Critical Thinking and Creativity with AI

# Critical Thinking and Creativity with AI  ## Contents *Open the Day Companion in a second tab, and do Before the Workshop days ahead — Block 4 needs three books you already love.* **START HERE** - [🧭 Open the Day Companion first](#🧭-Open-the-Day-Companion-first) — second tab, beside ChatGPT or Claude; every prompt for the day is one click - [Before the Workshop](#Before-the-Workshop) — accounts, pen and paper, and three books you love — do this before class day - [Also Bring](#Also-Bring) **WHAT THIS IS** - [Course Overview](#Course-Overview) - [Who This Is For](#Who-This-Is-For) - [The Mindset: AI as Your Intern](#The-Mindset-AI-as-Your-Intern) - [One Rule for the Whole Day](#One-Rule-for-the-Whole-Day) — two sanctioned exceptions: the lunch Value Sort is a web tool, and Block 6 is pen and paper - [Schedule](#Schedule) - [Morning](#Morning1) - [Afternoon](#Afternoon1) **THE DAY** - [Block 1 (10:00–11:00): Configure Your AI Assistant](#Block-1-1000–1100-Configure-Your-AI-Assistant) - [Workshop 01 - Configure Your AI Assistant](#Workshop-01---Configure-Your-AI-Assistant) - [Block 2 (11:00–11:35): Tools, Connectors & Memory](#Block-2-1100–1135-Tools-Connectors-amp-Memory) - [Workshop 02 - Tools Connectors and Memory](#Workshop-02---Tools-Connectors-and-Memory) - [Block 3 (11:35–11:55): Prompt Patterns & the Flipped Interaction](#Block-3-1135–1155-Prompt-Patterns-amp-the-Flipped-Interaction) - [Workshop 03 - Prompt Patterns and the Flipped Interaction](#Workshop-03---Prompt-Patterns-and-the-Flipped-Interaction) - [Block 4 (11:55–12:45): Critical Analysis & the Blended Voice](#Block-4-1155–1245-Critical-Analysis-amp-the-Blended-Voice) — the centrepiece — the vocabulary you build here is the real deliverable - [Workshop 04 - Critical Analysis and the Blended Voice](#Workshop-04---Critical-Analysis-and-the-Blended-Voice) - [Lunch (12:45–1:45): Values Card Sort](#Lunch-1245–145-Values-Card-Sort) — do the sort over lunch; Block 5 is the debrief and needs your top five already picked - [Block 5 (1:45–2:00): Values Debrief](#Block-5-145–200-Values-Debrief) - [Workshop 05 - Values Debrief](#Workshop-05---Values-Debrief) - [Block 6 (2:00–2:25): Creativity Warm-Up ⛔ NO AI](#Block-6-200–225-Creativity-Warm-Up-⛔-NO-AI) - [Workshop 06 - Creativity Warm-Up](#Workshop-06---Creativity-Warm-Up) - [Block 7 (2:25–2:50): Your Premise, From the Warm-Up](#Block-7-225–250-Your-Premise-From-the-Warm-Up) - [Workshop 07 - Your Premise From the Warm-Up](#Workshop-07---Your-Premise-From-the-Warm-Up) - [Block 8 (2:50–3:20): Master Plots — Most Things Are Templates](#Block-8-250–320-Master-Plots-—-Most-Things-Are-Templates) - [Workshop 08 - Master Plots](#Workshop-08---Master-Plots) - [Block 9 (3:20–4:00): Write With a Template → Vibe Authorship](#Block-9-320–400-Write-With-a-Template-→-Vibe-Authorship) - [Workshop 09 - Write With a Template and Vibe Authorship](#Workshop-09---Write-With-a-Template-and-Vibe-Authorship) - [Block 10 (after 4:00, past the booked end): Multi-Agent Story System](#Block-10-after-400-past-the-booked-end-Multi-Agent-Story-System) — stretch block — most days stop at 9, and that is a complete arc - [Workshop 10 - Multi-Agent Story System](#Workshop-10---Multi-Agent-Story-System) **RECORDINGS** - [Recordings](#Recordings) — full-day recordings from seven 2026 dates, plus morning and afternoon recordings from four earlier dates - [Full-day recordings](#Full-day-recordings) · 7 recordings — newest first; Friday 11 September is the most recent - [Morning](#Morning) - [3-30-26](#3-30-26) · 1 recording - - [Afternoon](#Afternoon) - [3-30-26](#3-30-261) · 1 recording - [3-2-2026](#3-2-20261) · 1 recording - [1-5-2026](#1-5-20261) · 1 recording - [12-8-2025](#12-8-20251) · 1 recording - [More recordings for this class](#More-recordings-for-this-class) · 3 recordings — undated: one Block 