What can PLWP do for Parents and Students?
Throughout the year, PLWP Teacher Consultants conduct programs for young writers.
Summer Writing Camps
When the school year ends, the learning has just begun for young writers in Northwest Missouri. Every summer, the St. Joseph School District sponsors PLWP's elementary and middle school writing camps. For the month of June, the best writers (nominated by their teachers) from elementary and middle school spend their mornings on the campus of Missouri Western State University. Area teachers lead the campers in lessons and activities designed to improve, inspire, and ignite their writing.
A record number of campers (103 elementary and 27 middle school students) attended PLWP writing camps in June 2008.
2008 "Writers In Progress" Camp Retrospective
2008 "Draw Your Own Conclusions..." Camp Retrospective
2007 "Writers 2B" Camp Retrospective
For information about the 2009 summer writing camps offered by PLWP and the St. Joseph School District, contact Christie Hofmeister, PLWP Youth Program Director.
High School Writing Day
The first Thursday in March brings the best teenage writers in Northwest Missouri and their teachers to the Missouri Western State University campus to participate in a series of writing workshops conducted by PLWP Teacher Consultants (TC) and/or university faculty. High School Writing Day 2008 is set for March 6. For more information, contact PLWP Teacher Consultant Stefanie Lyle, High School Writing Day director and St Joseph Benton High School language arts chair.
Our theme for the March 1, 2007, High School Writing Day tomorrow was "Write Now!" Valorie Stokes, Platte County R-III High School media coordinator and PLWP "Technology and Digital Literacy" learning communities facilitator, was our morning keynoter. One of Stoke’s students “Google Jockeyed” and Western’s pre-service teachers “Backchanneled” throughout Stokes’ address, an interactive ‘consideration’ of ways Web 2.0 tools have transformed writing/writing processes. Then, students and teachers participated in a series of writing workshops. At the day’s concluding “Open Mic” session, Stokes read a poem she compiled about “Writing Now” gleaned from students’ writing during her address.
2007 "Write Now" High School Writing Day Retrospective
Information on the 2008 High School Writing Day Event
Celebrating Rural Poetry
In 2006, PLWP received a grant from the Rural Sites Network to hold a youth poetry contest. Launched at High School Writing Day, the project sought place-based poetry submissions from area students. A panel of local poets was formed to judged the entries. Timothy Weeks, a ninth-grade home schooled student from Savannah, won the contest for his poem, “Blessed Man.” Weeks, his mother, and project coordinator Rebecca Dierking traveled to Washington, DC for a poetry reading at the Library of Congress. A celebration was also held at the St. Joseph Public Library, where the top ten young poets and the panel of judging poets read their works. An e-anthology and chap book were also published and distributed. Copies of the chap book are available in the PLWP office. For more information, contact Rebecca Dierking, project coordinator.
Celebrating Rural Poetry e-Anthology
Scholastic Scoring Sessions
Since 2004, PLWP has served as a preliminary judging site for the Scholastic Writing Awards, the Alliance for Young Artists and Writers national, annual high school writing and art contest. In 2007, Thirty-seven area pre-service teachers and teachers and MWSU faculty members met at Missouri Western State University on Saturday, January 19, and/or Saturday, January 26 where they judged over 3000 student contest entries. The teachers scored dramatic scripts, poetry, personal essay/memoir, humor, journalism, novel, science fiction/fantasy, and portfolio pieces written by students, grades seven - 12, from throughout the country.
