Story Starters: Writing Prompts for Second Graders

Does your child resist putting pen to paper? Does she make up any excuse she can think of to avoid writing? With second graders, it's important to focus on ideas, rather than perfect grammar, in order to get them motivated. Instead of the mechanics of writing, concentrate on the ideas that make it sing. This activity will help jump-start your child's creative juices...without the moans and groans!

What You Need:

Index cards

Glue stick

What To Do:

Step 1: Pull out some old magazines and help your child look through them for interesting pictures. Look for pictures that provide strong visuals of characters and settings. Or, pull out pictures that catch the eye, or make you want to learn more about the story behind them.

Step 2: Ask your child to clip the selected pictures out of the magazines and glue them onto index cards (one picture to a card).

Step 3: On the back side of each card, write some question prompts, such as:

• What is happening in the picture?
   
• Where is this picture taking place--use describing words. 
   
• Who are the characters--feel free to make up names!
   
• When is this happening--time of day, year, century...
   
• Why are they doing what they are doing?
• How will they finish what they are doing?

Step 4: Look through the cards with your child and brainstorm some ideas together. Be sure to include adjectives that describe the character(s) and setting. Write these brainstorms down on a piece of paper.