Struggling Publicly

Photo by jeffrey james pacres via flickr

We are in the midst of the Realistic Fiction Writing unit, and I am a struggling writer. This is not a brand-new realisation, but it is something I have been more public about this year. I have known for several years now, ever since I have committed to writing alongside my students within the genre of study, that fiction is hard for me. I can knock out an essay in 30 minutes flat, tell a personal narrative in 10, and jot a poem in 5. But stories... well, I often get stuck in the gate without an idea.

I know a variety of idea generating strategies because I teach them to my students. I try them out in my Writer's Notebook just like they do. But year after year, I come up with either boring ideas or no ideas. Once I settle on a (boring) idea to go with, I struggle to find the problem, the solution, the issue, and how to make characters into something other than myself or my own children. Do I have a disability? Something like dysfictographia-- the inability to write fiction (p.s. I just made that up)?

So this year, I shared my fiction-writing struggle with my students during the first week as we were building our writing community. I included my writing difficulty on my "About the Author" page of our Writing Gallery website. And I have been repeating it almost daily for the past couple weeks as we've been working through the fiction unit.

However, I've also been sharing my problem-solving attempts with them. I told them that I asked for help from my daughter, and we bounced ideas off of each other until we came up with something I thought I could write. I told them that I changed the setting to one that I had more experience with so it would sound more authentic. I showed them my Writer's Notebook of lead ideas, full of scratched out lines, inserted phrases, and questions to myself. I told them that, when reading aloud, I noticed my sentences sound clunky and I need to revise them to get rid of all those words I repeated. I asked them for help on the ending because it didn't show my issue as clearly as I wanted. Then I thanked them for their advice, which I will keep in mind as I write my next draft.

I want them to know that even grown-up writers, who they see as fluent and accomplished, work hard at writing and don't give up when the going gets tough.

I think they get it. I've gotten more comments this year that start with things like, "When you changed your setting because it wouldn't sound authentic, I think I need to do that too." Or "I noticed I repeat a lot of words too, so is it OK if I read this out loud to myself to catch them?" They give me encouragement and tell me they like my story, but then tell me something I can do to make it better. They are usually right. And I thank them.