Authors’ Retrospective: The Importance of Sharing Your Story
Contributions by Shannon Morey, Erin Oakley, and Beverly Stuckwisch
In December 2014, the Knowles Teacher Initiative launched Kaleidoscope: Educator Voices and Perspectives as a space for Knowles Teaching and Senior Fellows to share stories about teaching, inquiry, leading, and learning. Quickly, authorship expanded from exclusively Knowles Fellows to include teachers beyond the Knowles Community. Kaleidoscope aims to create a public space for discourse about teachers’ expertise, believing that teachers’ storytelling and knowledge sharing can transform educational outcomes for students. Now, 10 years later, Kaleidoscope is still going strong as a platform for educators to share their stories with the broader public. As a way to celebrate Kaleidoscope’s work over the last decade, I talked with authors from the journal in a variety of forums—email and synchronous meetings—to find out more about how they came to write for Kaleidoscope, what the journal has meant to them, and why they urge others to pick up the pen (or keyboard) to share their stories. These authors’ words inspired me to share a bit of our conversations in the hopes that other educators might be encouraged to make their stories public.
Writer? Or Not.
I am not a writer.
It feels ironic to write that sentence in a Kaleidoscope article, especially as a full time PhD student in science education whose entire existence revolves around writing, revising, and writing some more. Plus, I’m on Kaleidoscope’s editorial staff so I should consider myself a writer! I do not, however, include “writer” as one of my identity descriptors. I find writing challenging, and I look for ways to procrastinate getting started, only finding my rhythm once I’m deep into a piece (often with a deadline looming). I much prefer reading, and the genre matters little—from academic journal articles to the latest Sarah J. Maas novels, cereal boxes to nonfiction books to Kaleidoscope articles—I’ll read just about anything. Most of the Kaleidoscope authors I spoke with for this article shared similar sentiments. Last summer I worked with Erin Oakley, co-editor-in-chief of Kaleidoscope, to help her prepare for a conference; she launched her talk by stating that she also does not identify as a writer. In Erin’s own words, writing is scary: “You have to have a thought, write it down, and then, heavens to Betsy, you are supposed to share it with others???” (E. Oakley, personal communication, July 11, 2024). Exactly.
Shannon Morey, who has written and contributed for Kaleidoscope multiple times, felt similarly. Both of the articles Shannon published with Kaleidoscope were collaborations with other educators from her school. These articles were a way to “process and appreciate the work [they] had done together” (S. Morey, personal communication, June 28, 2024), but publishing (twice!) didn’t mean she thought of herself as a writer. Several of her teacher friends are fiction writers, and her husband has a book deal right now focused on Artificial Intelligence and democracy. As Shannon shared, “My comparison points in my personal life are pretty extreme…the people that I co-wrote the articles with are just two people that I love collaborating with and I think it felt like a natural extension of our work was to write about it… I don’t see myself so much as a writer” (S. Morey, personal communication, June 28, 2024).
The important part of the writing-to-publishing pipeline seems to be less about whether one feels they’re a writer, and more about needing to share a story more publicly.
Beverly (Bev) Stuckwisch’s perspective was a bit different. In an email, Bev noted that she’s “always enjoyed reading and writing; however, had it not been for Kaleidoscope, I’m not sure I ever would have sought out publishing my stories” (B. Stuckwisch, personal communication, April 25, 2024). Teacher Developers from the Knowles Fellowship Program encouraged her to incorporate writing for Kaleidoscope as a goal for a professional development (PD) experience. While Bev noted the PD wasn’t all that exciting to write about, the experience of having a peer advisor to support her writing for each article jump-started her desire to make her writing public through publishing, both with Kaleidoscope and in other venues. Since receiving that initial push to publish, Bev has worked for Kaleidoscope as a peer advisor (supporting other authors), associate editor, and is currently a co-editor-in-chief.
While the “writer” identity label resonates differently with each of us, the authors I communicated with are actual authors—they have written at least one piece for Kaleidoscope (and other publications, in some cases!)—even if “writer” isn’t an embraced part of their identity. The important part of the writing-to-publishing pipeline seems to be less about whether one feels they’re a writer, and more about needing to share a story more publicly. And, after this article, I might have to renegotiate my own relationship with my “writer” identity!
