Spring Writing Prompts

School isn’t out yet, and if you find your students are having a hard time focusing, particularly on writing, we have some prompts that will help. Writing prompts are a great way to get those minds working. Here’s some spring themed writing prompts to keep students writing.

1.      The trees, grass, and plants are all waking up from winter. Write about their feelings about this. Are they happy to be awake? Would they rather keep sleeping? What does the new season feel like?

2.      April showers bring May flowers, but what if those showers didn’t stop? Write a story about a world where it never stops raining. What happens? How do people live?

3.      It’s the time for gardens to start being planted. Write about the biggest garden you can imagine.

4.      Spring means warmer temperatures, which means you can finally spend more time outside. What are your favorite things to do outdoors in spring?

5.      Now that winter is over, birds are migrating back. Tell the story of a bird making the journey home, and what awaits them there.

6.      When it rains we can stay warm in our homes, but animals live outside. Tell the story of an animal that tries to stay dry in the rain. How do they do it?

7.      Spring is a time of growth. How have you grown over the past year?

8.      If you could only live in one season year round, which would it be? You would still have school and holidays, but the weather would always be the same as it is in either spring, summer, fall, or winter.

9.      It’s the time for spring cleaning. Does your family participate in spring cleaning? What do you think you could do to help?

10.   Did you know that bees are the reason we have flowers and vegetables? Write about a world with no bees.

Keep Kids Writing all Summer

We all know that writing is an incredibly important skill that is needed not just during school, but throughout our entire lives. That’s why it is important for you to encourage your kids to keep writing all summer to keep their skills from getting rusty. But this isn’t always easy. We’ve put together some writing ideas to keep kids writing all summer, and not only that, but to make them excited to write all summer.

One of the most basic ways to keep kids writing is to have them keep a journal. Writing a journal will not only keep kids writing, but it will give them something to look back on years later. It cements memories, and plenty of kids are already interested in keeping a journal. Make it fun. Take them out to pick up a nice notebook for their summer journaling. They may even choose to keep up the habit when school has started.

Another fun way to encourage writing over the summer is to have kids keep a nature journal. Not only will this keep them writing, it will force them to make observations and document data. Kids may keep track of flowers, record observations about a vegetable garden, track animal patterns, and more!

Have your kids write reviews for things they do over the summer. Reviewing allows children to express their opinion, which they can pass on to friends and family members. Almost anything can be reviewed; museums, movies, the zoo, restaurants, ice cream shops…let them go wild! Assemble all the reviews in a folder that can be referenced when making future plans!

If your kids don’t love the idea of putting pen to paper, what about fingers to keyboard? Have them set up a blog where they can write about whatever they want to the public. Kids will love seeing their writing online. This could be a personal daily journal or a blog focused on their interests. Maybe your kid loves geek culture and wants to write posts about that. Or maybe they like cooking and want to make a cooking blog. Put no restrictions and let them have fun!

Encourage your kids to take a stab at fiction by writing a book. Technically speaking, a novel is 50,000 words or more. Your child’s story doesn’t have to be that long, but it should be just that…a story with characters, setting, and a plot. Once your kid is done you can bind the pages together to turn it into a book format. This could really encourage young authors!

If a book seems like a bit too much, which requires original characters and settings, why not suggest fanfiction? Fanfiction is prose that is written based on characters and locations that already exist in the fiction world. Say for instance, that your child is a big fan of Harry Potter. Your kid can take their favorite character and make up a story about them. What does Hermione do during her summer vacation back in the muggle world? What is it like for Draco Malfoy back home? What happens to Harry Potter after the last book? This type of writing can be applied to just about anything; Disney, Avengers, Star Wars…the possibilities are endless. This allows your kids to write about something they are already passionate about.

For kids who are particularly resistant, suggest they create their own comic book. While this involves more drawing than writing, it still forces your kids to consider plots and characters, and write some dialogue!

There’s tons of writing options for kids, and it is likely you’ll be able to make at least one of these stick. Who knows, it may even be the start of a new passion for your child!