Most young kids love to spin an imaginative tale, but they’re often shy and unsure about getting words on a page. Fun and simple creative writing activities are a wonderful way to encourage your students to jot down their story ideas—and also strengthen their writing muscles.

Here are 5 creative writing activities to help turn your students into young authors.

1 ) Goofy Lists

Writing lists is a fun and easy way to spark the imagination! Give your students some goofy list titles and watch their creative ideas unfold.

Try these list titles:

1. 13 items I would pack to Antarctica
2. 12 things I would ask an animal if they could talk back
3. 7 ways to eat a potato
4. 16 items on a robot’s shopping list
5. 10 inventions I want to see in the future
6. 21 things you should NOT eat for lunch

2 ) Creativity Cans

Grab an old soup can, and make it into a “creativity can!” Dress it up with a label, glitter, and pom-poms. Then, add slips of paper inside with playful and unusual nouns.

Ask students to grab three slips of paper from the can. Invite them to create a story using those three nouns.

Give them this starting prompt: “Let me tell you a story about a _______, _______, and _______.”

Creativity Can Nouns
penguin, waffle, cactus, rainbow, pickle, robot, castle, toaster, gumdrop, bagel, rabbit, fox, octopus, crayon, sailboat, poodle, printer, snowflake, teacup, jellybean, clock, mirror, sloth, tuba, scooter, turtle

 

3 ) Meet Me! Acrostic Poem

An acrostic poem is a poem where the first letter of every line spells a word vertically. This “Meet Me!” acrostic poem is a simple way to encourage students to write a poem about themselves.

Ask students to write their name vertically down a page. Then, invite them to write a word or phrase that tells something about them for each letter of their name.

An example poem:

• Meet Me!
  
  • P ancakes. Blueberry pancakes are my favorite snack.
  • A ustin. This is where I was born!
  • T urtles. I have a pet turtle named Izzy.

Use these questions to help your students brainstorm ideas for their poem:

1. What is your favorite sport?
2. What is your favorite snack?
3. What is your favorite place to be?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. What is your favorite ice cream flavor?

You can use our free worksheet to get started.

4) Picture Prompts

Show your students some picture prompts. Ask them to imagine and write about what they think happened next in each picture.

You can also encourage them to create backstories for the “characters” in each photo:

 

5) Adjective Walk

Take your students on an “adjective walk!” Download our free printables from Writing Fabulous Sentences & Paragraphs, Grades 1-3, and teach your students about the power of adjectives. Click here for Free Printables.

Head on a stroll. Spend some time outside and somewhere with smelly (and tasty) foods. The goal for your students is to write down interesting and creative adjectives that help describe what they see, hear, smell, and taste on their “adjective walk.”

Ask your students to write and draw:

• What You See
• What You Hear
• What You Smell
• What You Taste

When you return from your walk, encourage your students to write a short story that uses one or more of their adjectives.

Try these prompts to get their stories started:

• “It all started in a/an [adjective] place…”
• “I first smelt the [adjective] food on a Tuesday…”

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