Today kicks off National Novel Writing Month–NaNoWriMo–and provides me, at least, with the chance to think about readers and writers–consumers and producers of books and information. In my past life as a liaison librarian at research universities the cycle of information literacy felt like a complete process. I taught a lot of undergraduate classes about finding, evaluating, and citing information (just like I do with my upper school students now), but I also worked with graduate students and faculty on publishing, sharing research, and scholarly conversations. We displayed research products, had sessions on metrics and predatory journals and lots more. The students and faculty I worked with readily saw themselves as creators as well as consumers of information. And they knew that the two were not separate or transactional, but an ongoing conversational process. As I prepped the library/writing support collaboration for NaNoWriMo, I realized that the information cycle feels very incomplete and spotty most of the time, and November is a great time to start to make it complete.

Like last year, our Writing Support teacher is hosting writing time during lunch in the library each day of November. I’ve built a collaborative spreadsheet where our participating students and faculty can log their writing throughout the month by day, time, and word count, and earn badges to mark their achievements–like hitting various word counts, writing 5 days in a row, attending the lunchtime writing blocks, etc. The library also has a display for the month that features books that were drafted or begun from NaNoWriMo projects. These are all pieces to support more of the creative (and creation) process for our community. I also plan to host a session on ways to share their work as we arrive at the end of the month so students can think about how to put their work into the world, and also how to think about intellectual property and copyright from the creators’ side of the desk.

I’m excited for the opportunity to work with our students as creators, and yet, it reminds me how infrequently I do this throughout the year. Some of the limitations for completing the information cycle are structural–I only get to work with classes when faculty invite me, and only have the time they allot. I regularly remind faculty that I can work with them and students on all parts of the research process and anything involving the using or sharing of information, but I still only get class time to talk about finding sources and citing them. Another structural piece is that the artifacts of student work go directly to the teachers and there is not a tradition yet for sharing those products beyond the classroom except in the arts. That said, opportunities exist–some initial work with our visual arts department has (hopefully) opened the door to more opportunities to work with students as creators. Our student publications are yet another way to work with students where they do see themselves as creators or information. These opportunities may be just the wedge in the door to help faculty see the possibilities to collaborate and inform their students about how knowledge is produced and shared in their disciplines, and how students can contribute their voices to the conversation. 

For now, I’ll be focused on our creative writers who see that the works they read influence the stories they want to tell, and who already know their voices belong in the world.