32+ Letter Writing Prompts: Creative & Persuasive Letter Prompts

Did you know that letter writing has risen in popularity over the recent years? In fact, in the year 2017 to 2018 over 36% of children said that they enjoy writing letters in their free time. While in 2011 this percentage was as low as 28%. It’s not a drastic increase, but it’s definitely a clear increase! So to support this continued rise in interest for letter writing, we have come up with over 32 letter writing prompts to encourage lower and middle school children to write more letters in their spare time. 

Our list of letter prompts covers everything from elementary school prompts to middle school letter-writing ideas, as well as persuasive letter writing ideas.  See our post on 150 writing prompts for middle school students for more writing ideas.

32+ Creative Letter Writing Prompts

Over 32 letter writing prompts for students in the 1st grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade to even 6th graders:

1. Favourite things: Write a letter to your pen pal asking them about their favourite things. Start by asking them about their favourite colour, food, animal and favourite subject at school. Then you can talk about your own favourite things.
2. Distant Relative: Write a letter to a distant relative (someone you haven’t seen in a while). In this letter, you can talk about the things you miss about them and also the things they are missing out on here at home. 
3. Fan Mail: Write a letter to your favourite celebrity. What would you ask this celebrity? Is there anything you would like to share with them? What do you like most about them?
4. Future Self: Write a letter to yourself in 5 years time. What would you tell your older self? What things would you want them to remember from the past?
5. Thank an everyday hero: Think about someone that inspires you. This could be a teacher, nurse, doctor, policeman and so on. Write a note to them thanking them for the service they provide every day.
6. Write to your favourite superhero: Superman, Wonder Woman, Captain America, Spiderman – Whoever your favourite superhero is, write an imaginary letter to them. You can talk about their superpowers, a recent battle they might have had, their arch-nemesis or anything else!
7. Lesson Learned: Think about something that you have recently learned and who you learned this from. Can you write a letter to thank them for teaching you this amazing new lesson?
8. See you later Letter: It’s the last day of school. Write a ‘see you later’ letter to your friends which you might not see over the holidays. 
9. Goodbye Letter: You’re leaving a long adventure and you don’t know when you’ll be back. Write a goodbye letter to your loved ones and friends telling them that you’ll miss them and about the adventure you have planned. 
10. Old Memories: Think about your favourite past memories. Who are these memories with? Write a letter to this person talking about your favourite moments from this memory. 
11. Weather forecast alert: Write a letter to someone in another country describing the weather where you are right now.
12. Cheer them up: Write a letter to cheer someone up who is sad. You could include a funny story or joke in this letter.
13. The first time we met: Think about the first time you met your friend. Write a letter to them reminding them of this time. 
14. Letter to Grandparents: Write a letter to your grandparents, asking them about the old times. What was school like for them? What kind of games did they play when they were young? 
15. Birthday Party invites: Write a letter inviting someone to a birthday party that you’re having. Talk about the party theme, food, music and don’t forget to include the time and location.
16. Apology letter: Have you hurt anyone’s feelings recently? Write them an apology letter to tell them how sorry you are. 
17. Letter to Santa: Write a letter to Santa, telling him that you have been good with examples. Don’t forget to include a wish list!
18. Alien Invasion Response: Aliens are coming to invade Earth! Send them a letter to convince them to stop invading Earth.
19. Letter of complaint: Imagine you recently went to a restaurant and the food was bad. Now write a letter of complaint to the owner of that restaurant. In this letter, you can give them ideas of how they can improve their food and service. 
20. Letter to publication: Do you have a favourite magazine that you read? Write a letter to your favourite publication telling them how good their recent issue was.
21. Letter to your mayor/council: Write a formal letter to the mayor of your town, telling them how to improve your town. You can talk about the issues in your town and how these can be fixed. 
22. Trapped on an island: Imagine you are trapped on an island in the middle of nowhere. Write a message in a bottle to someone. This can be an SOS message, a message telling others how good your life is now or how bad it is. What message would you want people to find?
23. People of the future: Write a letter to the people of the future in 100 years time. What things would you want them to know about your life?
24. Secret Admirer: This one is a good Valentine’s Day writing activity. Write an anonymous letter to someone you like, telling them everything you like about them. 
25. Letter to an object: Write a letter to an inanimate object in your room, like a pencil or a chair. What would ask this object?
26. New stuff: Write a letter about something new you got recently. You can start the letter by saying, “Today I got…”
27. Deforestation: You just found out that a new company is building its headquarters in your town. To build this new building they will have to destroy the local forest. Send a letter to your local mayor stating your opinion. Take a look at these endangered species writing activities for more environmental fun.
28. The Job Application: Write a letter to a company that you want to work for in the future. Tell them why you would make a good worker and why they should hire you.
29. Animal Testing: You recently found out that a local beauty company is using animals like monkeys and dogs to test their new range of make-up. Write a letter to this company telling them why this is unethical or bad.
30. Homework and more homework: Write a letter to your teacher telling them of your opinion on homework. Do you think homework should be banned? Why or why not? 
31. Animal Letter writing: Imagine if animals could write. Choose an animal of your choice and write a letter to them. What have you always wanted to ask your chosen animal? This DIY animal envelope tutorial could be a fun idea here. 
32. Fairytale letters: We’re sure that everyone has read a fairytale. Pick a fairytale character of your choice and write a letter to them. This could be Cinderella, one of the seven dwarves or even the big bad wolf.
33. Dear Mom Letter: Write a dear mom letter to your mom! You can start with the following sentence: I love this picture of you… Check this post for more ‘Dear Mom’ Letter prompts.

What do you think of these creative letter-writing prompts? Let us know in the comments and you can even share your letters with us too!