1-2 setup walkthrough, two on Block 8-9 structure **WHAT YOU BUILD** - [What You'll Leave With](#What-You’ll-Leave-With) - [Self-Paced Deep Dives](#Self-Paced-Deep-Dives) — the full multi-agent build, for after the class - [The Key Insight](#The-Key-Insight) — the close of the day — read this last **AFTER** - [After the Workshop](#After-the-Workshop) - [Continue Learning](#Continue-Learning) - [Next Suggested Courses](#Next-Suggested-Courses) **REFERENCE** - [Resources](#Resources) **FOR FACILITATORS** - [Facilitator Notes](#Facilitator-Notes) — teaching notes — students can skip - [Pacing](#Pacing) - [Common Issues](#Common-Issues) - [Energy Management](#Energy-Management) - [If Someone's Stuck for a Story Idea](#If-Someone’s-Stuck-for-a-Story-Idea)  ## 🧭 Open the Day Companion first # **→ [themultiverse.school/x/critical-thinking-companion](https://themultiverse.school/x/critical-thinking-companion)** Keep it open in a **second tab, beside ChatGPT or Claude**. It highlights whichever block we're in right now, and every prompt for the day is one click to copy. --- > 📽️ **[Slide Deck](https://docs.themultiverse.school/p/creative-automation-slides)** · 📈 **[Plots and Subplots](https://themultiverse.school/x/story-arc-braids)** — how seasons braid several arcs at once **Use AI to think better and make things — in a single day, no coding required.** --- # Recordings This class runs roughly once a month and **changes every time.** Older recordings are still worth watching — you can see the ideas evolve. ## Full-day recordings Each of these is the whole day, morning and afternoon, in one video. ### Friday 11 September 2026 *(most recent)* <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IUiiMSytT58OBK1CJ8UEZRPsVAgsszip/view">▶︎ Full day · Fri 11 Sep 2026</a> ### Friday 7 August 2026 <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zHKRcEtJa9vPy25aGk8Ia3zcOvFscHL2/view">▶︎ Full day · Fri 7 Aug 2026</a> ### Monday 29 June 2026 <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-_v3u3nHuOtSRbOIe6SjMjxJ2j-PNJdE/view">▶︎ Full day · Mon 29 Jun 2026</a> ### Friday 5 June 2026 <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/12bFcn1PF5v5fZhsaRl0YFxztygXS6COe/view">▶︎ Full day · Fri 5 Jun 2026</a> ### Friday 8 May 2026 <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rR5FEgmbdad0YV8c_gGTjKrLwKCNGetW/view">▶︎ Full day · Fri 8 May 2026</a> ### Friday 17 April 2026 <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1K-uphYRPSNzPhI7GqmOIwLxCswLNL1kC/view">▶︎ Full day · Fri 17 Apr 2026</a> ### Monday 2 February 2026 <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fakHpsTRe8wTTQd9iB99Zcf7e162PDV0/view">▶︎ Full day · Mon 2 Feb 2026</a> ## Morning ### 3-30-26 <a href="https://www.loom.com/share/1e74409db361480db89ddd21d79a47b0">▶︎ Unlocking Creativity and Critical Thinking with AI · 116 min</a> ### 3-2-2026 <a href="https://www.loom.com/share/750c5fede7394fe5a6128b4dfe5d49cc">▶︎ Navigating AI Tools for Enhanced Learning and Productivity · 121 min</a> ### 1-5-2026 <a href="https://www.loom.com/share/af3f06f8e87a41248d50e9e1c990b427">▶︎ Getting Started with AI Assistants: A Comprehensive Guide · 127 min</a> ### 12-8-2025 <a href="https://www.loom.com/share/3de6109b489c4d7db9fb86de2dba5253">▶︎ Creative Automation Workshop: Harnessing AI for Writing and Collaboration · 114 min</a> ## Afternoon ### 3-30-26 <a href="https://www.loom.com/share/cfdb6dea83334301a431e61e3c1df173">▶︎ Navigating Values and Creativity in the Age of AI · 188 min</a> ### 3-2-2026 <a href="https://www.loom.com/share/4faee411dbb744af8b7e09f08f37584d">▶︎ Exploring Values, Creativity, and AI in Modern Workspaces · 101 min</a> ### 1-5-2026 <a href="https://www.loom.com/share/d56df8526ef24ead98bee59e7b6ee366">▶︎ Exploring Values and Creative Processes in AI 🌟 · 161 min</a> ### 12-8-2025 <a href="https://www.loom.com/share/f8213850806e4e748efdc1dae927a374">▶︎ Navigating Creativity and Capitalism: A Collaborative Workshop · 182 min</a> --- ## Course Overview Learn to work fluently with an AI assistant, build a genuine critical vocabulary out of the books you already love, and use both to make something you actually like. **The Throughline:** By the end of the day you'll have a configured assistant that knows you, a critical vocabulary derived from your own taste, a blended voice, a book premise grown out of your own divergent thinking, a structural framework chosen deliberately from many, and a real scene written in your voice — plus a clear-eyed account of exactly how much of that was still your work. **Duration:** 10:00–4:00 Pacific (6 hours, including a 1-hour lunch) **Format:** 9 core workshops, 1 stretch workshop, 6 self-paced deep dives **No coding required** — just curiosity and a willingness to have your assumptions challenged. --- ## Who This Is For - **Writers** who want to move from premise to real prose in hours, not weeks - **Anyone who wants to think more clearly** — the critical analysis half stands on its own, with or without AI - **Creatives exploring AI collaboration** — see what it can and can't do - **People skeptical about AI in creative work** — this class takes that seriously rather than arguing you out of it > **A note for writers and creators:** AI can't replace what makes your work *yours* — your > voice, your values, your creative choices. What it *can* do is handle the scaffolding so you > spend more time on the judgment that actually matters. > **Fair warning:** This class is meant to break you. In a nice way. We're going to challenge > your assumptions about creativity, authorship, and what AI can and can't do. Some of what > you see will excite you. Some of it will unsettle you. That tension is the whole point. --- ## The Mindset: AI as Your Intern **AI is not here to replace you.** It's here to do the scaffolding faster. If you're a writer, AI is the intern who drafts the synopsis you hate writing, generates dialogue options for you to refine, and handles the first-pass work you'd normally slog through. You're still the writer. You still make the creative decisions. **Your job today:** Boss around an intern. Keep what's useful, throw out what isn't. --- ## One Rule for the Whole Day **Everything you build stays inside the assistant.** Not in a Google Doc you tab over to. Not in a vault you have to remember to update. In the chat, in memory, in the project. The skill you came here for is working fluently *with* the assistant. Every hop out to a separate document is a hop away from that skill — and it's the first thing that falls apart the week after class ends. --- ## Schedule ### Morning | Time | Block | Workshop | |------|-------|----------| | 10:00–11:00 | **Block 1** (60 min) | [Configure Your AI Assistant](/_WE92EdSSESGOdO4sQ05HA) | | 11:00–11:35 | **Block 2** (35 min) | [Tools, Connectors & Memory](/GxrUWHFcScijvXyH3PiJvg) | | 11:35–11:55 | **Block 3** (20 min) | [Prompt Patterns & the Flipped Interaction](/EK6A-KspR0WJXd8ilnv2dQ) | | 11:55–12:45 | **Block 4** (50 min) | [Critical Analysis & the Blended Voice](/89j4Yn1hRIqVsmuCRBVM5A) | | 12:45–1:45 | **LUNCH** | Values Card Sort | ### Afternoon | Time | Block | Workshop | |------|-------|----------| | 1:45–2:00 | **Block 5** (15 min) | [Values Debrief](/sGknVREmTNevbNP7_gRDaQ) | | 2:00–2:25 | **Block 6** (25 min) | [Creativity Warm-Up](/BJRNoAIpTMKhe47tNMm-uA) *(no AI)* | | 2:25–2:50 | **Block 7** (25 min) | [Your Premise, From the Warm-Up](/-21eTvgFRJ6G7VUFZxjhPw) | | 2:50–3:20 | **Block 8** (30 min) | [Master Plots — Most Things Are Templates](/EumTBIwJQleJDI7hP-UOCg) · [plots & subplots](https://themultiverse.school/x/story-arc-braids) | | 3:20–4:00 | **Block 9** (40 min) | [Write With a Template → Vibe Authorship](/eOtSLBSCTg6rVPburx0laQ) | | after 4:00 | **Block 