Shelly Wright's article "Why Academic Teaching Doesn't Help Kids Excel in Life" displays her negative opinion on our modern day school setup. She believes that kids need to be passionate about what they are learning, or else they're simply going through the motions. I agree completely, however have an opinion of my own. Elementary, middle, and high schools are a foundation. We learn a broad spectrum of materials, then later, many people go to college, pick a major, and pursue their passion. Think of pre-collegiate curriculum as broad spectrum antibiotics, and schools as a Diagnostic Center. Before anyone has figured out what a patients problem is, they give them antibiotics that will fight basically every bacterium. This helps the patient to hopefully feel a bit better while they find out the true cause of the problem, and can treat it directly.
Kids cannot simply learn a few things because they aren't passionate about everything else. They are exposed to everything in order to gain a general knowledge and to figure out what they do enjoy. The problem is not in what we are being taught, but how we are being taught it, and how that information is being tested on and our "intelligence" recorded.
School is memorization to the common student. Learn the material, get a good grade on the test, forget the material for a few months, relearn it for the final exam, then forget it entirely. Less small facts, more big picture ideas. Why do we need to know that Chinggis Khan was the father of the Mongols who were also the Yuan dynasty, and Marco Polo was very impressed when he visited them because they participated in frequent bathing? This was an actual test question, I kid you not. Students don't necessarily need to have an in depth understanding of everything, but a routine idea. As long as they understand the general concept, things should be okay. If a student wants to learn more, that's what AP courses and college are for.
Another change to the classroom should be the introduction of a larger variety of classrooms. I don't mean more generic rooms, but a larger variety of classes and teachers that offer the same courses as everyone else, but featuring a different environment and/or teaching style. Classrooms that teach using mostly hand on experiences, ones with lots of pictures and diagrams for visual learners, some that consistently incorporate music and rhythm to assist in learning, as well as your typical sit down in your seat in your row and listen. There should be outdoor classrooms, classes at night, and classes, even entire schools, designed for children with conditions like ADHD.
As a teenager with ADHD, I know how thousands of kids struggle in their academic environments all the time. We are always told to sit still and to be quiet, when really, our brains are usually flooding with information and ideas inspired by what we have learned. Non-traditional classrooms are the only option for non-traditional learners. We will never succeed in a regular learning environment unless we are medicated and stripped of a lot of our creativity and energy. Instead, those traits should be fostered and used to our advantage.