It seemed from the moment I started teaching, I was finding connections to people I knew, people I knew who knew people, and so on, like the Kevin Bacon game. I’ve come across people I haven’t seen since high school, as both parents of students and fellow teachers – and one superintendent! Facebook gives us the mutual friend phenomenon, where I discovered that I spent summers growing up at a campsite with someone who’s now a principal in my school board (I would have known sooner, except I never saw his last name written down, and I never put the pronunciation and the spelling of it together. I’m sure I have some photos of bad ’80’s hair and shuffleboard contests somewhere). Teaching for me, has always had a sense of connection, of belonging to a community. I sensed it at staff meetings, workshops, my vice-principal intern sessions, while taking my principal qualifications courses, and so on. I’ve always loved feeling that there were colleagues “out there”.
How many of us have said or heard, “Teaching is a small world?” I have always felt the connectivity of our world, our community, and that feeling has never been stronger than right after my first step into the blogosphere (a word I just learned). The feedback, outpouring of support and the reassuring comments have slightly overwhelmed me, but also have left me feeling … good, for lack of a fancier word. So thank you for that. The first step was the most challenging, but I feel like I’ve gone past the tipping point, and I can’t wait to keep going!
ErHead 