Make a Game from Creative Writing

This year my daughter is in sixth grade.  In language arts, they have been studying all sorts of writing genres in literature.  From poetry to prose to drama, each category has several sub-categories, varying in degree from lyrical poetry to journalism to science fiction.  To help my daughter better understand these genres, we started playing a creative writing game.

This morning, we wrote down all the different types of fiction genres, drama and poetry which she has been studying:
fantasy
sci-fi
realistic fiction
myths
mystery
romance
historical fiction
westerns
horror
adventure
lyrical poem
narrative poem
essay
journalism
histories
tragedy
comedy

In another pile, we wrote down story titles (we got to show a bit of creativity here).  Some examples are:
2,000 Glorious Moons
The Fatter the Better
Cowboys Never Know the Difference
Down Below the Sea
Pickled Eggs at Sunset
The Rescue
Baking Cruel Pie
A Million Rats
Dying Quickly
The Strange Keep to Themselves

Each of us took turns choosing from the genre pile, then choosing from the story title pile.  After selecting four couplings, we sat down at our computers to write our stories.

I got started on my first assignment: "2,000 Glorious Moons" in the journalistic style. Sarah started her drama with the title, "The Strange Keep to Themselves." 

About 45 minutes later, we took turns reading our creative writing with each other.  We talked about what our favorite literary devices were, and I'm thinking that the next dimension to this game should include also selecting from a pile of literary devices (alliteration, personification, allegory, simile, metaphors, rhyming, puns....) by which the story should be told.

This is a fun activity for you to do with your kids, and will truly inspire them to be creative while learning all sorts of writing methods.