Local Knowledge is Important
Identifying as a writer is one barrier that stops teachers from becoming teacher-authors. Another barrier is feeling that a story isn’t relevant or important enough to share with others. It can also feel particularly vulnerable to make something public when the story being shared doesn’t have a conclusive ending–one that’s neatly packaged and resolved. As Bev noted, “I started working on my leadership story for the Knowles Fellowship and had no intentions of publishing it because it was extremely vulnerable and contained a lot of conflict with no resolution. However, as 2017 turned into 2018 and I continued working with my inquiry group about how to have and facilitate difficult conversations, I ended up getting some of the resolution I wanted and started to consider making the story public” (B. Stuckwisch, personal communication, April 25, 2024). Even without a conclusive “ending” to her story, Bev published “Difficult Conversations in Support of LGBTQ Students”, one of the most highly trafficked articles on the Kaleidoscope website. Clearly, conclusive endings aren’t always necessary for a story to resonate with others.
Bev’s initial hesitation to share a story that felt vulnerable and unresolved and my own idea that a story needs to be “universal” to be worth sharing stuck with me as I read through past issues of Kaleidoscope. Sara Abeita’s piece “Growing Deep Roots In A Broken System”, summed these ideas up well:
"Reflecting with my Knowles colleagues about my inquiry data on that patio in Phoenix, I realized that what I had learned throughout the year studying a specific question in my classroom helped me to better understand the dynamics that occurred in two of my classes but not in another. The mindset shift I had in that moment was that this was still a positive learning exercise for me and the students in my classroom. While the things I discovered didn’t apply to classrooms across the world, they did apply to two of my classes and could help me to better foster a healthy learning environment for those particular students. Knowledge doesn’t have to be groundbreaking or universally applicable to be useful. The changes I implemented from the observations I made during my inquiry did help the students in those classes, and that was enough to make the process useful. Learning the intimate details and functions of my classes and the students in them helped me to make small changes to benefit those students, and it also helped to empower me to push for school policies that I knew would help how these particular classes functioned." (Abeita, 2023, emphasis added).
As there is no “one size fits all” solution for education, there is no “one size fits all” teacher story that will inspire the changes that need to happen to support our students. Still, a story doesn’t need to shatter the world or be universal to be impactful. Bev noted that “reading the writing of other teachers and helping them process their experiences [as a peer advisor] inspired me to take more risks and be more vulnerable for the sake of uplifting teacher voices and finding common ground in the teaching community” (B. Stuckwisch, personal communication, April 25, 2024). As Erin Oakley pointed out, “the knowledge that I have for my context is important to share” (E. Oakley, personal communication, July 11, 2024). Local, situated knowledge won’t resonate with every person, or even at every moment, but it will most certainly resonate with someone, somewhere, sometime—and that’s what matters.
Why Kaleidoscope?
Kaleidoscope’s model is unique in that we offer individualized support and feedback for storytellers through peer advising. This support can be critical for writers. Bev shared that peer advising support was pivotal in her decision to publish her stories: “After attending a Knowles Summer Conference session with Kaleidoscope, Becky [Rebecca Van Tassell] ended up peer advising me on publishing both [my] PD Review and another article … that was born out of some of my inquiry work in the Fellowship. I got so much out of this peer advising relationship that I decided to volunteer to be a peer advisor for Kaleidoscope after!” (B. Stuckwisch, personal communication, April 25, 2024). While this article is the first time I’ve tried on the “writer” identity label, I’ve served as a peer advisor for several teacher writers as part of my associate editor role. The experience has been highly rewarding, and every single story I’ve been privileged to be a part of has held facets that resonate with me.
As it turns out, writing for Kaleidoscope isn’t just a way to engage the rest of the education community in important and relevant conversations—it’s also a way to invite new educators into the conversation.
In true Knowles fashion, Kaleidoscope is for teachers, by teachers, making it an accessible space for storytelling and cross-context learning to occur. When I started teaching in the teacher licensure programs at Oregon State University (OSU), first as an instructor and now as a PhD student, I mostly stuck to academic articles and books relevant to a course. I stand by many of these assignments—for example, Grading for Equity: What It Is, Why it Matters, and How It Can Transform Schools and Classrooms by Joe Feldman provides a solid foundation for my assessment course as students grapple with ideas around grading systems and what it actually means to equitably assess student learning. However, many academic texts can be a slog, leaving even the most relevant article in danger of being ignored. As I’ve built and rebuilt courses in OSU’s licensure programs, I look for ways to include Kaleidoscope articles in my curricula to make ideas more accessible and more relevant to my preservice teachers. Authors sharing ideas from their local contexts about grading, identity, teacher leadership, professional development, and many other topics has been far more impactful to my students and supported more meaningful conversations than any of the other learning materials I’ve integrated. As it turns out, writing for Kaleidoscope isn’t just a way to engage the rest of the education community in important and relevant conversations—it’s also a way to invite new educators into the conversation.
