Somewhere I saw a political cartoon: a human teacher has a class composed of a variety of animals (a horse, a fish, a chimp, etc.) and says to them all, "You will be scored on how well you climb a rope."

I have the strong opinion that the standard 'one size fits all' approach is deeply misguided. I feel this way having experienced the educational system from both sides, as a student and as a teacher.

As a kid, I was a shy nerd. For exercises, teachers always paired me up with idiots and slackers. I always ended up doing all the work. As a direct result the dolts had that much more reason not to challenge themselves, because no matter how much or how little they could do, it was far below what I could do. I had little reason to challenge myself, either, because as long as I was smarter than an idiot, I was doing fine.

Gym class was the exact opposite. The jocks would get heaps of praise for doing what they would have done anyway, whereas I couldn't catch a ball and no one ever took the time to give me some remedial fitness training.

As an adult, when I had the chance to teach, I decided I wouldn't offer a level playing field. The kids in the middle were content to work on their class assignments, and I'd give them a little help and a little challenge here and there. The kids at the top end, I'd not hassle them in the least, except to come along now and then to really challenge what they thought they knew. That left me with the time and emotional energy to dedicate to the kids at the low end, who needed a lot of help and encouragement. Let's just say that worked out very well for everyone.

Now 20+ years on, my kid is of school age. He's like me: I see him crushing his schoolwork and receiving praise but not really being challenged to excel. Conversely I see him on his soccer team needing a lot of extra help and encouragement that he's just not getting. Naturally, then, he enjoys his schoolwork and hates soccer. I don't think it needs to be that way.