100 Awesome Quotes For Your White Board

Affiliate links included

Do you use a white board or chalk board in your homeschool or classroom? I love mine and use it for everything from explaining Venn Diagrams to mini history timelines to letting kids do their math problems to weekly quotes like the list here.

I had an English teacher my freshman year of high school who would put inspirational and motivational quotes up on the board every Monday morning and we were tasked with copying it in our classroom journals and then writing something about the quote: what it meant in general, what it meant to us personally, how it related to the world around us, or what emotions it evoked. It was a great exercise and taught me not only a lot about myself but also how to write thoughtfully about the thoughts of others.

Now as someone who educates my kids at home, we use quotes on the white board during our group teaching time. You can read more about how we do that here: Creating a Circle Time That Works For You


100 Awesome Inspirational and Motivational Quotes for Your Classroom White Board

1. Be hard on yourself and life will be easier.

2. The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched - they must be felt with the heart. -Helen Keller

3. Start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible. -Francis of Assisi

4. God always gives His best to those who leave the choice with him. -Jim Elliot

5. Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant. -Robert Louis Stevenson

6. You must do the things you think you cannot do. -Eleanor Roosevelt

7. Two roads diverged in a wood and I - I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference. -Robert Frost

8. Do your little bit of good where you are; its those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world. -Desmond Tutu

9. Miracles are a retelling in small letters of the very same story which is written across the whole world in letters too large for some of us to see. -C.S. Lewis

10. I am not afraid of tomorrow, for I have seen yesterday and I love today! -William Allen White

11. I've been absolutely terrified every moment of my life - and I've never let it keep me from doing a single thing I wanted to do. -Georgia O'Keefe

12. We relish news of our heroes, forgetting that we are extraordinary to somebody too. -Helen Hayes

13. What great thing would you attempt if you knew you could not fail? -Robert H. Schuller

14. The best way out is always through. -Robert Frost

15. There is nothing stronger in the world than gentleness. -Han Suyin

16. A place for everything, everything in its place. -Benjamin Franklin

17. I said to the almond tree, 'Friend, speak to me of God,' and the almond tree blossomed. -Nikos Kazantzakis

18. Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people. -Eleanor Roosevelt

19. I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work. -Thomas A. Edison

20. The question isn’t who is going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me. -Ayn Rand

21. A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on. -Sir Winston Churchill 

22. The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work.  -Emile Zola

23. Do, or do not. There is no 'try'.  -Yoda 

24. Try to learn something about everything and everything about something. -Thomas Henry Huxley

25. The difference between 'involvement' and 'commitment' is like an eggs-and-ham breakfast: the chicken was 'involved' - the pig was 'committed'. -unknown

26. Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go. -Oscar Wilde

27. The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good. -Samuel Johnson 

28. Many a man's reputation would not know his character if they met on the street. -Elbert Hubbard

29. Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens. -Jimi Hendrix

30. Life isn’t about getting and having, it’s about giving and being. –Kevin Kruse

31. Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value. –Albert Einstein

32. Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance. -Will Durant

33. The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity. –Amelia Earhart

34. I have often regretted my speech, never my silence. -Xenocrates

35. We become what we think about. –Earl Nightingale

36. There are people in the world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread. -Mahatma Gandhi

37. Life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. –Charles Swindoll

38. You can never cross the ocean until you have the courage to lose sight of the shore. –Christopher Columbus

39. Either you run the day, or the day runs you. –Jim Rohn

40. In any contest between power and patience, bet on patience. -W.B. Prescott

41. The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why. –Mark Twain

42. Going to church doesn’t make you a Christian any more than standing in a garage makes you a car. -Billy Sunday

43. If at first you don’t succeed . . . so much for skydiving. -Henny Youngman

44. If you hear a voice within you say “you cannot paint,” then by all means paint and that voice will be silenced. –Vincent Van Gogh

45. There is only one way to avoid criticism: do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing. –Aristotle

46. Patience is something you admire in the driver behind you, but not in one ahead. -Bill McGlashen

47. Few things can help an individual more than to place responsibility on him, and to let him know that you trust him.  –Booker T. Washington

48. By the time a man realizes that his father was right, he has a son who thinks he’s wrong. -Charles Wadsworth

49. Why didn’t Noah swat those two mosquitoes? -Unknown

50. Start where you are. Use what you have.  Do what you can. –Arthur Ashe

51. An archaeologist is the best husband a woman can have; the older she gets the more interested he is in her. -Agatha Christie

