powerful
This is powerful, powerful stuff. Thanks for sharing your personal example in this context -- the contrast between the expectations of school and the learning we (including kids) are becoming capable of is truly mind-boggling.

I bet you'd be interested in Michael's comment on one of my recent posts -- he was a teacher-on-call with a difficult class and found one of the students particularly troublesome. One day while he was in the school library perusing some magazines, he noticed the troublemaker's face on the cover of a BMX magazine...it changed his view of the kid and has him pondering the hidden talents and interests of every student.