10** *(past the booked end — only if the room is flying)* | [Multi-Agent Story System](/niLt0SsgT5K7eGht7HC08Q) | **Track note:** Workshop 1 has ChatGPT and Claude variants for the setup steps. Everything else works identically on either platform. If Claude has paused new signups, use ChatGPT. --- ## Block 1 (10:00–11:00): Configure Your AI Assistant ### Workshop 01 - Configure Your AI Assistant **→ [Workshop 01 - Configure Your AI Assistant](/_WE92EdSSESGOdO4sQ05HA)** (also: [ChatGPT version](/y3k6T2XfRPOvl5nK8mCc9g) · [Claude version](/AdJxH2RFQZqa4QOXVFfxCQ)) Signup triage — a good chunk of the room hasn't made an account yet, and that's normal. Then platform choice, system instructions, and tokens. **Key concepts:** tokens and context windows · system instructions as persistent rules · downloading the *real* app, not a data-harvesting lookalike --- ## Block 2 (11:00–11:35): Tools, Connectors & Memory ### Workshop 02 - Tools Connectors and Memory **→ [Workshop 02 - Tools Connectors and Memory](/GxrUWHFcScijvXyH3PiJvg)** Memory turned on and inspected. What a tool is and when the model reaches for one. Connectors, and what you're actually granting when you wire one up. **Key concepts:** ChatGPT Memory vs. Claude Projects · tools as *doing* rather than *knowing* · connector permissions are real permissions --- ## Block 3 (11:35–11:55): Prompt Patterns & the Flipped Interaction ### Workshop 03 - Prompt Patterns and the Flipped Interaction **→ [Workshop 03 - Prompt Patterns and the Flipped Interaction](/EK6A-KspR0WJXd8ilnv2dQ)** Stop writing prompts one at a time forever. There's a small set of reusable patterns, and the most useful one is making the model interview *you*. **Key concepts:** flipped interaction · persona · few-shot · step-by-step · critique & refine · scheduling --- ## Block 4 (11:55–12:45): Critical Analysis & the Blended Voice ### Workshop 04 - Critical Analysis and the Blended Voice **→ [Workshop 04 - Critical Analysis and the Blended Voice](/89j4Yn1hRIqVsmuCRBVM5A)** **The block that changes how you read.** Take three books and three writers you love and work out what they are actually *doing*. Strip the names off. Blend what's left into a single voice that belongs to nobody. Write with it, and compare against a naive prompt. The vocabulary you build here is the real deliverable — it's what makes the assistant useful for analysis rather than just generation, and it's yours whether or not you ever touch AI again. **Key concepts:** mechanism over summary · style *analysis* vs. style *imitation* · nobody owns a technique · your taste is the only data here that's actually yours --- ## Lunch (12:45–1:45): Values Card Sort **This is your most important reflection of the day.** Work through it while you eat. **[Value Sort — The Good Project](https://learning-tools.thegoodproject.org/value-sort)** 1. Sort all values into three piles (Very Important / Somewhat Important / Not a Priority) 2. Bubble sort your "Very Important" pile 3. Narrow to your **top 5** 4. Tell your assistant --- ## Block 5 (1:45–2:00): Values Debrief ### Workshop 05 - Values Debrief **→ [Workshop 05 - Values Debrief](/sGknVREmTNevbNP7_gRDaQ)** Why that was harder than it looked. The gap between your **ideals** and your **operating values** — and why that gap is usually what's bothering you at work. Then load your top five into memory, where they'll shape every creative decision this afternoon. **Key concepts:** values can't be totally ordered · they have to be held in tension · the discomfort is information --- ## Block 6 (2:00–2:25): Creativity Warm-Up ⛔ NO AI ### Workshop 06 - Creativity Warm-Up **→ [Workshop 06 - Creativity Warm-Up](/BJRNoAIpTMKhe47tNMm-uA)** Pen and paper. Ten genre pairs that don't go together, ten visual styles that clash. Circle the ones you can't stop thinking about — **they're the seed of your premise in the next block.