Lately I have been trying to get my students to buy into the Shitty First Draft. I teach writing intensive courses each semester, and one of the core requirements of the W courses is that there must be explicit writing instruction. When I sit down at the beginning of each semester and think about what I want to do differently or better in my courses, I always come to the conclusion that I can do a better job of teaching writing. This is not necessarily true in the Advanced Composition course the Education students have to take, but I’d have to admit that there’s some truth to my own self-criticism in regards to the American Lit courses I teach each fall.
The students have to write a 15 page paper, for which I require a succession of drafts. I build in workshop days approximately every fourth class for the students to work in groups on their latest drafts of the assignment, and during these I sit in on the groups and add my two cents. I also require conferences at midterm and make myself available for conferences by appointment throughout the semester. But this isn’t always enough.
This semester, I have found that my students are having tremendous difficulty just generating ideas for their papers, and they are coming to workshop sessions with very paltry drafts. Not just shitty drafts in the classic sense of the term, but drafts that are really nothing more than a paragraph or a list.
After having talked to about half of the twenty students in the course, I began to see clear patterns. 1. Students were not taking the time to read the samples of student essays I had provided, and even when they did they really did not know what was important to observe. 2. The students were not especially well read, either in terms of classic literature, Bible stories, or mythology, or in terms of current events. In terms of popular texts like movies and television, they were unsure how to begin reading these as texts. 3. They were so terrified of not having enough to say about a topic for fifteen pages that they strove for exceedingly broad topics in the resigned belief that even if they didn’t write a good paper they’d at least be more likely to fulfill the page requirement. 4. They were unwilling to embrace the messiness of the drafting process. They were horrified by the thought of cutting and pasting, moving things around, exploring tangents, and having multiple, interrelated tasks going on simultaneously.
So then I asked myself what I could do differently. I started by taking a day to discuss some of the student papers I have posted on a course wiki, talking aloud about what I thought was successful, effective, or interesting, and why. I asked the students to make observations and note patterns of what students did to make the papers effective. In conferences, I spent time going online and showing the students good websites for current events, starting with places like the New York Times. Many students were surprised at how comprehensive such a site was. I also gave a lot of pep talks and struck deals. I’d say, "Get to seven pages and then let’s revisit this idea about the 15 page paper." I also had to assure the students that the learning process was more important than the grading process.
Lastly, and this was in many ways the hardest and most important psychological hump to get over, I had to encourage and cajole the students into embracing the shitty first (and sometimes second, third, and fourth) draft. We read Annie Lamott’s chapter by the same name. I showed them how I use two—and sometimes, with the help of a laptop, three—screens to be able to see multiple drafts and pages, so I can cut and paste from one draft into a new one, while simultaneously doing research on a third screen. I told them stories I’d heard from Wally Lamb about using notecards on bulletin boards, and even showed photos of William Faulkner’s home where he wrote his outline of ideas and events for A Fable on the walls of his bedroom.
I don’t know yet how much this has or will help, but students thus far have expressed thankfulness for these various efforts. Their next draft is due on the 18th. I guess I’ll find out then how much of this was taken to heart and mind.
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