I have a secret to tell you.
I’m not really sure I should. After all, it feels a little like a chef revealing the secret ingredient to a closely guarded family recipe, but I’m going to share it with you anyway.
As you may know, I create many writing prompts and wrote the daily writing prompts for SchoolhouseTeachers.com for over two years. That’s a lot of writing and a lot of prompts.
Where do I get my ideas? Here’s my secret: Often, I take news articles and recycle them to fit my needs.
Lost Cities
For instance, when I read that archaeologists found two lost cities deep in the Honduran jungle, my mind went to how fun it would be for young sci-fi or adventure writers to write about finding a lost city. After all, the idea of a lost civilization sparked Sir Arthur Conan Doyle to write The Lost World.
What would explorers find? Would people still live there? Why had they been hidden for so long? Were they trying to hide something of value from the rest of the world? Hmmm.
Dog fighting vs. Football
When writer Malcolm Gladwell declared that dog fighting is no different than football, I saw a great compare-and-contrast opportunity: Make a list of ways dog fighting is similar to football. Then make a list of ways dog fighting is different from football.
Octopus escapee
I have a sizeable funny bone, so when I read that an octopus almost escaped from its tank (The War of the Worlds, anyone?), I thought about what a fun writing prompt that would make: What animal would you like to see escape from a zoo or aquarium? Write about it or write a short story.
When my three children were younger, I started developing daily writing prompts for them based on interesting events, family vacations, movies, books, baking, and so forth that we’d recently experienced. Today I read what they wrote way back then, and it makes for precious reading.
More resources
If inventing writing prompts isn’t your thing, don’t worry. You can use mine! Here are the High School Prompts, and here are the Middle School Prompts. You’ll find even more on our blog.
And here is SchoolhouseTeachers.com. When you become a member for a low monthly fee, you can access all my daily writing prompts and many other exciting courses written for grades K-12.
You may be surprised to learn that there is a year’s worth of writing prompts in Jump In‘s teacher guide and in the Teacher Guide to The Power in Your Hands: Writing Nonfiction in High School. Be sure to grab your free samples while you are there!
Yours for a more vibrant homeschool,
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This article by me in The Old Schoolhouse magazine is also loaded with links to other helpful posts that will give you and your writers some welcome relief.
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