just the right mix of chalk and challenges.” ― Joyce Meyer

70. “The teacher is one who makes two ideas grow where only one grew before.” ― Elbert Hubbard

Teacher’s Day Quotes and Words of Thanks

The following quotes can be used in cards and emails when trying to show your appreciation to your teacher or your child’s teacher.

71. “Tell me, and I forget. Teach me, and I remember. Involve me, and I learn.” ― Benjamin Franklin

72. “Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.” ― John Dewey

73. “What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to a human soul.” ― Joseph Addison

74. “I cannot teach anybody anything; I can only make them think.” ― Socrates

75. “If someone is going down the wrong road, he doesn’t need the motivation to speed him up. What he needs is education to turn him around.” ― Jim Rohn

76. “The main objective of teaching is not to give explanations, but to knock at the doors of the mind.” ― Rabindranath Tagore

77. “I have always felt that the true textbook for the pupil is his teacher.” ― Mahatma Gandhi

78. “Teachers are the most responsible and important members of society because their professional efforts affect the fate of the earth.” ― Helen Caldicott

79. “Technology is just a tool. In terms of getting the kids working together and motivating them, the teacher is the most important.” ― Bill Gates

Quotes to Remind Us Of The Impact of Teachers

These quotes will remind you of that one teacher who made the biggest impact on you as a child.

80. “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” ― Nelson Mandela

81. “If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life.” ― Barack Obama

82. “A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops.” ― Henry Brooks Adams

83. “The true teachers are those who help us think for ourselves.” ― Dr. Sarvepali Radhakrishnan

84. “The teacher who is indeed wise does not bid you to enter the house of his wisdom but rather leads you to the threshold of your mind.” ― Kahlil Gibran

85. “The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires.” ― William Arthur Ward

86. “Good teachers make the best of a pupil’s means; great teachers foresee a pupil’s ends.” — Maria Callas

87. “Wonderful teachers should never let themselves be drill sergeants for the state.” — Jonathan Kozol

88. “Teaching might even be the greatest of the arts since the medium is the human mind and spirit.” — John Steinbeck

89. “Teaching seems to me beyond doubt the greatest of the professions.” — Theodore Burghard Hurt Brameld

Great Teachers Day Quotes About the Profession

The role of a teacher is greater than anything that can be written or described in a simple job description.

These quotes show some of how they go above and beyond in their roles.

90. “A teacher is one who makes himself progressively unnecessary.” — Thomas Carruthers

91. “Of all the hard jobs around, one of the hardest is being a good teacher.” — Maggie Gallagher

92. “Good teaching must be slow enough so that it is not confusing, and fast enough so that it is not boring.” — Sidney J. Harris

93. “A teacher’s job is to take a bunch of live wires and see that they are well-grounded.” — Darwin D. Martin

94. “The task of the excellent teacher is to stimulate ‘apparently ordinary’ people to unusual effort.” — K. Patricia Cross

95. “A good teacher is like the rising sun that comes to fill the empty and dark minds with the light of the education” ― Anamika Mishra

96. “An extraordinary teacher teaches how to be larger than life by following your own dreams, own goals, and own instincts.” ― Amit Ray

Which of these teacher appreciation quotes was your favorite?

Teacher Appreciation Week allows us to let educators know how much we value their hard work, caring, and sacrifice.

Teachers play a big role in shaping the world around us.

An educator is the guide who holds our hand, opens our minds, and touches our hearts.

Hopefully, the quotes above will help you honor and appreciate them.

Which of these teacher appreciation quotes was your favorite?

Do you have any other inspirational quotes to add to the list?

Let us know in the comment section below.

Also, don’t forget to share with your friends and followers.