I grew up in such a musical family, and my dad was the first chair in the Johannesburg Symphony Orchestra, and my mom was a piano teacher and a painter, so it was kind of a creative environment, and it was kind of in my DNA.
Instead of unfairly demonizing teachers, we should be working with them to find solutions to the problems in our schools and make sure every child gets an outstanding public education.
I need a teacher quite as much as Helen. I know the education of this child will be the distinguishing event of my life, if I have the brains and perseverance to accomplish it.
The teacher that I was for decades, and that I still am in a certain way, wondered what was meant by the word education. I was truly dumbfounded at the very thought of dealing with such an essential and extensive subject.
I'm a school teacher, and later on, well past my formal education, I became very interested in science.
I treasure my meetings with individuals affected by autism - parents, children, teachers and friends. Their strength is inspiring. They deserve all possible opportunities for education, employment and integration.
I went to a very elitist, snobbish, expensive education in India, and it almost killed me. I was all set to be a diplomat, teacher, doctor - all laid out.
Without any doubt at all, teacher quality is the fundamental differentiator. Not just, incidentally, of education, but I would argue, probably the biggest single differentiator of success for the nations of the 21st Century.
The institution of a public library, containing books on education, would be well adapted for the information of teachers, many of whom are not able to purchase expensive publications on those subjects.
Freedom begins with what we teach our children. That is why Jews became a people whose passion is education, whose heroes are teachers and whose citadels are schools.
I was a teacher for a long time. I taught at a community college: voice, theory, humanities. And nowadays, music education is a dying thing. Funding is being cut more and more and more.
But the fact is, no matter how good the teacher, how small the class, how focused on quality education the school may be none of this matters if we ignore the individual needs of our students.
My mother is a special education teacher but also an artist, and my father an advertising executive. They are about as wacky as you can get without being alcoholics.
I want to be a lawyer, a dancer, an actress, a mother, a wife, a children's author, a distance runner, a poet, a pianist, a pet store owner, an astronaut, an environmental and humanitarian activist, a psychiatrist, a ballet teacher, and the first wom...
But I think that any young drummer starting out today should get himself a great teacher and learn all there is to know about the instrument that he wants to play.
I have come to believe that a great teacher is a great artist and that there are as few as there are any other great artists. Teaching might even be the greatest of the arts since the medium is the human mind and spirit.
There's a film I did called 'Front of the Class', about a teacher who had Tourette's. That was a beautiful blend of drama and comedy. There's some great moments of levity in the script.
Among the great names that adorn the roll of Nobel prize-winners in Medicine is that of Otto Meyerhof, my admired teacher and friend, to whose inspiration, guidance and encouragement I owe so very much.
I started in the kitchen of a Holiday Inn in Birmingham. I wanted to be a sponge, wanted to learn and progress. I knew I didn't want to work in a hotel forever, but I had some good teachers there.
Knowing what to expect from a teacher is a really good thing, of course: It lets you get the right answers more quickly than you would otherwise.
Good teachers must inspire children to work hard - make projects and give them good marks even if genuine projects look crude and unprofessional.
