Helen Parkhurst, "Education on the Dalton Plan," 1922
Not until learning is envisaged from the learner’s point of view will our youth come out from school really educated…Under the old system the teacher has become the chief actor in the play. She is, perhaps unconsciously, occupied in trying to impress her personality and her ideas upon the children. But the Dalton Plan reverses these parts and gives the child’s personality a chance; the teacher’s part being to accompany the enfolding life step by step. This is not to relegate the instructor to an inferior plane. To understand the child and to keep pace with his growth she must grow herself, for the same fundamental laws that govern growth prevail on every successive plane.