It’s almost the end of the school year. You have a few weeks left and decide to engage your students in fun writing assignments to end the year with a bang and squeeze in more writing practice. We have all the fun ideas to get your students looking forward to writing every day even through the last month of school apathy and energetic wiggles. Join us as we explore 5 fun end of the year writing ideas.
1. Would You Rather? Stories
My students have always loved a good “Would You Rather?” question. I utilized them as brain breaks, conversation starters, and awesome ways to connect and learn about each other at the beginning of the school year. I’ve even used the “Would You Rather?” videos on YouTube as fun holiday games with my middle schoolers. I love pondering them myself! Engage students in fun “Would You Rather?” questions as Daily Journal Entries. Here are some interesting ideas!
- Would you rather have the ability to fly like a bird or breathe underwater like a fish?
- Would you rather have the power to talk to animals or be able to understand any language spoken or written?
- Would you rather be able to run as fast as a cheetah or jump as high as a kangaroo?
- Would you rather have the ability to teleport anywhere instantly or be able to time travel to any point in the past or future?
- Would you rather live in a castle with a dragon or a spaceship with aliens?
- Would you rather be able to eat only your favorite food for the rest of your life or try a new food every day?
A “Would You Rather?” prompt could also become a springboard for a narrative story as well!
2. Digital Storytelling
Incorporate students’ love for technology with the opportunity to write a great story. Give students a variety of prompts to choose from and have them create a story or picture book on Canva or Google Slides. A tip we have found that motivates students is to have them ponder on their story and illustrate it first using technology. Then, based on their illustrations, they write their story.
Storybird is a website that does just that. Students choose from a variety of artwork to then craft a story centered around it. Sign up for the free trial to see if you like it. We love it! There are picture book, comic book, and long-form story options. You can even choose the option to have Storybird print your book and send it to you! This would be a great collaborative end-of-year writing project.
We also love Storyboard That for a free digital comic strip maker. Students from elementary to high school love Storyboard That.
3. Creative Writing Units
The key to students’ writing motivation centers around finding a fun, interesting, and creative writing prompt. Every year, I utilize the Superhero Writing Prompt, and every year, students are talking about this assignment in the halls and at lunchtime. I can’t take the credit for it. My sixth-grade teacher first presented my class with the prompt,
“If you were a superhero, what would be your superpower?” I remember the excitement I felt as a student pondering what I would choose and wondering if the power of invisibility or telekinesis would be most fun. I remember the boys AND girls were SUPER excited and talked about this story for weeks. We loved working on it every day and discussing it.
Bank on that same enthusiasm to help carry you through to the end of the school year with our Superhero Writing Unit.
Grab your Superhero Power today!
This unit contains everything you’ll need from prewriting graphic organizers to rough draft paper and finally superhero publishing paper and a fun superhero matching craft!
Another fun writing unit students love is our Pirate Writing Activity. Students create a narrative with a pirate as the main character. Pirates are a fun thing to learn about in May and June! It reminds me of the beach and the summertime coming soon. Create a pirate-themed week with pirate picture books, pirate history, and this writing unit!
Seize this treasure while ye can!
With tons of prewriting graphic organizers, publishing papers, and a pirate craft, students will have a swashbuckling time and “walk the plank” into a love for writing!
3. Outdoor Writing
Take advantage of the beauty of spring by taking your students outside to write. Students can write descriptive paragraphs on nature, write a story with a bird or tree as the main character, and utilize the great outdoors for inspiration. Nature can inspire poetry writing. Students can illustrate what they see outside first and then use that as a springboard for a story.
Encourage students to find a bug or animal outside and observe it. Have them use their imaginations to create an interesting story about the animal or insect they observed. Better yet! Have them write a story from the perspective of that creature. An ant might see a picnic so much differently than we do.
4. Letter Writing
A favorite activity I would always implement during the last month of school was to have students write letters to the incoming students for the next school year. I would save them and pass them out to my new students at the beginning of the year. The letters were always so interesting to read.
From students explaining my various personal quirks (like always make sure you have two sharpened pencils) to introductions about me as their teacher. (“She’s fair but fun,” was something I often heard!) Students would write helpful tips and tricks to survive that grade. They would write about fun projects and field trips the students could look forward to. The letters always turned into a time of reminiscing and were a memorable keepsake. It was always an interesting assignment that my students loved.
5. Countdown Writing
Use the enthusiasm of counting down to the last day of school and incorporate writing all at the same time! Pick a certain number of days you’ll start counting down. Maybe it’s when there’s 20 days left or 10 days left of school. Each day, students journal about a different writing prompt relating to summer.
Some examples include, “Describe your favorite summer dessert,” or “If summer had a smell, what would it be?” Students respond in paragraph entries in a journal. Make it even more interesting by writing the prompts down on little slips of paper, placing each one in a balloon, and popping a balloon each day to count down and to get the newest idea to write about.
We utilized a similar idea in our Sunflower 24-Petal Interactive Countdown to Summertime. This resource comes with an interactive sunflower in which the teacher or student pulls a petal off to count down to the last day of school. This resource also comes with 24 writing prompts, one for each day of the countdown. Or, you can use the list to give students options for a longer, end-of-year writing assignment. It also comes with a matching bulletin board to display your interactive countdown!
Grab yours today for some COUNTDOWN FUN!
Conclusion
We hope these five ideas can make writing engaging, fun, and enjoyable as school comes to a close. These activities will allow students to reflect on the school year, imagine interesting stories, and create lasting memories at the same time.
