Story Cubes
speakingfluencycommunicationpracticesmall-grouplow prep15-20 min
Nine cubes, each face showing a simple pictogram. Students roll all nine and must create a story incorporating every image rolled. The constraint is the engine — a random combination demands creative connection.
Based on Rory's Story Cubes, a commercial game now widely adopted in ELT. Works with real cubes or a dice-roll app, or printed image cards.
Procedure
- Each student or pair rolls 6–9 cubes (or draws 6–9 image cards).
- Plan phase (2 min): arrange the images in a possible story order. No writing, just thinking.
- Storytell (2–3 min per student): tell the story out loud, touching each image as it comes up. Every image must appear.
- Partners listen, ask one follow-up question each, vote on most creative.
- Optional write-up: the best story is written down as homework.
Why It Works
- Constraint drives creativity: random images force connections the student wouldn't self-select.
- Vocabulary stretching: each picture demands a word; the set forces variety.
- Narrative structure practice: beginning, middle, end emerge organically.
- Fluency over accuracy: the story must keep moving; correction comes later if at all.
Cube Set Themes (available commercially or DIY)
- Original set: general icons — tree, lightbulb, arrow, phone
- Actions: running, sleeping, dancing, cooking
- Fantasy: dragon, wizard, castle, quest
- Mystery: footprint, magnifying glass, clue, suspect
- Science: atom, microscope, planet, formula
- DIY: print 9 images per student on a sheet; learners cut and roll
Variations
- Shrinking roll: each round, roll one fewer cube. Students reuse nine-cube stories as source material for six-cube retellings.
- Genre constraint: the story must be in horror / romance / comedy / news-report style.
- Chain Story Cubes: one student rolls, starts the story for 30 seconds; next student rolls 3 new cubes and continues.
- Partner cube: pairs roll; partner A constructs the story using odd-position cubes; partner B uses even-position cubes; merge.
Tips
- Insist all images appear. The constraint is the point.
- For lower levels, pre-teach the key vocabulary on the cubes before rolling.
- Video-record stories occasionally. Students love replaying their own absurd plots.
- Great for review of narrative tenses: constrain the story to past simple + past continuous, or to conditionals.
Source
Rory's Story Cubes (O'Connor, 2005) — originally a board game, widely adopted in ELT. Creative Writing Through Constraints tradition (Oulipo).