Never said that you were an American; only that your post reminded me of the American public education system. BTW, I also did not claim that tne American syste

Never said that you were an American; only that your post reminded me of the American public education system. BTW, I also did not claim that tne American system is unique. It is only the one with which I am most familiar. Otherwise, I think it's safe to say that you missed my point. I am not advocating constant aimless noodling. I am saying that we focus here entirely too much on the importance of rules and not nearly enough on the creation of new rules. In short, perhaps you took my statement regarding "virtually no limits" a bit too literally. As it is, you present a false choice between rigid, highly structured, rules-based thinking and pointless meandering about without any basis in reality. Certainly you see a middle ground? As for my initial read on your comments, what triggered me was your statement that one system (with more rigid rules) inspired more creativity. In my view, you can argue other merits of such a system, but creativity is exactly not one of them. And true creativity is what we are sorely missing in this country and the world.