24 Journal Prompts for Creative Writing in the Elementary Classroom

Many elementary teachers feel stuck when they first implement journaling into their classroom routine. They want their students to produce high-quality writing but struggle to come up with engaging topics to stimulate deep thinking.

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Writing Prompts for Elementary School Students

By Janelle Cox

Don't fall into the trap of telling your students to write about whatever they want when they journal. This will result in wasted time generating topics and unfocused writing. Well-chosen journal prompts yield productive creative writing and make a teacher's life easier. Get started with these journal topics.

Journal Prompts for the Classroom

These 24 journal prompts are teacher-tested and sure to inspire your students to do their best writing. Use these to begin your journaling routine and find out what topics your students most enjoy writing about.

1. What is your favorite season? Describe how you feel during that time of year.
2. What people in your life inspire you and why?
3. Write about your favorite and least favorite subject in school and explain your reasoning.
4. What do you want to be when you grow up? Try to describe at least three jobs that you think you would enjoy and be good at.
5. What is your favorite holiday to celebrate with your family and what traditions do you share?
6. What qualities do you look for in a friend? Explain how you make sure you are a good friend.
7. When is the last time you apologized for something you did? Describe how apologizing felt.
8. Use sensory detail (sight, smell, hearing, touch, and taste) to describe what you do each day when you come home from school.
9. If you could design a whole day to do anything you wanted, what would you choose to do and who would be with you?
10. If you could choose one superpower to have for a day, what would it be and how would you use your power?
11. Do you think children should be told when to go to bed? Explain what you think would be a fair bedtime and why.
12. Write about what it would be like to switch places with someone in your life (parent, sibling, grandparent, neighbor, teacher, etc.). Describe the biggest differences.
13. If you could go back in time to fix a big mistake you made but it would cause you to make a different mistake, would you fix the big one? Why or why not.
14. If you could choose one age and stay that age forever, what would you choose? Describe why this is the perfect age to be.
15. What historical event do you wish that you could've seen for yourself and why?
16. Write about what you do on the weekends. How do your weekends differ from your weekdays?
17. What are your favorite and least favorite foods? Try to describe what they taste like to someone that's never had them.
18. What unusual animal do you think would make a better pet than a dog? Explain why.
19. What cheers you up when you are feeling sad? Describe in detail.
20. Describe your favorite game (board game, sport, video game, etc.). What do you like about it?
21. Write a story about the time you turned invisible.
22. What do you wonder about what it's like to be an adult?
23. What is a skill you have that you are most proud of? Why does it make you proud and how did you learn it?
24. Imagine that you went to school and there were no teachers! Talk about what that day would be like.