Last month we began a new series called, simply, Tales
from the Field. With it we encourage Child and Youth Care workers to continue,
albeit in a different forum, the age-old Child and Youth Care tradition of story
telling.
We invite you to become a part of this
exciting series, within which you, the member of CYC-Net, will help to tell the
story of our field.
Below we have re-printed the original invitation so that
you, too, might decide to participate.
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THE ORIGINAL INVITATION
Hello Everyone,
The sharing of
knowledge in Child and Youth Care grew out of an oral tradition. Knowledge was
passed from one generation of child and youth care workers to the next through
the telling of tales of experience. And this tradition continues today. We see
it, for example, when a new situation arises and one worker says to another,
'this reminds me of . . .' and then follows this with a story within which
there is something relevant to the situation. Or when child and youth care
workers are sitting around debriefing a shift and they start to tell tales of
experiences they have had with different young people and families. Always in
these tales are moments, experiences, events that share the knowledge of
experience.
These stories are also the way in which we convey to others what it is that we
do as Child and Youth Care workers. How often, when asked by others to say what
it is that we do, do we tell a tale about our work rather than offer a
definition?
We here at CYC-Net believe in the power of these stories, and we know that there
are as many tales as there are encounters with young people and their families.
We encourage Child and Youth Care Workers to share those stories. So, what we
would like to do is have a special section on CYC-Online called simply "Tales
from the Field". Each month we would like to post/publish one tale on CYC-Online.
But in order to do this, we need your tales ...
We also know
that it is not easy to begin the process of writing. For some reason while we
all tell stories, we hesitate to put them in written form.
So, here is our proposal. We invite all of you to send us one story. It
doesn't have to be a
finished story, or a polished story, or even a story with a clear and profound
message. It doesn't have to be a long story, or the best story or even a recent
story. It doesn't even have to be a story about you, it could be about
something you saw or heard about. It just has to be a story. It could be a
paragraph long, a page long, or more if the story requires it. Our commitment
is that if you send us your story, we will work with you, as necessary, to help
get your story ready for posting/publication on CYC-Online. In this way,
collectively, we will all contribute to the education of child and youth care
workers and the evolving description of our field.
And what we need right now is for some of you to decide that this is something
you would like to do. To start with we would like to work with 12 or 15 people
who are interested in publishing one of their tales. That way we would have
enough to start this new series on CYC-Online
So, if
you are willing to help spread the learning, or help the description evolve, or
if you are interested in taking a step forward in your own development, or if
you just have a burning desire to tell your tale, please let us know and we will
get back in touch with you outside of the
discussion group.
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