Using inspirational quotes in the classroom can instantly boost your classroom culture and students’ attitudes. Quotes are such an inspiration to me. I collect them, read them, and look at them often. They inspire me to work hard and keep going. One of my favorite quotes is “It is remarkable what you can build if you just don’t stop.” Quotes also remind me everyone has bad days and to be kind to others. There are quotes out there that are relevant to every topic. Bringing these quotes into the classroom is inspiring to students as it increases their perseverance, kindness, and empathy.
Why use quotes in the classroom?
Quotes can become a student’s inner dialogue. They can discover a mantra.
Mantras: a statement or phrase repeated frequently. There are specific quotes that resonate with me which then become a mantra. I end up telling myself them over and over again. On my first day back at work after having my first son, I repeated to myself ‘I can do hard things.’ over and over and over. It became my inner dialogue. I said it to myself my entire drive to work, walking into work, and now whenever I face something difficult I go back to the mantra ‘I can do hard things.’ Our students do not always have a positive internal dialogue or self-talk, and they aren’t sure what to tell themselves when they are having a hard time. When they hit a roadblock, they quit. They tell themselves they can’t do it.
As teachers, we can help replace that negative self-talk with something positive. Sharing meaningful quotes each week allows students to find quotes that resonate with them, so when they are going through a difficult time they have quotes or mantras to help push them through. Some quotes I’ve used for our quote of the week have become students’ mantras.
Quotes can increase students’ perseverance.
Another one of my favorite quotes that I tell my students is ‘Everything is hard before it is easy.’ When introducing fractions (especially equivalent fractions) to third graders, I remind them of this quote which turns into a class mantra because we say it ALL THE TIME! This helped tremendously with the culture of my class, with students’ beliefs about themselves, and normalizing struggling. Their perseverance really increased when they could cheer themselves on and tell themselves internally that they can do hard things and first it’ll be hard then it’ll get easier. As their teacher, I had to give them the strategies to help them push through those rough moments when they would want to give up.
Quotes can teach life lessons and themes.
Inspirational quotes are also a great way to teach life lessons in bite-size pieces. We didn’t go into education JUST to teach the core subjects, I also want to teach children those ‘soft skills’ which include being kind, empathic, and resilient. I want students to leave my classroom as better people, isn’t that the dream?!? Talking about kindness, being different from others, and reinforcing that in life they will fall but they also can choose to get back up is just as important, if not more, than reading on grade level. I use these quotes to teach these BIG life lessons I also want to expose students to.
Students really do remember them!
My students remembered the quotes weeks and months after it was our Quote of the Week. They had text-to-life connections at very unexpected times which warms your heart as the teacher. Conversations like “This quote reminds me of…”
When to use inspirational quotes?
Let’s be honest, there is no perfect time to teach or talk about quotes. There is never enough time. You have to make the time. I choose to integrate them into my morning meeting.
I saw ‘Keep the Quote’ floating around Instagram that originated from Miss Fifth. She challenged her students to find quotes, submit them, then they would pick a quote for the week. The students would vote on who they thought should ‘Keep the Quote’ at the end of the week. I LOVED this idea and implemented it in my class. I tweaked it to my third graders’ needs and I encourage you to tweak it to your student’s needs too.
Keep the Quote was an agenda item during our morning meeting. We discussed it each morning. Here is the routine we followed:
How I Find Quotes
Miss Fifth encourages her students to find the quotes and she picks one a student submits. I would love for that to happen in my classroom BUT in our jammed pack school day, it was difficult for my third-grade students to search for quotes and write them down. Again, I love this idea and always advocate for students taking on leadership roles in the classroom but I tried it and 8/10 times finding a quote fell on my shoulders.
Monday morning would come and at times I would have no Quote of the Week selected nor did I have any in our class mailbox students suggested. I would have to locate a quote then I write it on chart paper to display. While this system worked, I always try to save time and streamline my systems.
So, 100+ Printable Inspirational Quotes was born. I created a resource with over 100 printable inspirational quotes. I print out all of the quotes at the beginning of the school year and place them in a binder. Then my students can still assist with choosing a quote each week but I have already predetermined where they come from. I also can choose quotes from the binder. I usually put the quote of the week in a sheet protector and hang them by our morning meeting agenda. You can also choose FOUR (or more) quotes at once, place them all in the sheet protector so when you take out one to give to a student who was voted to ‘Keep the Quote’ next week’s quote is already ready!
Do you use inspirational quotes in the classroom? Have you found them beneficial?
