In Eleanor Duckworth's class "T-440: Teaching and Learning" at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, students sometimes wonder how Duckworth's model of teaching and learning works in elementary classroom settings. In this article the author, a graduate of "T-440" and a 6th grade teacher at the Smith College Laboratory School, chronicles her efforts to respond to the individual ideas of students while carrying out the prescribed curriculum supplied by the school. The author wonders how she will stay on schedule if she takes time to respond to students' individual ideas, what pressures she will experience, and what compromises will be made. Conversations with students about math, literature and geography illustrate the author's attempts to follow student thinking. In the end, the author realizes that prescribed curricula is not necessarily an obstacle to following student thinking, and new questions about teaching, learning, and curriculum development emerge. (Contains 6 footnotes.)