Our Weekly Creativity prompts challenge you to make a piece of writing (a poem, a journal entry, a story outline, a review) or art, or music, or a spoken word recording, or other piece of creative work. All the prompts we have written are brought together on this page – see below. The first prompt of the month is also a Flash Contest!
You can find more writing and art activities on our Activities pages.
Sign up to the mailing list to receive a weekly email that brings the Weekly Creativity prompt and links to our Book Club and Writing Workshop bookings right to your mailbox!
Creativity Prompts
Be a time traveler in reverse! What would happen if a character from the past arrived in the present? Choose a time period you like and know a little bit about, and write down at least 3 things that make it really different to now (like the clothes, the transport, ...
Write 5 phrases about things you see around you (e.g. “a bird chirping in a tree”) and use them in a poem, or turn them into a piece of art ...
Make 5 sketches of things outside your window, and/or write a 5-line poem about what you see outside your window ...
Compose a piece of art (it can be photography, painting, drawing, or any medium) and think about your color choices. What emotions can you convey using certain colors? What do certain colors symbolize? ...
Write a poem or create a piece of art about a family tradition ...
Draw or paint a scene from a book you are reading, or have read. This is a Monday prompt, so if you are writing your response in the week it was first published, you can submit it to our Weekly Flash Contest, via Submittable! If you decide to submit your ...
Write a collaborative story with a family member or a friend (digitally, if you don’t live together!). Each person participating writes one sentence, then it’s the next person’s turn ...
Watch this movie scene with the sound off, writing your own dialogue. Use that imagined dialogue as the basis for a short story or play ...
Be a time traveler! Choose your favorite period in history (ancient Greece, medieval Spain, the Gold Rush–wherever and whenever you like). Think of 3 features that will help your reader know they are in that place and time (like the food, the buildings, the bathroom arrangements…) Then decide who is ...
It’s Tuesday! Write a 20-line poem in which every line begins with the letter “T.” To make it harder: only two of those lines can start with “the.” ...
