Rambling(started the post with one thing in mind and ended up somewhere else altogether)

I was at school a lot last week doing prep for the fair and one thing I noticed is that periodically a kid would come through saying "Freeze tag, freeze tag" or "Capture the flag, we're playing Capture the Flag" to get a game going. amelia told me that Freeze Tag is usually boys vs. girls "but I don't like that so sometimes I just tell them what side I'm going to play on and that's that."
I asked Des to explain Capture the Flag to me and this was his response "It is so fun but it's really hard to explain and to learn. You just have to play it and get the rules while you play. there are these different people and they have to run to the sides and they can be prisoners but I think you can get rescued and then if you don't get caught you have to take this thing from the guards and get it back to your side." I said "That sounds pretty hard Des." He said, pretty cheerfully, "Oh it is. I've lost every single time I played."

Anyway, I watched a big game of Capture the Flag play out and later on I saw a two boys, a six year old and a 16 or 17 year old pass each other in the hall. The teenager said "Hey,good game, man" as he reached down and tousled the younger boy's hair. It was just so nice. And so unexpected. Especially because this teenager is taller than I am, has a couple of piercings and a beard that makes him look like he's 26.

And speaking of expectations, I was talking to another girl and she just blew my mind. I've chatted with this girl a couple of times and she seems really nice and I know my kids like her so I asked her about her other school experiences besides Sudbury. She told me how she had a lot of problems in other schools and was getting kicked out of class because of her attitude and that she was considered a trouble maker. It was so hard for me to reconcile that image with the interesting friendly intelligent young woman that I was talking to. I don't share this as a testamonial to the idea that sudbury cured her or fixed her in some way, I say it as evidence that traditional schools fail to adapt their methods or respond positively to a student that challenges them. so that student finds a way out; they follow this girl's route and get themselves kicked out or they check out which is what I did(I'll have to devote a post to my legendary truancy some day). Or find another way to endure the endless hours of the school day. What a waste.