Writing Prompts for Secondary Students

Helping your students learn how to effectively respond to writing prompts is an important step in their development as competent writers. Spontaneous written responses require students to adapt the writing process to an immediate situation. This skill needs to be taught and reinforced through regular practice. To effectively assign or develop writing prompts, it is important to assess the students’ readiness for such a task and to create prompts that meet your assignment goals.

1. Goal: Assess student writing skills or prepare students for statewide assessment Instruct your students how to read a prompt carefully, noting what it requests. Practice reading prompts as a class and decode them together. Teach what the prompt requires in response:
   • Narrative prompts – focus on topic, introduction, logical action sequence, conclusion, descriptive details.
   • Expository prompts – focus on topic, introduction, logical sequencing of ideas, detailed supporting information, conclusion.
   • Persuasive prompts – clear thesis, strong supporting evidence, counter possible arguments, conclusion that restates thesis and/or calls to action.

2. Goal: Encourage ongoing thinking and processing as a part of student learning. Use quick-write prompts after instruction to promote reflection or organize thinking about responding to prompts:
   • What is something important you learned today?
   • What do you think are the 3 most important points?
   • What would you like to know more about?
   • What do you enjoy/not enjoy about this topic?
   • What do you not understand?

3. Goal: Assess newly acquired knowledge in content areas
   • Assign prompts which spark students’ imaginations about material recently covered, yet demand recently learned information.
   • Use prompts from different genres (narrative, expository, persuasive) and allow students to choose a different genre each time.

When assigning any prompt, beware of the following:

• Expecting prior knowledge about specific subject matter
• Requiring students to write about sensitive issues including religion and loss
• Assuming all students have had the same experiences
• Writing a prompt longer than two or three sentences
• Giving too many suggestions or not enough

When designing your own prompts, write a prompt that is:

• Specific and immediately relevant
• Interesting to students
• Related to all students’ experience
• Clear in purpose, expectations and criteria
• Written using age-appropriate vocabulary

Sources:

Albertson, Bonnie. Delaware Writing Project, 1999 http://www. nwrel.org/eval/writing/DEPrompts.pdf
6 + 1 Trait® Writing - Trait Prompts, Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory, http://www.nwrel.org/assessment/prompts.php?odelay=2&d=1&prompt=1

visit other tips for writing prompts: