Listen to thisAnother busy month, and so, another (this time very short) shorty.
I tend to reflect back this time of year, and so I’ve been looking back at my column. I started it last year with the importance of hope in looking forward. As I now consider the different pieces, I notice that each one furthered my clarity in some way. Writing about the teaching helped me see more clearly some of the dynamics at play and fortified my faith in its importance. I’m clearer about tacit and explicit knowledge and their relationship to practice. The contribution of writing to our field has been brought into sharper relief, and my understanding of touch and our fear of touching kids has been further developed. It’s not like I didn’t know about these things before. It’s just that I have a clearer understanding now. I’m also clearer about my own lack of clarity. Kind of like, “The more you know, the more you know you don’t know.”
Anyway, I have appreciated, and for brief moments have even enjoyed, writing to you, my mostly imagined reader. You have helped me to deepen my understanding and strengthen my hopes for making a contribution to our work in this way. I hope that it has been of some benefit to you as well, for that, really, is the whole point. And I think it’s okay, not really knowing either way. I have always thought of residential child care practice as an act of faith. Faith that if I turned up, was as present as I could be and put my head, heart and soul into providing a healing, developmentally enhancing environment, that while the positive impact may not even germinate, much less sprout and grow strong in front of my own eyes, it could and would at a later time, when that kid was ready. Those rare, sweet moments “when I was thanked or told in some way that I made a difference “were great, but they weren’t enough to fuel the fire in my belly necessary do the work. I think there are similarities with teaching, doing research, and writing.
So, Happy New Year everybody. I hope you have faith and clarity in the year ahead.
