Middle School Creative Writing Responses

I teach middle school creative writing, and one of our current projects is to write a fantasy story about a group of adventurers, who lose their memories and have to find them. This idea came from a prompt I found online, and I thought it was a great starting place for generation of story ideas.<br><br>Here are some of the ideas my students came up with:<br><br>Because the story is about a group of adventurers, the students were allowed to choose who the members of the group would be. Here are some of my favorites:<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>*2 humans, 2 half-elves, 2 gnomes, 1 halfling, and 1 dragon*<br><br>*2 gnomes, 1 zombie, 2 shadow dragons*<br><br>*1 dragon, 1 phoenix, 1 dragon-wyrm, 1 wraith, 1 ghost*<br><br>*2 humans, 2 half-elves, 1 dragon*<br><br>*4 humans and one demon*<br><br>\---<br><br>The source of the memory loss varies wildly. Some common sources are: a castle, a volcano, the forest, a portal, a cave, a temple, a battle, and a curse.<br><br>Here are some more interesting options:<br><br>*Wendigo with a cold*<br><br>*Magic bookstore*<br><br>*Scary clown who works at the castle*<br><br>\---<br><br>The students are also asked to consider how their characters will handle the situation and what sorts of clues they might follow to find their memories. Here are a few of my favorites:<br><br>*Make a map of the forest, which leads them astray*<br><br>*Follow a forest spirit in the hopes of finding a town*<br><br>*Go back to the volcano and try to ask it for their memories back*<br><br>*Find an old lady who gives them a riddle and a spellbook*<br><br>*Drink some enchanted water*<br><br>*Follow tracks which lead them to a treasure chest in the forest*<br><br>*Search the town until they are caught by the bad guy*<br><br>\---<br><br>Finally, here are a few of the most interesting bad guys, which includes a few of the ones mentioned in the previous section:<br><br>*Evil king and his shadow dragon and green dragon<br><br>*Evil sorceress<br><br>*Evil wizard<br><br>*Evil king and evil dragon<br><br>*Evil mermaid<br><br>*Evil wizard and evil dragon<br><br>*Evil inventor<br><br>*Evil dragon<br><br>*Evil queen and evil dragon<br><br>*Evil king<br><br>*Evil sorcerer<br><br>*Evil sorcerer with 2 dragons<br><br>*Evil wizard with a dragon and a cyclops<br><br>*Evil emperor and his shadow dragon<br><br>*Evil king and his phoenix<br><br>*Evil emperor<br><br>*Evil wizard and evil dragon and evil king<br><br>*Evil dragon and evil phoenix and evil wizard and evil cyclops<br><br>*Evil emperor and evil dragon<br><br>*Evil dragon<br><br>*Evil dragon and evil king<br><br>*Evil sorcerer and evil dragon<br><br>*Evil dragon and evil wizard<br><br>*Evil dragon and evil wizard and evil phoenix<br><br>*Evil emperor and evil dragon<br><br>*Evil dragon and evil king and evil phoenix<br><br>*Evil wizard and evil dragon<br><br>*Evil dragon and evil wizard and evil cyclops<br><br>There is a good chance that at the end of this project, I am going to have at least 20 evil dragons and/or wizards. It's going to be a real world-wide apocalypse of magical proportions.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>Edit: I should note that these are 8th graders.