About the Missoula Writing Collaborative
The Missoula Writing Collaborative teaches literary competence, critical thinking, cultural awareness, and artistic joy through creative writing.
What helps young children with literacy? What helps them get excited about writing? How can they learn about the power of language? How do we help them cope with the difficulties of this time—the isolation, uncertainty, and fear? How do we bring them joy? The answer is poetry. At the Missoula Writing, we believe stories inside them that are just waiting to emerge, whether it is in the form of an ode, a place poem, or a poem about a superhero.
Since our beginning in 1994, we have brought writing instruction to more than 44,000 students in 34 schools in western Montana, from two-room schoolhouses to multi-classroom elementary schools in the greater Missoula area and on the Flathead Reservation of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes. We work with classroom teachers to highlight classroom goals, and offer readings for parents and free anthologies for all students.
In all these venues, and with the world, we teach kids to love to write.
What The Teachers are Saying
"For several years running, the Missoula Writing Collaborative has put guest-writer-poet-teachers in our classes. Our middle school students have grown as writers and as humans. I’ve personally witnessed the Missoula Writing Collaborative’s rippling effects: through self-expression, our 7th
graders strengthen their own voices, process experiences with more depth and see the world around them with new light."
– Mindy Hammett, 7th Grade Teacher, C.S. Porter Middle School
"Encouraging young people to write makes them more thoughtful, reflective people, better consumers of information, and ultimately,
better citizens."
– Catherine Jones, Paxson Elementary School Parent
"Poetry is a great way to express your feelings and emotions...I like it because you get to write about the things that happen to you and that
changed your life."
– Owen Dale, Fourth Grade, Lewis and Clark School
Our 2020-2021 Writing Residences
Missoula Elementary Schools:
- Chief Charlo School
- DeSmet
- Franklin
- Hawthorne
- Jeanette Rankin
- Lewis & Clark
- Lowell School
- Paxson School
- Rattlesnake School
- Target Range School
Missoula Middle Schools:
- C.S. Porter
Missoula High Schools:
- Big Sky High School
- Loyola High School
- Seeley-Swan High School
- Western Montana Schools:
- Arlee Elementary
- Bonner School
- Charlo Elementary
- Darby School
- Dixon School
- Drummond
- Florence-Carlton School
- K. Harvey Wilson School
- Lolo Elementary School
- Ovando School
- Pablo School
- Potomac School
- Ronan School
- St. Ignatius School
- Stevensville Middle School
- Victor School
- Woodman School
Help keep our kids writing!
Help support our residencies, writing classes, and camps by donating online at missoulawritingcollaborative.org.