Narrative Writing Prompts for Elementary ELA

Your students love to tell stories! Think about Monday morning. How many of your students want to tell stories about their weekends? Helping your students share their stories through the writing process is so powerful. These narrative writing prompts for elementary ELA make it easy for your students to write their own stories even if they are participating in distance learning. Try these narrative writing activities in your own elementary ELA classroom.

Fiction Stories

When your students think of stories, they’re often fiction. Students love to share make believe stories just as much as stories from their own lives. They may want to start their own stories with “once upon a time” or talking animals, for example! I love these narrative writing prompts to help students create their own stories from prompts, like this one.

Write a story that begins with this sentence, “Once upon a time there were three kangaroos.” Through the digital narrative writing prompts on Google Slides, your students can brainstorm the problems the kangaroos encounter to develop their ideas into a paragraph long story.

Try another simple narrative writing prompt about an alien invasion. Allow your students to share their own stories during in-person or distance learning classes.

Nonfiction Narratives

Narrative does not necessarily mean make believe. Teaching your students to write their own autobiographical stories through narrative writing is one way students gain hands-on learning through their own eyes!

Think about a time when an ordinary experience had a lasting impact on your life. Encourage your students to share a story about a small moment in their life that turned into a joyous occasion! This is a great lesson for students to show that amazing stories can come from everyday moments like spending time with family or cooking a meal. 

Another nonfiction prompt I love sharing with students is telling the story of how they met their best friend or a moment they have shared together. You can differentiate this activity by allowing students to write about any friend (if they say they don’t have a best friend) or a family member.

Collaborative Stories

Google Slides allows students to share and collaborate with one another. You can make any of these digital narrative writing prompts collaborative by sharing the slides to Google Classroom and giving small groups editing capability. Simply post as each student can edit the document or slide presentation then assign the slides to certain students in the class. You may also have one student share their copy with their partner or group members. Fiction stories typically work best for the collaborative digital writing prompts. 

These narrative writing activities for elementary ELA will have your students excited about learning and sharing their own stories! From imaginary animals and alien invasions to stories of everyday moments with friends and family, your students will work through the writing process to demonstrate narrative writing standards. 

Each prompt will take students through the full writing process and include the following:

• Student-friendly slides with ready-to-type text boxes

• Brainstorming Section

• Rough Draft and Planning sections

• Editing and Revising checklists

• Final Draft slide

Get started using these digital narrative writing prompts in your elementary English classroom as stations, independent learning, writing lessons, or collaborative team work. 

In addition to narrative prompt ideas, head on over to also read all about informative writing activities for elementary ELA!

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