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The Child and the Curriculum looks at the process of education from both perspectives — child and curriculum. Dewey leads the reader to view the curriculum, what the child must learn, from the child's present state of mind. He also considers the teachers point of view as the vehicle that imparts and delivers the curriculum. Dewey understood that the structure of a child's mind is far different from that of an adult. John Dewey knew from both the personal experience, and active research, that the curriculum and the child must meet on the child's terms. This book explains how and why curriculum must provide the opportunity to explore, experience, and connect information, so the child truly understands and internalises the abstract principles, the logical classifications, the space and time, constructing the worldview that is specified by the curriculum. These philosophical educational doctrines that he concisely expressed in this book shaped the direction of American education.