Writer’s block. Everybody’s been there. Especially students who don’t like to write.
Writing Workshop in school can be a very difficult part of a student’s day. Some kids take naturally to the task of putting their thoughts to paper, but there are many who struggle. The hardest part is often getting ideas down in the first place. Blank pages, whether a piece of paper or a word processing document, can be extremely intimidating, and even starting to plan or come up with ideas can stump students. Many people can’t get past that empty white space.
But think: the human brain is amazing.
The brain can associate events, people, and concepts with a blend of imagery, sounds, emotions, descriptive words, tastes, impressions, and more. Processing all that information and then synthesizing it into just words is challenging. Help young writers get past that blankness with a visual story starter or creative writing prompt! Storyboard That will help students get the words flowing and the ideas blossoming!
A story starter or writing prompt is a sentence or two that gives the writer an idea of what to write about. It could be a question, a starting scene, a picture, or many thing combined. The idea is to give writers a starting off point, so that they don’t have to think of a writing topic from scratch.
Storyboard That has come up with a variety of story starters or daily writing prompts to help people get thinking about narratives. Storytelling is a part of everyone’s daily life, and we want more people to feel confident in telling all of their stories. Our starters are single cells comprised of various scenes, characters, and items. Many of them are intended to be ambiguous, strange, or indicative of an upcoming change. The story starter could be just a picture of a character in a scene, and sometimes there is a lot of action involved.
The point of these picture prompts for creative writing is to get you thinking, NOT necessarily to get you to write a story about the specific image. The person who created the image may have been thinking one thing when making it, and the person responding to the image could have a completely different reaction. In fact, the story starter may lead to a seemingly unrelated story, and that is A-OK.
Here’s a picture. Let’s write about it.
Sometimes simple and interesting writing prompts are all somebody needs. However, struggling writers may need a little extra help in getting started. One way to get somebody thinking is to ask questions (thanks, Socrates). Focus questions around different parts of the story starter.
Identify characters, if any. Give them names. How are characters related? Do physical characteristics, including age, clothing, appearance, and pose indicate anything to you? What are the background stories of the characters?
Identify setting, if any. Where is this? When is this? How did the characters/objects get there? Why are the characters/objects there? Where are they going? Is there something odd about the characters or objects in this particular setting?
Identify action, if any. What is happening? What JUST happened? What is about to happen? What would (or could) happen if everything stayed the same or continued on the same course?
Identify mood or emotional feel, if any. Is the setting or situation happy, spooky, sad, confusing, uncomfortable, funny? What is normal in this situation or setting? What emotions do the characters feel? Why do they feel that way? What would they do next because they feel that way? What are they thinking?
Identify items, if any. What are these things? Do they belong there? What’s missing? What are the items for? How are the items being used? What other items could be added and why?
In the process of thinking about and answering these questions, new ideas could spring up from anywhere! Associations from a single image or question may take your writers on an incredible journey in multiple directions. Let students be creative, and guide them when they need it! Create your own story starters using Storyboard That.
The ability to write creatively has many benefits. A few of the benefits are listed below.
Not only does creative writing have many benefits when it comes to strengthening our brain and skills, it is also a lot of fun!
Need some creative writing ideas for the classroom? Storyboard That has got you covered. Check out our ideas for all ages below, and don’t forget to storyboard your ideas and your story for an extra element of creativity and engagement!
Our former teachers have put together a list of interesting writing prompts for all ages. We understand that writing prompts for college students’ creative writing differs greatly from creative writing prompts for kids, so we have broken up our ideas into subcategories to help you get started. The best creative writing prompts and visual prompts for creative writing are open to interpretation and provide enough information to get started, while allowing lots of room for creative freedom.
Good writing prompts for the younger age group can vary depending on grade. For example, your kindergarten through second grade students would benefit from story starters that just contain pictures, or simple writing prompts that do not require much comprehension. The upper elementary students are becoming more technologically savvy, and may prefer online writing prompts that they can search for themselves and work on digitally. Here are some ideas to help make creative writing for students fun and engaging
The middle school years are when children are coming into their own, figuring out who they are, and finding their voices. Good creative writing prompts for middle school students should focus on things that pre-teens and teens are interested in and can relate to.
As students enter high school, they tend to focus more on writing reports, essays, and creative writing may not be as interesting to them or prevalent in the classroom. Here are some unique writing prompts examples that appeal to older students.
Guess what? Story starters and writing prompts are fun for adults too! Although adults are busy, daily creative writing prompts could be a fun way to start the day. Don’t have time? We’ve got some short creative writing prompts for adults on hand as well.
Creative writing for adults can be fun! Enjoy!
Social and emotional learning, or SEL, is a very important part of a child’s education. It teaches children self-management, self-awareness, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision making skills. Social and emotional learning can be difficult to teach in school, as it deals with feelings, emotions, and sometimes difficult topics. Reading picture books about these topics makes discussions less intimidating, and writing about these issues can help as well. One way to get students thinking about social and emotional topics is to have them write. Here are some useful suggestions to help get the ideas churning.
Try adding these picture prompts for creative writing to your day!
Simply copy the storyboard and use it as a template in an assignment for your students! The best part? You can change our pictures and templates to suit the interests of your students, or simply leave them as is!
Storyboard That also offers several print options if you want to take our writing prompts offline! You can use these story starters or have students make their own. One cell is all you need! Then, when you go to print, select one cell per page and you will see these many options including lines for writing and name and date at the top! This is a great activity for a creative writing station, soft starts in the morning or choice time in the afternoon. Teachers could even combine every students storyboard into a giant creative writing prompts packet for students to work on throughout the year.
Story cubes are great for helping students come up with awesome stories. They can roll characters, props, weather, scenes, and more, and craft stories out of their results! Create your own story cubes or have your students create some to share with their classmates for collaborative storytelling!
A great next step to take for a struggling writer is to storyboard first! If writing/typing the words is too much of a challenge, show what happens next with images. Create a narrative in three or six cells to get the basic idea ready, then flesh out the idea in text!
Creative writing prompts for middle school students should focus on things that kids of their age can relate to. Some examples of things that interest middle schoolers are: friends, family, movies, social media, sports, traveling, and music.
A story starter is anything that aids the writer in beginning their creative story. A story starter could be a picture or words, simple or action packed, silly, ambiguous, or serious.
1. Create your own brand new holiday. Tell a story about how that holiday began.
2. Write a story about two sisters who travel back in time.
3. You wake up one morning and your dog starts talking to you. What happens next?