NATCHEZ &045; Students may be enjoying summer vacation, but some area teachers are taking some summer school lessons of their own.

Twenty-one teachers from four counties are participating in the Alcorn Writing Project for the month of June. The project, a branch of the Mississippi Writing and Thinking Institute, uses local teachers to lead sessions on writing and thinking techniques for teachers.

The teachers participating were selected on the basis of their successful classroom practices as teachers of writing and their potential as successful teachers of other teachers, said Talya Huntley, a Natchez High School teacher. The project includes teachers from all grade levels, Pre-K to high school.

Theresa Deer, a Pre-K teacher at Franklin Lower Elementary School, said she was able to take lessons taught by high school teachers and learn from them.

&uot;Every day I take them and adapt those to our classroom,&uot; Deer said. &uot;I haven’t see the same thing twice and it is helping me get back into more in-depth writing.&uot;

The teachers in the program do daily writings pertaining to the lessons of the day. At the end of the program, July 1, all the writings will be combined into a published book.

Shemekia Lacey, a first year high school teacher from Woodville, said the project has been very beneficial so far.

&uot;Coming together with other teachers has been really interesting,&uot; Lacey said. &uot;I’ve heard strategies that may be useful in my classroom.&uot;

The program started in 1989 and serves 15 public school districts in a 12 county area of southwest Mississippi. Participants will receive six graduate hours upon completion of the course work.

This year’s participants are from Adams, Franklin, Jefferson and Claiborne counties.