Unlocking Creativity with AI: How My Seven-Year-Old Son Wrote His Own Adventure Novel

Last week my seven year old son Misha wanted to write a story but was stuck on how to start. I’d not yet introduced him to ChatGPT but thought ‘why not?’ After all, his big sister Aline was already using it to excellent effect for her revision (to date we’ve written guides for two of her history units including lists of prompts to ask historical characters their points of view on world events - works a charm). It seemed like the right time.

I asked Misha what genre he wanted the story to be in. ‘An epic adventure’ he told me. He decided he would be the hero. He then gave me a brief idea as to what he wanted the story to be about (a rocket journey to Mars where he got stuck and had to be rescued by ‘supermama’ - an interested inversion on the hero narrative). I keyed the criteria into ChatGPT and it wrote a nice neat story.?

He read the story and his eyes lit up. ‘Let’s do another!’ he said. He excitedly gave me the outline of another (Misha stumbling on a monster in a forest and defeating it by hitting it (randomly) with a guitar). Once again GPT gave a nice, easy to read story.?

Six stories later we had a little collection. I then showed him how to create images for his stories by taking elements of the written description and copying them into Midjourney. Once again the eyes shone as the images took shape (the same feeling I used to have when waiting for photographs to appear in a tray of developer).?

We took the stories and images and copied them into Vellum, which is by far and away the best book formatting application available (only for Mac I’m afraid but worth every penny for anyone serious about creating ebooks or print books to sell online).?

I saved the stories as an ebook collection and sent it via Airdrop to Misha’s iPad. He loved reading them! It’s the most I’ve seen him read for a long time. He’s more into art than reading.?

We then got serious. ‘Let write a whole adventure novel!’ he said. Again I asked him to give me the outline of the story and the characters (this time he generously brought his little sister Emily into the narrative). He wanted the story to be about venturing into a forest with his sister, meeting a dragon who turns out to be friendly, finding a castle with treasure guarded by a monster, fighting the monster with the help of the dragon, then fleeing. We used the ‘hero’s journey’ narrative and let ChatGPT do its thing.?

It created the ideal story. Eight chapters, each the right length to hold Misha’s attention. Once again we set about creating images, then dropped it all into Vellum.

And there we had it. A short novel with pictures, bespoke to Misha’s narrative and character requirements.?

You might read this and think ‘but where was the creativity? AI did all the work.’ I would strongly disagree. The storyline was Misha’s - he thought of the narrative arc. All I did was transcribe his summary into ChatGPT (and include the hero’s journey arc to give it structure, but this could easily be taught to him even at his age). He decided on the elements of the story to input into Midjourney and even suggested iterations when the images didn’t come out quite as he might have envisioned. I did little more than facilitate.

To be able to take these ideas and make them real so quickly is truly transformational. But it is more than that. After a couple of stories Misha soon began to see the formulaic structure ChatGPT was using. When it gets into a ‘groove’ it can be rather repetitive. This can prove problematic, but in the case of teaching children structure it’s a bonus.?

For Misha it enabled him to learn how stories are structured, which then informed his ideas as he developed them. By the time we came to write our mini novel, he naturally gave me the different parts of the hero’s journey structure without me needing to tell him. From the equilibrium (Misha and Emily walking in the forest)?through to the disruption (the guarded treasure), rising action (rescuing the treasure), climax (chased by the monster), falling action (getting away) and resolution (back home), Misha caught the narrative arc perfectly. He even brought in the dragon ‘helper’ character without realising. It was a pleasure to see his creative brain working overtime.

There’s so much talk right now about ChatGPT and cheating. However, if you look at it through another lens you can see its potential. For it is in its very formulaic nature that you can couple it with human imagination and quickly create compelling writing. As an English teacher my eyes are as opened as my son's.

For children this is a game-changer. One of the primary teachers at BIST has been using it in a similar way with her year 1 children, writing stories collectively and asking the children to make suggestions as to how the stories can be improved. They’ve enjoyed how they can impact on the storyline, working with their teacher to rewrite and improve based on their feedback.?

I also love how you can tailor the stories perfectly to each child: I’ve mentioned this with revision guides, but for creativity it can be so helpful too. For Misha, being the hero of his story is instantly attractive, hooking him into the creative process and opening his eyes as to his own potential. He immediately read the stories to his mama, really inhabiting them as he did so, as if he had written every word himself.?

AI can hugely augment our creativity if we use it in the right way. Are these stories wholly ours? Of course not: we had help. Then again, ChatGPT can’t write without prompts and Midjourney is worthless without our input, so it’s a joint process through and through. Let’s start seeing AI as a genuine assistant to our creativity, using it to unlock ideas and teach structure in a compelling, absorbing way.?