** **Why before AI:** jumping straight to the assistant *narrows* creative output — you anchor on its first suggestions. Divergent exercises first offset that, and roughly triple output. --- ## Block 7 (2:25–2:50): Your Premise, From the Warm-Up ### Workshop 07 - Your Premise From the Warm-Up **→ [Workshop 07 - Your Premise From the Warm-Up](/-21eTvgFRJ6G7VUFZxjhPw)** Feed it your friction — not a cold request for ideas. Then refine with named criteria, one per round: more COMPELLING, more CHALLENGING, more PERSONAL, more PRECISE. **No vague requests.** "Make it better" is useless; the assistant doesn't know what you value. --- ## Block 8 (2:50–3:20): Master Plots — Most Things Are Templates ### Workshop 08 - Master Plots **→ [Workshop 08 - Master Plots](/EumTBIwJQleJDI7hP-UOCg)** People have confidently announced the "true" number of basic plots and arrived at wildly different answers: 69, 37, 36, 20, 10, 9, 8, 7, 3, 2, 1. We look at all of them — Freytag, Campbell, Harmon, Tobias, Polti, Snyder. **The point is the plurality.** No framework is correct; they're lossy compressions at different resolutions. And this generalizes well past fiction — a grant, a pitch deck, a go-to-market plan are all templates too. Story Circle is one entry on this list, not the structure of the course. **→ [Plots and Subplots — how seasons braid](https://themultiverse.school/x/story-arc-braids)** · Every framework here describes *one* arc; a season runs several at once. Diagrams for the four-arc season and for the many-arc ensemble patterns — rotation (Lost), overlap (Battlestar), parallelism (Thrones) — plus a mermaid template for mapping your own. --- ## Block 9 (3:20–4:00): Write With a Template → Vibe Authorship ### Workshop 09 - Write With a Template and Vibe Authorship **→ [Workshop 09 - Write With a Template and Vibe Authorship](/eOtSLBSCTg6rVPburx0laQ)** Bring in material only you have. Build characters in the assistant. Write a real scene at a middle beat, read it critically, and fix it twice with named criteria. Then the reveal: you like it, **and it wasn't zero work.** The machine did the typing; every decision that made it good was yours. That's **vibe authorship**. **The part that should bother you:** if your critical vocabulary had been worse, the output would have been worse — and you wouldn't have known. --- ## Block 10 (after 4:00, past the booked end): Multi-Agent Story System ### Workshop 10 - Multi-Agent Story System **→ [Workshop 10 - Multi-Agent Story System](/niLt0SsgT5K7eGht7HC08Q)** Most days we don't get here, and that's fine — Block 9 is a complete arc. If the room is moving fast: a Director that sets up scenes without writing them, characters with enough agency to refuse you, and narrative that emerges from between them. --- ## Self-Paced Deep Dives The full multi-agent build, for after the class: 1. [Build Your Director](/jTdZxCiEQCaaP4hLnLRlBw) — [ChatGPT](/jTdZxCiEQCaaP4hLnLRlBw) · [Claude](/aOOlWezqSs6Qwx7dxWpDiQ) 2. [Multi-Agent Story Demo](/A1bPuX0CRte3qwea_uXhvQ) 3. [Build Character Agents](/60tQdr9DRO-dnp3caRFQzQ) 4. [Run Your First Scene](/OQcGhg8USwuZJamfjjQnaQ) 5. [Automate ONE Scene](/0MoE2YkMRLaeqIAiek3JWA) — with Make.com 6. [Scale to Full Book](/0hSIx85jRx6tZ-CWCo_Tag) Also: [Path 1 - OpenAI Multi-Agent Story System](/ow5MfyGyTm-CAlh53qV7lw) · [Path 2 - Claude MCP Story System](/HBXRs9lPQ_utxJXIvR6KwA) --- ## What You'll Leave With - ✅ An assistant configured with your preferences, memory, and top 5 values - ✅ **A critical vocabulary built from books you already love** - ✅ A blended voice profile that belongs to no one - ✅ A book premise grown from your own divergent thinking, refined with named criteria - ✅ A working map of the major plot frameworks — and the knowledge that most things are templates - ✅ At least one real scene in your voice, iterated critically - ✅ An honest account