Negotiating a shared understanding of critical literacy among teachers has proven challenging, even for a group that is highly motivated like a graduate course. Building consensus on how to apply critical literacy in one's own school is even harder when motivation and ability vary greatly among teachers. As emerging teacher leaders, candidates in a Master's program should initiate respectful conversations about critical literacy to develop a collaborative community, without demanding compliance that could threaten others. The ideal is to thoughtfully balance advocacy, openness to different views, and maintaining collegial relationships, in the same spirit that critical literacy is practiced with students.

1. MSVU Master’s in Education Final PowerPoint for Fall 2010 Paddy Morgan Negotiating a Shared Understanding: Challenges in Creating a Community of Critical Literacy Practice

10. A few thoughts on this subject from the author: Negotiating a shared understanding of Critical Literacy has proven occasionally problematic within the context of this course, despite the overall motivation and capacity of the participants. Negotiating courses of action around Critical Literacy at one’s own school are all the more challenging, when motivation and capacity are far from comparable. As candidates in this Master’s programme, I understand our own school roles as initiating and inviting conversations around the work we do in Critical Literacy, with an eye to developing a community of practice at the school level. Preaching Critical Literacy will still attract eager teachers, keen on examining their own practice and being reflective research-practitioners; however, lived practice -- with an openness to sharing one’s efforts -- engages others without threatening them. As discussed at the last seminar for this course, one must strive for a deliberate balance: taking a stand on issues while being open to hearing others, challenging the power structures of one’s own discursive communities while maintaining relationships within them, and quarrelling joyously about ideas that matter. One’s rich relationships and exploration of meaningful curriculum with students should ideally be paralleled in our collegial undertakings. If the latter can be done over lunch at Yolanda’s, all the better.