About Naomi Kinsman

As an author, arts educator, and creativity coach, I’ve been exploring story and play as tools for learning, creating, and personal growth for many years. Along the way, I discovered the power of stepping into our stories as a way to navigate our creative work and lives. I found this doorway through my work with young writers, and have now seen it work with thousands of students—youth and adults alike.

One of the first Creative Lift tools was the Writerly Play toolkit for educators. Writerly Play blends storytelling, improv, and visual thinking tools to guide writers through the sometimes-mysterious, but always meaningful, process of discovering, cultivating, and sharing their one-of-a-kind voices. I use Writerly Play in my work as founder and Executive Director of Society of Young Inklings, a nonprofit dedicated to helping youth writers get the big ideas out of their hearts and heads and onto the page. For the past 15 years, Society of Young Inklings has produced the annual Inklings Book anthology, a book featuring short stories and poetry by 3rd-9th grade youth writers from around the world.

My books include the From Sadie’s Sketchbook series for middle grade readers and the award-winning Spilled Ink, a Writer’s Commonplace Book. I collaborated with Natalie Grant, grammy-nominated singer, as the writer of Grant’s Glimmer Girls series.

I host the Creative Lift podcast, and teach Skillshare courses such as Goal-Setting for Creatives: Play to your Strengths and Tap Into Flow.

I hold a BA in Theatre Arts from Seattle Pacific University, studied theatre with the Piven Theatre Workshop, and have an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Hamline University.