Creator of the first popular lightbulb and what we today call the record player (and countless other inventions), Thomas Edison had strong views about education:
“The present system does not give elasticity to the mind. It casts the brain into a mold. It insists that the child must accept. It does not encourage original thought or reasoning, and it lays more stress on memory than on observation. The result of accepting unrelated facts is the fostering of conservatism [in thinking]. It breeds fear, and from fear comes ignorance.”
In contrast to his outlook on traditional schooling, Edison supported a positive alternative in education — Montessori — for, as he said, ”It makes learning a pleasure. It follows the natural instincts of the human being.”