@TheHoneyBadger
I appreciate much of what you say Polka but you can surely recognise that you were unusual amongst your peers? You can see that it would be very few kids who'd find it that easy to fly through content and get A's?
I share your frustrations in terms of my own secondary experience where at primary I'd been allowed to go ahead and no restraints placed on me and then got to secondary and sat around waiting for literally years to get to where I was at before I started. It was indeed frustrating and pointless feeling and I wagged school a lot and got into trouble but was capable enough to pull it out of the bag for my exams and get good results.
For sure there should have been facility for me to keep learning and branching out but it would be silly to pretend that there weren't a majority of students who needed it to be that basic and that slow.
The downside of 'inclusion' is that often it seems like no one is best served in the interests of trying to serve everyone.
I don't think most of my peers experienced it exactly as I did, no. The system failed me in the way I described, and it failed them in many other different ways. Was the majority's time in those years optimised for learning? Definitely not. Hence the need for fundamental re-examining of what education is actually
for in my opinion. What is the purpose? Why do they go to school each day and what are the things they need to know/ be able to do when they leave?
Some examples: top of my list would ne critical thinking/ learning philosophy (as that is what it teaches: logic). In a world of conflicting and false information, being able to identify psychological manipulation and analyse things rationally is essential. Far more important than memorising facts that can be found in seconds on the internet. It should be taught from primary school but is completely absent. Why?
Politics. If people do not understand how their political system and other political systems are structured and why, then how can they evaluate it or make rational choices in voting without being manipulated?
Economics - to make any decisions in a general election and be able to tell what is the likely outcome of the policies proposed this is essential. On the national curriculum? Nope. Understanding economic cycles, the effect of public vs private spending/ debt, compound interest (mortgages, savings, credit cards). Etc.
Yet mysteriously many politicians and business leaders studied PPE at university... hmmmmm. Draw your own conclusions from that. Ignorance is easier to control.
A focus on these critical thinking skills and basic understanding of society supplemented with core subjects (maths, science, languages) would be sufficient. Then let people focus the rest of their time on their individual talents and interests. That is how you inspire a love of learning in the majority of pupils in my opinion, and give them all confidence.
Everyone has abilities. Many are destroyed by the schooling process. I was lucky mine were of the academic kind that schools recognised even though I found being there hell and boring, in equal measures. But why is art or drama less valuable? Or practical abilities? Or sport? It's better for someone to have one real talent be nurtured than be forced to study things they will never be interested in to a low level that is not useful for their interest or career. I really recommend watching the TED talk at the link I posted - he explains the view I've always had in a much funnier and more knowledgable way than I can.