Sheridan Blau on the National Writing Project, writing on page 98 of James Gray’s Teachers at the Center:
Having experienced what it means to learn in a community of learners, teachers are inclined to count such learning as more authoritative and authentic than any other and to think of such learning as the proper aim of instruction. They therefore become determined to turn their own classrooms into learning communities that will function like a writing project, where respect for the intelligence of every learner is the starting place for all activity, and where all learners are expected and required to take responsibility for their own learning as well as for assisting others to learn — a community where learning entails the production of knowledge as well as its reception, and where knowledge is always seen as provisional and subject to challenge and refinement.
As my friends and colleagues gather in Washington D.C. for the National Writing Project’s Spring Meeting, I hope they’ll take a few moments to reread Blau’s words here.
This is what’s worth fighting for, y’all.
This matters. It’s important.
Be well, be firm, and be kind.
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