New courses added for January including a 3-Hour Intensive on beating writer’s block and a 10-week program for writing and marketing a television pilot. Elevate your writing craft with focused, interactive workshops. Each course combines on-demand lectures, practical exercises, and live online sessions to provide a comprehensive learning experience. Join a community of passionate writers and take your storytelling to the next level.
Registration available through the Pennwriters Online Education program. Contact Diana for more information.
WRITER’S BLOCK BUSTERS
A 3-HOUR INTENSIVE WRITER’S WORKSHOP
Saturday, January 3, 2026
2:00 PM – 5:00 PM ET
Live Interactive Zoom Session
This intensive 3-hour workshop distills proven writer’s block breakthrough techniques into one transformative afternoon. Through rapid-fire writing exercises, mini-lectures, and actionable strategies, you’ll identify your unique creative obstacles and walk away with a personalized toolkit to demolish them. Expect to write, laugh, share (optionally), and leave with both words on the page and renewed confidence in your creative process.
This workshop welcomes writers across all mediums—fiction, nonfiction, poetry, screenwriting, journalism, and beyond. Whether you’re a beginner or seasoned professional, you’ll discover practical tools to demolish the barriers between you and your best work.
WHAT YOU’LL TAKE HOME
- Your Writer’s Block Emergency Kit (customized strategies that work for YOU)
- Completed writing exercises and prompts (words on the page!)
- Cognitive Reframing Worksheet with examples
- Rapid Generation Techniques Guide
- Writing Ritual Design Template
- 30-Day Post-Workshop Writing Plan
- Curated resource list: writing apps, virtual writing rooms, and accountability tools
- Bonus: 30-day access to private Writing Companion Discord room
WRITING & MARKETING THE TELEVISION PILOT
Saturdays, 2 to 5 pm, ET
PART 1: FROM CONCEPT TO ACT ONE
Duration: 4 weeks
Meeting Time: Saturdays, 2:00 PM – 5:00 PM ET
Proposed Dates: January 10, 17, 24, 31 – 2026
Course Description
Transform your television series idea into a professional outline and polished first act. This intensive four-week course takes writers from initial concept through series development, structural planning, and completion of the pilot’s crucial opening act. Through a combination of on-demand video lectures, live Zoom sessions, and hands-on writing assignments, participants will develop the foundational elements of their television pilot while learning industry-standard formatting, character-driven storytelling, and the unique demands of episodic television.
PART 2: WRITING & MARKETING THE TELEVISION PILOT SCRIPT
Duration: 6 weeks
Meeting Time: Saturdays, 2:00 PM – 5:00 PM ET
Proposed Dates: February 7, 14, 21, 28, March 7, 14
Course Description
Complete your television pilot teleplay in a structured workshop environment and prepare it for professional submission. This six-week intensive focuses on finishing Acts Two through Five through weekly page workshops, developing marketing materials (pitch bible and deck), and learning industry navigation strategies.
WHERE PLOT MEETS STORY
Tuesdays, 7 to 9pm, ET
August 4, 11, 18, 25
Most writers struggle with the fundamental misconception that plot and story are the same thing—but they’re not. Plot is what happens (the physical events), while story is why we care (the emotional journey). A plot without story is merely a series of events that leaves readers cold; a story without plot is characters spinning their wheels with nowhere to go. This intensive 4-week online course teaches writers across all mediums how to masterfully weave these two essential elements together. Through hands-on exercises, practical techniques, and weekly 2-hour workshops, participants will learn to create compelling plots that serve powerful emotional stories, transforming their writing from flat sequences of events into rich, engaging narratives that readers can’t put down. Whether you’re writing novels, screenplays, short stories, or any other form of fiction, this course will give you the tools to understand where plot truly meets story—and how to make that intersection the beating heart of your work. This course is designed to benefit fiction writers of all levels of experience and is not specific to any particular genre.
MASTERING DIALOGUE
Tuesdays, 7 to 9pm, ET
September 8, 15, 22, 29
Transform your dialogue from functional to unforgettable in this intensive 4-week workshop designed for writers across all mediums. Week 1 establishes the foundation with “Voice and Authenticity,” teaching participants to develop distinct character voices and break through dialogue-writing blocks using targeted exercises in subtext and speech patterns. Week 2, “Conflict and Tension,” explores how great dialogue drives plot forward while revealing character depth through disagreement, power dynamics, subtext, and what characters don’t say. Week 3 dives into “Advanced Techniques,” covering genre-specific dialogue challenges, cultural authenticity, period dialogue, and innovative formatting approaches for different mediums. The final week, “Revision and Polish,” focuses on editing dialogue for maximum impact, identifying and breaking personal writing patterns that lead to blocks, and developing sustainable practices for consistently strong dialogue. Each 2-hour session combines mini-lectures, hands-on writing exercises, peer feedback, and personalized coaching, ensuring participants leave with both improved skills and practical tools to prevent future creative stagnation. Writers will work with dialogue samples from their own projects while exploring techniques from screenwriting, novels, short stories, theater, and beyond. This course is designed to benefit fiction writers of all levels of experience and is not specific to any particular genre.
TACKLING THE REWRITE
Tuesdays, 2 to 4pm, ET
November 3, 10, 17, 24
Congratulations on completing your first draft! Now comes the crucial next step: transforming that wonderful yet messy manuscript into a polished, marketable work that will capture agents’ and editors’ attention. This intensive 4-week course equips both novelists and screenwriters with essential revision tools and industry knowledge to bridge the gap between “finished” and “ready to submit.”
Each session combines targeted revision techniques with live workshopping of participants’ opening pages. You’ll develop personalized revision tools including a Rewrite Plot Map and Character Story Maps, while learning to strengthen structure, deepen characters, and sharpen dialogue without losing your story’s unique voice. We’ll also explore current submission trends, craft compelling query letters, and build customized submission lists tailored to your specific project. By course end, you’ll have both a strategic revision roadmap and practical feedback on your opening pages—everything needed to confidently move from rough draft to submission-ready manuscript. This course welcomes fiction writers of all experience levels and genres. This course is designed to benefit fiction writers of all levels of experience and is not specific to any particular genre.