Jerome Bruner

Cognitive Science American 1915 – 2016 101 quotes

An influential cognitive psychologist who made significant contributions to educational psychology, perception, and the study of narrative.

Quotes by Jerome Bruner

We begin with the hypothesis that any subject can be taught effectively in some intellectually honest form to any child at any stage of development.

The Process of Education 1960

Knowing is a process, not a product.

Toward a Theory of Instruction 1966

Education is not just about the transmission of culture, but about the transformation of culture.

The Culture of Education 1996

The child is not a miniature adult, but a different kind of organism.

The Process of Education 1960

Learning is not a spectator sport.

Toward a Theory of Instruction 1966

The most important thing about education is that it should be interesting.

The Process of Education 1960

We teach a subject not to produce little living libraries on that subject, but rather to get a student to think mathematically for himself, to consider historical problems, to engage in the act of discovery.

The Process of Education 1960

The mind is not a passive recipient of information, but an active constructor of reality.

Acts of Meaning 1990

Meaning is not given, but made.

Acts of Meaning 1990

Culture is not just a way of life, but a way of making sense of life.

The Culture of Education 1996

The purpose of education is to create meaning.

The Culture of Education 1996

Narrative is not just a way of telling stories, but a way of thinking.

Acts of Meaning 1990

The child's mind is not a blank slate, but a richly structured system.

Toward a Theory of Instruction 1966

Discovery, whether in the arts or sciences, is a matter of rearranging or transforming evidence in such a way that one is enabled to go beyond the evidence so reassembled to new insights.

The Process of Education 1960

The goal of education is not to fill the mind with facts, but to teach it how to think.

The Process of Education 1960

The human mind is not a computer, but a storyteller.

Acts of Meaning 1990

Learning is an active process in which learners construct new ideas or concepts based upon their current/past knowledge.

Toward a Theory of Instruction 1966

The culture provides the tools for thinking, and thinking provides the means for transforming culture.

The Culture of Education 1996

The essence of discovery is not to find new lands, but to see with new eyes.

The Process of Education 1960

The child's world is a world of action, not just perception.

Toward a Theory of Instruction 1966