What’s in a word?

 Each word has many layers to it.  Not only do many words hold several definitions, but each person has a personal connection to and individual understanding of a definition of a word.  Take for instance the word continuity.

This weekend I helped facilitate the Massachusetts Writing Project Retreat in Worcester.  The MWP is a state-wide “teachers teaching teachers” network of the four local sites of the National Writing Project: Boston Writing Project, Buzzards Bay Writing Project, Central Massachusetts Writing Project and the Western Massachusetts Writing Project.  It’s nothing short of amazing what can happen when great minds come together.  This retreat is about networking, sharing ideas and resources with each other.  It is also about real work: the building and strengthening of MWP as a state-wide non-profit professional development program to improve the education of all children in the Bay State.

We began our time together “reflecting on a word.”  We explored first individually, then in small groups and finally as a large group, our understanding of this thing we call “continuity” in the National Writing Project.  It was difficult to stay focused on defining the word for ourselves; we wanted to talk about the challenges of continuity or begin to imagine the solutions.  It was an important exercise to stay with the word.

In the National Writing Project model, teachers become members of the Writing Project after completing the Invitational Summer Institute, a 4 week intensive exploration into the act of teaching.  Teachers write as a way to reflect on and learn from their teaching and to better understand writing so as to become better teachers of writing.  Teachers conduct exploratory research into an area of teaching that will best inform their own teaching.  And teachers develop a workshop on their best teaching practice that they share with their colleagues.  Continuity is the way that teachers continue as members of the writing project. 

However, in our conversation at the retreat we discovered that many teachers feel a part of the Writing Project even before they complete the Invitational Summer Institute.  Perhaps they have attended writing groups or writing retreats sponsored by the Writing Project.  Perhaps they have been involved in school-based professional development or study groups.  This brings up the question: what happens if we begin to think about continuity beginning after a person’s first encounter with the Writing Project?  It changes the way we approach the way we work with teachers.

            Here are some of the ideas that came up at the retreat.  Continuity is communication, community, and support. It builds leadership, sustains the structure and workings of a site, generates vision, and shares and grows knowledge.  It has a nature of reciprocity, nourishment, and acknowledgement.  To use a term from the National Writing Project, we are a “professional home” for teachers.  It is a place that teachers come to learn, to share, to grow, to lead, to be known. 

We’ll see how this exploration into a word begins to influence the work we do. 

It’s only a word—hmm.

Susan