Collective Experience

I've spent the past three days working on a Curriculum Committee made up of teachers from all over New England, New York, and Bermuda. Ordinarily, my first thoughts of curriculum aren't all that exciting. But always, on second thought, and considering my years of experience on curriculum committees, I am fully excited about the possibilities. Usually, I'm not disappointed. And I certainly wasn't this week.


This is my second year on this particular committee. The big committee was broken into smaller groups. Mine focused on writing. There were five of us: a superintendent from New York, two elementary teachers--one from New York, one from Bermuda--and two secondary teachers--one from Maine and one (me) from Massachusetts. Our assignment was come up with ways to integrate spirituality into our teaching of writing (we all teach in Christian schools).

After some brain- storming, we divided ourselves into two smaller groups, by grade level. Coincidentally, the two elementary teachers were the younger ones of our group, The two of us secondary teachers, while we do not look our ages (ha!) had 65 collective years of teaching between us. That was a shocking thing to discover, but it made our job easier. We were able to put together five sample lesson plans to one full and two mini-lessons on the part of the other two.

Some might chalk it up to elementary being more complicated than secondary, but I prefer to call it practice... experience...that has to count for something =)

Photos: the road home...soggy and misty after dousing rains all morning.