Halloween is a fun time of year for students. They love talking about what their plans are; sharing costume ideas, who they are trick-or-treating with, and which candy is their favorite. Teachers who want to draw on their student’s excitement create lesson plans that focus on Halloween. The writing activities below include story ideas, themed questions, and even party planning to make writing exciting! The 24 “horror”ific Halloween writing activities and lesson plans are sure to bring excitement and anticipation to the classroom!
1. Fun and Scary Writing Prompts
These Halloween-themed writing prompts range from funny and silly to scary and spooky. Teachers can give prompts to students every day in October for kids to practice their skills. The kids will love writing stories and sharing them with their friends.
Learn more: Teacher’s Notepad
2. Halloween Grammar Blast
Grammar is a part of any English classroom, so why not make it fun and engaging with Halloween-themed sentences? Students will correct Halloween-themed sentences with errors like fragments, run-ons, and comma splices.
Learn more: Real Cool English
3. Halloween Mad Libs
Mad Libs are a great way to help students practice their parts of speech and creative thinking. Students will insert random words that fit the required part of speech in the blanks. We can guarantee they’ll love reading their crazy stories once complete!
Learn more: Happiness is Homemade
4. Halloween Story Mat
Story mats help students organize their ideas and thinking. The story mat has different options for each part of a plot that the students get to choose from. The story mat helps students get started on stories by offering choices for each plot point. Story mats are a great tool to help reluctant writers get started.
Learn more: Peterson’s Pad
5. Story Starters
Story starters help students with a “jumping off” point for their creative thinking. These story starters are Halloween-themed and help reluctant writers get started.
Learn more: Education.com
6. Story Grid
Another great way to help students with story ideas is to use a story grid as it offers several different ideas to include in a story. This Halloween story grid includes themed ideas for both scenes and characters and is sure to help your learners get started.
Learn more: Pitner’s Potpourri
7. Haiku Hauntings
This haiku resource is great for any grade level. Students will write a Halloween-themed haiku. They will write 3 lines; with 5 syllables in the 1st and 3rd lines, and 7 syllables in the 2nd line. They can write about ghosts, haunted houses, or their Halloween costumes.
Learn more: Student Treasures
8. Class Spooky Storybook
This spooky writing activity is fun for the whole class. There are numerous ways your class can write a story- each student can take a page, small groups can work on a specific part of the story, or the class can all work together. Your class will love showing off their creative writing skills as they create a collaborative storybook.
Learn more: Student Treasures
9. Halloween Concrete Poem
This descriptive writing task is a fun writing activity and the perfect resource for Halloween! A concrete poem is written in a particular shape to reflect the given topic. Students can write a poem in the shape of a jack-o-lantern, a friendly ghost, or even a witch!
Learn more: Tech 4 Learning
10. Halloween “How-Tos”
Teaching students about different writing formats is important as they reach high school. Students will choose a Halloween-related topic, such as how to decorate their house, and will then write the instructions in a sequential paragraph.
Learn more: Tech 4 Learning
11. Opinion Essay
Students love to share their opinions. Challenge them to write an opinion essay that is Halloween-themed. For example; writing about which haunted house is the spookiest, who has the best Halloween decorations, or which Halloween candy is the best.
Learn more: The Mountain Teacher
12. Monster Menu
Have your students write a monster menu after discussing what a monster might eat. They can add reasons as to why the monster would eat a particular food in order to add the dish to the menu.
Learn more: The Primary Planet
13. Haunted House For Sale!
This is such a fun writing idea that reviews the entire writing process and engages hesitant writers. First, have learners design a spooky-looking house before going on to piece together an advertisement to sell their house.
Learn more: Jodi Durgin
14. Pumpkin Perspectives
This creative writing activity requires students to write from the perspective of a pumpkin. The goal is to persuade a human which pumpkin to choose in order to carve!
Learn more: Lessons A to Z
15. Mummy Writing
After teaching and learning about mummies, students will write an informative essay about mummies. They have to include an introduction, three key details about mummies, and a conclusion. Once finished, learners will edit their work using a self-check rubric.
Learn more: The Applicious Teacher
16. Sensory Halloween Chart
This 5 senses activity is great for lower elementary students. They will think about what they see, hear, and feel inside a haunted house. Then, they will use sentence frames to help describe the haunted house. This is a great writing activity for lower elementary students.
Learn more: Proud to be Primary
17. Vocabulary Picture Cards
This fun prep resource is for kindergarten or preschool students. Teachers can use Halloween-themed vocabulary words to teach kids how to use the words and how to write them. They can use the picture cards in a story flip book with line writing paper as well.
Learn more: The Kindergarten Connection
18. Halloween Narrative
In this activity, students will write a narrative about their best Halloween ever. Teachers can provide daily writing prompts to help scaffold learning in order to create the final narrative. Graphic organizers are also helpful.
Learn more: Read, Write, Think
19. 5 Word Horror Stories
If you’re looking for a quick, engaging, yet rigorous writing activity, then this is the lesson for you! This activity has students write a horror story using only five words. Have kids share their finished stories with the class or put them up on a bulletin board.
Learn more: The Secondary English Coffee Shop
20. Create a Monster
After reading a monster book with the class, teachers can get students to make their very own monsters! They can create their monster using assorted cardstock and other decorative elements before writing a descriptive paragraph about it.
Learn more: Firstieland
21. Crumpled Pumpkin
Each student will begin with a story starter. Once students have written a few sentences, have them crumple their paper into a ball and toss it to the front of the classroom. Students will all then pick a new crumpled pumpkin and continue the story!
Learn more: Presto Plans
22. Plan a Halloween Party
This is a project-based learning activity that students will love. They will complete several steps to plan a Halloween Party; including thinking about invitations, types of food, and decorations. Kids can also decide if it’s a costume party or if there will be a costume contest!
Learn more: The Tahoe Teacher
23. Stellaluna Bat Activity
After reading Stellaluna, kids will complete the bat writing template. They will include the story plot on the bat to summarize the beginning, middle, and end of the read-aloud.
Learn more: Unique Teaching Resources
24. Little Devil Craftivity
This cute writing activity and craft pose an interesting question: What Halloween prank would you pull? This encourages kids to think creatively and then logically explain their thoughts. They have to explain their prank as well as explain why they have picked it.
Learn more: The Purple Pumpkin Blog
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