John Dewey (1859, 1952) , American philosopher of education whose Experience and Education (1938) argued that learning is the transformation of the learner through purposeful experience, not the deposit of information into the learner. Dewey's most consequential contribution to teacher education was the concept of reflective practice , the teacher who learns by teaching, who deepens their own understanding through the act of making the discipline explicit for students, who treats the classroom as a site of inquiry for both parties.