The content of education is an obstacle in rural children’s learning. The subject matter and the way in which it is taught render learning more abstract for rural children. The language of education is often different from rural children’s home language. Rural life is underrepresented in textbooks, and the partial depictions of village life that have made it into textbooks are often out of sync with children’s lived reality. The content of education must be revisited to stimulate children to envisage the relevance of schooling for current and future rural lives.