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Not all American schools fail our children. Sudbury Valley School (founded in 1968) and the democratic school movement, of which is a part, are examples of schools that exemplify the very highest ideals of what the United States was, is and can be(I can't speak to schools in other parts of the Americas.) Thus I will use the democratic school as a basis for comparison to the typical classroom-based teacher-managed schooling on the assumption that this is what is meant by "American schools."

Here are the key characteristics of prototypical classrooms as distinguished from democratic schooling:

1. Separate children from their community.

In democratic schools the children are able to access resources in the wider community at times and in ways that are appropriate to their needs and are often encouraged to be resourceful in ways that are simply unthinkable in traditional schools.

2. Place students into developmentally homogeneous groups.

Even in schools where they do "age-mixing" of a few grades the children are with others who are in the same developmental phase. In a democratic school setting the children have a whole range of people at very different developmental levels, which means they get to observe and interact with people who have a wide variety of social skills and styles. This is a social learning environment that is quantum leaps better than developmental homogeneity.

3. Put an adult in the position of managing the behavior of the children.

In the democratic school environment the responsibility for behavior is squarely on the shoulders of the behaver, adult or child. There are rules and the rules are enforced equally by the members of the community. Every member of the community is also equally empowered to change the rules using the democratic process. Everyone is responsible for their own behavior within the context of the rules that they all agree to abide by through the democratic process.

4. Encourage the adult(s) to maintain control over all the children's activities at all times.

There are classes available in democratic schools, but they operate according to the agreements between the teachers and the students, not according to arbitrary guidance from the school about how such things should be done. Thus a teacher is free to demand as much homework or any other form of study they think is right for the subject and the students. Another aspect of the classes is that the students can choose whether or not they want to take them, thus the teachers must

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