Those of us who write regularly know how difficult it is to write regularly.  Unfortunately, our students do not often see the difficulties we experience and, as a result, are unable to learn from them.

This past weekend, I reviewed several pieces of writing in progress; writing on which I have worked during the past month with little success.

• There is the beginning of an essay on why giving people what they need to do their jobs is not a desirable goal; that individuals need to be provided what they need to do their jobs well.  The 277 words in the draft are what is left from the approximately 1,000 words that I have written and edited and deleted while working on the text.
• Then there is the reflection on how students can cause their own problems.  The allusion to No Exit is very good.  However, because of the need to protect the privacy of an individual whom I want to cite, the body of the text is too vague.  Sometimes it takes months to find a solution to such a problem—if the problem is even fixable.
• I have 148 words inspired by a note that campus security left on my car.  I know where I want to go with the essay, but cannot come up with the words to express myself well.
• Last week, I wrote a very good 43 word introduction to an essay about collegiality.  But life interfered with the essay’s progress.
• I have notes for an essay inspired by a meme that argues that “No matter who is President, Jesus is King,” a video in which a pastor uses history well to make his point, a response to a blog posting titled “Offended at Epcot,” and some other items that are floating around.
• There were some great potential responses to articles published in The Chronicle of Higher Education and Inside Higher Ed for which I have notes.  But the dialogue has moved on without me and those notes must go into the dust bin.

During my “dry spell” of the past few weeks, I have published two memorable moments in Today in History on October 13 and October 19.  Those two successes have been shared with students.

Sharing my successes and completed work with students in not, however, nearly as important as sharing my struggles.  When a student was telling me how difficult it was to edit the memorable moment on which she is working down to fewer than 350 words, I laughed and responded, “Tell me about it.”  I then shared with her the difficulty I was having with “Basketball Introduced as Olympic Sport” because I wanted to include more details than 350 words would allow.  Students like knowing that others—especially their professor—struggle, too.

Last week, another student wanted to begin a new topic because he is finding so little information on the topic on which he has been working during the past month.  Because I do research, I appreciate how one can do quality research and have little to show for it.  To calm this student’s fears, I was able to provide a specific example about how I have spent hours trying to find more credible documentation for something on which I have been working.

Almost 30 years ago, I wrote an assignment with my students.   I typed my first draft on a mimeograph sheet and ran copies of the draft for me students.  I still remember one woman accusing me of garbling my text just to make it difficult for them.  I assured her that I had given everyone a real first draft.

Last fall semester, I did something similar by providing students with the first draft of “Measuring Learning by the Numbers.”  The draft was close to 1,500 words and was one of the whiniest and most pathetic things I have written.  I was actually quite embarrassed to show it to anyone.  Yet I shared it with my students and they were able to see not only that their professor could draft prose that was worse than their writing.

While it is important to share our successes with our students, it is equally important to teach our works in progress as well as our failures.

–Steven L. Berg, PhD