Creative Writing Prompt Ideas for Kids
Learning basic writing skills is very important for young children. However, coming up with an idea of what to write about can be the hardest part, even for adults with years of writing experience! Giving younger children writing promps that leave room for them to use creativity is a great way to help them with their writing. I have come up with a list of fun writing promps for children from about 3rd-6th grade, although many of them can be adapted for younger or older age groups. These ideas can be useful for teachers or parents that like to have their children journal or write at home.
1) If you could choose one animal to have a real conversation with, which animal would you choose to talk with? What kinds of questions would you ask the animal? What do you think they would want to know about you?
2) If you could change one thing about your school, what would it be?
3) Write a letter to your future self. What do you hope the future version of yourself is like? What advice do you give your future self?
-Tip: It is fun to put this letter in a sealed envelop to give back to the child to read at a later date. For example, have the children write the letter the first week of school and return them to the children on the last day of school.
4) What would your dream house look like?
5) If a genie granted you 3 wishes, what would you wish for and why?
6) Write about a new toy or game you would like to invent. What would it do? What would it look like? How much would it cost? A good follow up writing assignment would be to write a script for a commercial for your new toy. If you want to go the extra mile, record the child reading the script to create a "commercial"
7) If you could visit any place in the world where would you go and why?
8) If you could have any superpower what would it be and why?
9) Would you like to be famous? Why or why not? If so, what would you like to be famous for?
10) Describe a dream you have had.
11) Why DID the chicken cross the road? Create a story about a chicken and come up with your own creative reason for why he decided to cross the road.
12) What school subject do you feel is the most important for students to learn about in school and why?
13) Write about a time in your life when you were embarrassed at first, but now you look back and laugh about it.
14) Write about the day you woke up in a different time period. Pretend you woke up one day and had went back in time to the Ice Age, The Civil War, or even the future, etc. What did you do this day? What was it like?
15) Write about a time that you were very proud of yourself. What was it that you accomplished? How did you accomplish it? Did you work hard to reach your goal?
16) Use your imagination and write a story about a day when you woke up and everything had shrunk! You were now a giant and everything else was tiny.
17) Use your imagination and write a story about the day your friend asked you to babysit her pet monkey. How did your day with the monkey go?
18) Write about a person you admire.
19) What is your favorite holiday/day of the year and why?
20) Write about something you are afraid of. Explain why you are fearful of it.
21) What would life be like if you lived on the moon instead of on Earth?
22) If you could be placed in the world of a television show, which one would you choose and why? Tell what you would like this particular episode to be about.
23) If you could have any animal as a pet, which animal would you pick? Why would you chose this animal, and how would you take care of it?
24) Write an alternative ending for your favorite book (or a story you are currently working with in class)
25) Write a story using all of your spelling words (or vocabulary) words for the week.