A Fun Descriptive Writing Prompt for 3rd, 4th, and 5th Grade
This idea is straightforward. Students secretly draw an image, describe it, and then have the rest of their peers figure out which drawing is theirs based on the description.
For example, you could have each upper elementary student secretly draw a monster before writing a descriptive essay describing their monster. When the essays are completed, display all of the different monsters and have students read their descriptions to the class. If the students described their monsters in a detailed way, their peers should be able to figure out which monster is theirs!
Creating and describing a monster is a fun writing activity for Halloween, but you can adapt this for any time of year or almost any topic! For example, in the winter, you could have students draw and describe a snowman.
If your students are experienced with using interesting words, organizing their writing, and walking through the writing process, then this activity can literally be done with just a blank sheet of paper!
If your upper elementary students would benefit from a little more structure and scaffolding in their descriptive writing, then my no prep descriptive writing resources will help them improve their writing. I have one for:
Descriptive Writing Mini Lesson Ideas to Support This Activity
This descriptive writing activity lends itself well to all sorts of writing mini-lessons - and my no prep monster descriptive writing, snowman descriptive writing, and alien descriptive writing resources each come with 3 no prep mini lessons that will help set your students up for success when they begin their writing project!
- Thinking about interesting word choice and adding similes to their writing (extra figurative language practice is always helpful!)
- Thinking about staying on topic and how to organize paragraphs
- Assessing the word choice, organization, and conventions of already-written paragraphs.
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