52. Fall seven times and stand up eight. –Japanese Proverb

53. Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away. –Maya Angelou

54. Life expectancy would grow by leaps and bounds if green vegetables smelled as good as bacon. -Doug Larson

55. There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love. -Martin Luther King, Jr.

56. If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else. –Booker T. Washington

57. All that is gold does not glitter, not all those who wander are lost; the old that is strong does not wither, deep roots are not reached by the frost. -J. R. R. Tolkien

58. A truly rich man is one whose children run into his arms when his hands are empty. –Unknown

59. True love is not a strong, fiery, impetuous passion. It is, on the contrary, an element calm and deep. It looks beyond mere externals, and is attracted by qualities alone. It is wise and discriminating, and its devotion is real and abiding. -Ellen G. White

60. A thousand words will not leave so deep an impression as one deed. -Henrik Ibsen

61. The Christian life is not a constant high. I have my moments of deep discouragement. I have to go to God in prayer with tears in my eyes, and say, 'O God, forgive me,' or 'Help me.' -Billy Graham

62. Education costs money.  But then so does ignorance. –Sir Claus Moser

63. You may be disappointed if you fail, but you are doomed if you don’t try. –Beverly Sills

64. When a deep injury is done us, we never recover until we forgive. -Alan Paton

65. Before I was humiliated I was like a stone that lies in deep mud, and he who is mighty came and in his compassion raised me up and exalted me very high and placed me on the top of the wall. -Saint Patrick

66. There is only one secure foundation: a genuine, deep relationship with Jesus Christ, which will carry you through any and all turmoil. No matter what storms are raging all around, you'll stand firm if you stand on His love. -Charles Stanley

67. When you are courting a nice girl an hour seems like a second. When you sit on a red-hot cinder a second seems like an hour. That's relativity. -Albert Einstein

68. All generalizations are false, including this one. -Mark Twain

69. The Gospel announces that Jesus came to acquit the guilty. He came to judge and be judged in our place. Christ came to satisfy the deep judgment against us once and for all so that we could be free from the judgement of God, others, and ourselves. -Tullian Tchividjian

70. It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership. -Nelson Mandela

71. Our culture is all about shallow relationships. But that doesn't mean we should stop looking each other in the eye and having deep conversations. -Francis Chan

72. How well I have learned that there is no fence to sit on between heaven and hell. There is a deep, wide gulf, a chasm, and in that chasm is no place for any man. -Johnny Cash

73. I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else. -C.S. Lewis

74. A friend is someone who knows all about you and still loves you. -Elbert Hubbard

75. The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it. -Flannery O'Connor

76. You can safely assume you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do. -Anne Lamott

77. The best way to find out if you can trust somebody is to trust them. -Ernest Hemingway

78. No persons are more frequently wrong, than those who will not admit they are wrong. -François de La Rochefoucauld

79. People often claim to hunger for truth, but seldom like the taste when it's served up. -George R.R. Martin

80. In truth, there was only one christian and he died on the cross. -Friedrich Nietzsche

81. Just because you don't understand it doesn't mean it isn't so. -Lemony Snicket

82. Love truth, but pardon error. -Voltaire

83. If the road is easy, you're likely going the wrong way. -Terry Goodkind

84. Within the covers of the Bible are the answers for all the problems men face. -Ronald Reagan

85. There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn't true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true. -Søren Kierkegaard

86. Hope is the thing with feathers That perches in the soul And sings the tune without the words And never stops at all. -Emily Dickinson

87. He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose. -Jim Elliot

88. You don't love someone because they're perfect, you love them in spite of the fact that they're not. -Jodi Picoult

89. The things you do for yourself are gone when you are gone, but the things you do for others remain as your legacy. -Kalu Ndukwe Kalu

90. Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed. -Alexander Pope

91. A baby is God's opinion that the world should go on. -Carl Sandburg

92. The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool. -William Shakespeare

93. May you live every day of your life. -Jonathan Swift

94. Joy can only be real if people look upon their life as a service and have a definite object in life outside themselves and their personal happiness. -Leo Tolstoy

95. To love is to act. -Victor Hugo

96. If a book about failures doesn't sell, is it a success? -Jerry Seinfeld

97. Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God. -Corrie ten Boom

98. Some things have to be believed to be seen. -Madeleine L'Engle

99. You were made by God and for God and until you understand that, life will never make sense. -Rick Warren

100. Radical obedience to Christ is not easy. It's not comfort, not health, not wealth, and not prosperity in this world. Radical obedience to Christ risks losing all these things. But in the end, such risk finds its reward in Christ. And he is more than enough for us. -David Platt


Need whiteboard supplies? I recommend the following:


We use quotes in our homeschool during our group teaching time, or Circle Time. You can learn more about Circle Time by searching the site (on the home page) or purchasing my very helpful eBook, complete with printables for planning.

Click the image to learn more.