Try this elementary school activity as a fun way to combine creative writing and daylight savings time.
Daylight saving time is rapidly approaching. Here are several fun creative writing ideas for can be adapted for grades four through eight. Encourage your students to explore the ideas to their wildest imagination. Because this is a fantasy based idea there is no confides to restrict their writing especially the first one, Time Leaps Ahead.
I. Time Leaps Ahead (older)
Prompt: It’s time to move the clocks ahead one hour. But the clocks go crazy, racing ahead in time. When they finally stop you find yourself in the year _______ .
Before hand distribute four numbers to each student from 3 to 9. (No 1’s to avoid students traveling back in time).
1. Have students decide what year these four number are going to represent. For example if they draw 3, 5, 8, 3. They may choice to travel to the year 3583 or 5338 or 8533 or 3385, etc.
- Have them write the year at the top of their paper.
- Brain storm: There are several ways you may have your students list their ideas. Some things to think about:
a. what do the animals, plants look like
b. what type of transportation, communication, entertainment, houses, or food is there
c. What do the fashions look like
- Arrange idea in the order the student wants to present them in his/her paper.
a. Describe the people (fashions), then the houses, ect.
b. Maybe they want to focus on just the difference of animals or plants in a compare/contrast paper.
The next two writing prompts also focus on scheduling. The students need to keep in mind they have one hour. So for instance, to watch a two hours movie is not feasible. The activities chosen must be able to be completed in the one hour time frame.
II. Time Freezes
Prompt: When the clocks are set ahead…time freezes for an hour for everyone but you. How do you spend that hour? And why.
III. Time Repeats Itself
Prompt: Instead of the clocks moving ahead an hour they continually replay the same hour over and over. If the you could plan out an hour to relive, what would it include?
Time Travel…Freeze Time…or Replay Time
