Surprising Ways Creative Writing Can Help Your Child Learn

July 18, 2023 byElizabeth Preston

6 min to read

Student studying in a blue plaid shirt taking notes while taking an online class in creative writing.

Much of writing in a student’s education is focused on the traditional essay format. And while essays are an effective teaching tool, did you know that creative writing can also teach students about writing, the world, and themselves as well as help them to fall in love with writing and reading? Here are some surprising ways creative writing can help your child learn, as well as some creative writing ideas for kids.

What is Creative Writing?

Creative writing “is a form of artistic expression” in which the writer uses their imagination to express some meaning. It can be nonfiction such as a memoir or personal essay, or fiction such as a novel or short story. Some other forms of creative writing include poems, journals, song lyrics, scripts, flash fiction, short stories, and illustrated narratives such as comics and graphic novels.

What is Creative Writing Learning?

Creative writing learning can involve a student studying the elements of creative writing, including voice, characters, point of view, and setting. In fact, learning and mastering those elements are great creative writing learning goals for students. Creative writing learning can also include students crafting their own creative stories or reading and analyzing creative writing texts or handbooks.

Reading creative writing can be particularly enlightening for students as they not only see different writing elements in action, but they can also explore worlds, cultures, and time periods they otherwise would not have access to. Thus, reading creative writing can help to expand students’ understanding of the world. This is a great way to include more diversity in a student’s education.

Benefits of Creative Writing for Kids

Developing Linguistic Intelligence

Creative writing can help students develop their linguistic intelligence, which is the ability “to understand and use spoken and written language.” Students with high linguistic intelligence tend to enjoy learning new vocabulary, telling stories, learning new languages, reading, and writing.

Exploring Empathy

Creative writing also exercises students’ empathy skills since it requires students to think about their characters’ emotions, motivations, and thoughts. This may also translate into students being able to better understand and vocalize their own feelings and thoughts, thereby deepening their self-awareness. Some research finds that creative writing’s connection to emotions and empathy may increase a person’s physical health and emotional well-being as well.

Improving Problem-Solving Skills

Additionally, creative writing encourages students to be imaginative problem solvers and creative thinkers since most stories should have a problem that must be solved or a conflict that must be resolved. Students can be as realistic or outlandish as they want in how the stories’ problems are solved, because the solutions are not necessarily bound by this world’s rules (although they can be if the student chooses).

Becoming More Confident with Language

Creative writing also encourages students to learn about language, because they must experiment with words, sentence structures, and grammar to achieve different effects in their writing. Indeed, creative writing is an effective way to encourage students to learn about grammar so that they can learn when and how to break grammatical rules for stylistic effects. This may, in turn, encourage students to read deeply into some of their favorite books or explore new books so that they can see how to create different characters, settings, dialog, action moments, and dramatic effects in their writing.

Creative Writing Ideas for Kids

While having your student write a short story is a great way to introduce them to creative writing, there are other methods by which students can creatively write. Here are five creative writing ideas for kids.

Journaling

Journaling is when your student writes down their thoughts and feelings. It’s a self-reflective exercise that can help them sort through their emotions and experiences. Journaling can be centered around a given prompt, or it can be completely free with no boundaries regarding the topic. It can be timed, or it can last as long as the student needs. Grammar should not be a concern when journaling, thereby releasing any pressure a student may feel that could limit their writing flow. Find some journaling prompts for students here.

Poetry

Poetry is an excellent format for students to play with structure and words. For example, haiku is an understandable form of poetry for young students to read and imitate.

Learning Coaches may consider having more academically advanced students read classic poems, analyze them both in terms of their meanings and uses of language, and write their own poems in similar structures to the ones they read.

Lyrics

Lyrics are akin to poetry in many ways; they encourage students to engage with structure as well as experiment with the sound and rhythm of words.

Try asking your student to create new lyrics to one of their favorite songs or to a classic nursery rhyme.

Illustrated Narrative

Illustrated narratives, such as comics and graphic novels, are great for helping students “hear” and understand dialog. They are also beneficial for teaching students concision since there is often only a small space for written material.

Parents and Learning Coaches can help students create their own illustrated narratives by having students draw a comic complete with dialog bubbles that speaks to a given prompt. The prompt can be something simple such as, “How did your morning routine go?” to something more fun, such as, “What would your pet say and do if they were a superhero?”

Script

Writing a script is a rewarding way to encourage reluctant writers to have fun with writing since scripts mesh the world of the stage and screen with writing. Writing a script helps students learn to use powerful verbs and be more precise and descriptive with their writing.

One way to get students to try screenwriting is to ask your student to rewrite the ending to a movie that they watched. Another fun way to get your student screenwriting is to have them choose a few of their toys and play with them for a while. Then, ask your student to write down the story that they just played out, including what each toy “said” during the play session.

There are numerous ways to get students into creative writing, and there are several benefits to students writing creatively. However, perhaps the best benefit of creative writing learning is that it encourages students to have fun with writing. They get to be playful and imaginative with words and are not necessarily bound by strict rules. By showing students how they can have fun and feel free with writing, parents and Learning Coaches can help their students to enjoy their education and even develop a love for writing.