Relevance—Now and Later
Writing for Kaleidoscope is important—without our authors, we would just be a blank page on the Internet with no content. Still, there’s another side to the equation. Kaleidoscope is a space for readers, too! Shannon and I spoke about this during our conversation, and we agreed that, writing for the journal aside, reading from Kaleidoscope has felt important for both of us. We look whenever the latest issue has been announced, and we’ve found the “Call and Response” section to be a quick read and a fun way to hear other teachers’ thoughts. Then, we dive into the articles. As Shannon noted, “It’s a nice way to hear current teacher thoughts about … something that’s kind of “of the moment”, or you know, particularly relevant for that particular time and I’ve found that to be really interesting and of course, like I said, I love to skim through the table of contents [looking for articles that resonate]” (S. Morey, personal communication, June 28, 2024).
Sometimes that relevance emerges later. For example, as I prepared for this article, I went back through old issues of Kaleidoscope, re-reading articles I enjoyed when they first came out and also reading through articles that I had previously missed. This process resonated with Shannon: “I was looking for my articles to remind myself what I wrote about [in preparation for our chat] and I was like, … I should go back and reread these other peoples’ articles because this looks relevant to something that I’m thinking about for next year” (S. Morey, personal communication, June 28, 2024).
What you share doesn’t have to be education’s panacea—it doesn’t even have to feel particularly applicable outside of your own context.
Writing for Kaleidoscope sustains itself across time and space, which sets it apart from other writing spaces. Academic articles (my whole world right now) are written from the perspective of building knowledge. My PhD advisor talks about seminal pieces in science education and teacher development that I need to be familiar with, but also the necessity of keeping up with current research as a way of understanding the direction our field is heading. News articles create condensed snapshots of teaching and learning, often for dramatic effect, and typically without context or clear purpose to support educators in the classroom. Kaleidoscope feels different. There is a clearly articulated goal to create a public dialogue that centers teachers’ expertise so that their contextual knowledge can be shared with others. By emphasizing storytelling, Kaleidoscope supports authors and readers to reach past the current moment to share situated, contextual knowledge that evokes empathy, challenges preconceptions, and gives voice to key experts in the field: the teachers.
Final Inspiration
Why write? Writing can change your life. When shared, your writing also has the potential to change other peoples’ lives. What you share doesn’t have to be education’s panacea—it doesn’t even have to feel particularly applicable outside of your own context. In education research there is constant tension between generalizability and deeply situated knowledge—this dichotomy applies here too. The important part, really, is sharing something meaningful about a particular corner of education. It doesn’t have to be generalizable to all classrooms, or the entire education system. If just a few other teachers relate to your story, that’s enough—and makes your story worth sharing.
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Cacciatore, K. & Morey, S. (2017). A novel co-teaching model to support student and teacher growth. Kaleidoscope: Educator Voices and Perspectives, 4(1), 14–19.
DiMaria, S., Milks, K., Stetzenmeyer, A., Stuckwisch, B. (2024). Peer advising: A lever to promote teacher story-telling. Kaleidoscope: Educator Voices and Perspectives, 11(2), URL NEEDED.
Feldman, J. (2024). Grading for equity: What it is, why it matters, and how it can transform schools and classrooms (Second edition.). Corwin.
Morey, S., & Eckels, M. (2018). Collaboratively prototyping science classroom tasks. Kaleidoscope: Educator Voices and Perspectives, 5(1), 26–29.
Stuckwisch, B. (2016). Professional development: Literacy learning. Kaleidoscope: Educator Voices and Perspectives, 3(1), 27–29.
Stuckwisch, B. (2017). An honest look at a one-to-one classroom. Kaleidoscope: Educator Voices and Perspectives, 3(2), 12–15.
Stuckwisch, B. (2018). Difficult conversations in support of LGBTQ+ students. Kaleidoscope: Educator Voices and Perspectives, 5(1), 11–14.
Citation
Livingston, M. (2025). Authors’ retrospective: The importance of sharing your story. Kaleidoscope: Educator Voices and Perspectives, 11(2), https://knowlesteachers.org/resource/authors-retrospective-the-importance-of-sharing-your-story.