of what "vibe authorship" costs and what it's worth - ✅ A repeatable process for any story, and for a lot of things that aren't stories --- ## Before the Workshop | Item | Link | Notes | |---|---|---| | **ChatGPT** or **Claude** | [chat.openai.com](https://chat.openai.com) · [claude.ai](https://claude.ai) | Pick one. Plus/Pro recommended, free works. Claude sometimes pauses signups — ChatGPT is the safe default. | | **Free alternative** | [LM Studio](https://lmstudio.ai) · [Hermes Agent](https://hermes-agent.nousresearch.com) | If you don't want to pay. LM Studio runs a model on your own laptop. Hermes Agent is free and hooks up to a free [Groq](https://console.groq.com/keys) or [Cerebras](https://cloud.cerebras.ai) key — the key setup is the fiddly part, so ask and we'll set you up. | | **Google account** | You probably have one | Only if you want a connector to try | **Deep dives only (not needed for the class):** [Obsidian](https://obsidian.md) · [Claude Desktop](https://claude.ai/download) · [Node.js](https://nodejs.org) ### Also Bring - **Laptop** with a modern browser, and **pen and paper** (Block 6 is offline) - **Three books you love and three writers you love** — have them in mind before you arrive - **Examples of your own writing** (2–3 samples), optional but useful - **A story idea**, even vague --- ## After the Workshop - **Write more scenes** at different beats — notice the voice holding - **Run the same premise through a different framework** and see how much the container did - **Use the critical vocabulary on something that isn't fiction** — a proposal, a talk, a pitch - **Share what you made** — Wattpad, Substack, Kindle Direct Publishing ### Continue Learning - [Anthropic Prompt Engineering Guide](https://docs.anthropic.com/en/docs/build-with-claude/prompt-engineering/) - [OpenAI Prompt Engineering Guide](https://developers.openai.com/api/docs/guides/prompt-engineering) --- ## Resources **During the workshop:** - [OpenAI Tokenizer](https://platform.openai.com/tokenizer) - [Value Sort — The Good Project](https://learning-tools.thegoodproject.org/value-sort) - [Christopher Noessel, *Master Plots*](https://christophernoessel.medium.com/master-plots-3c94a7b61a32) — the plot taxonomy survey - [Plots and Subplots](https://themultiverse.school/x/story-arc-braids) — how concurrent arcs are staggered across a season **Story structure:** - *Save the Cat* — Blake Snyder ([beat sheet](https://savethecat.com/beat-sheet)) - *Into the Woods* — John Yorke - [Dan Harmon's Story Circle](https://blog.reedsy.com/guide/story-structure/dan-harmon-story-circle/) **AI & creative writing:** - *Co-Intelligence* — Ethan Mollick - Keep experimenting; this field changes monthly --- ## Facilitator Notes ### Pacing - **Block 1** — setup always takes longer than you want. Let it. Claude signups are intermittently closed; default to ChatGPT if so. - **Block 4** — the heart of the morning. Don't rush the "strip the names" step; that's where the penny drops. - **Lunch** — Values Card Sort keeps minds engaged while eating - **Block 5** — the ideals-vs-operating-values framing lands hard for people in jobs they don't like. Give it room. - **Block 6** — enforce the no-AI rule. It's the block people most want to cheat on and the one that most needs protecting. - **Block 8** — skim, don't read aloud. The plurality is the point, not any single list. - **Block 9** — most people finish one scene. That's enough. The reveal matters more than volume. - **Block 10** — usually doesn't happen. Don't force it. ### Common Issues - **Login problems** — have a backup browser ready - **Claude not accepting signups** — switch the whole room to ChatGPT - **ChatGPT rate limits** — switch to Claude, or to LM Studio / Hermes Agent with a free Groq or Cerebras key - **"My premise is boring"** — they smoothed out the clash from Block 6. Send them back. - **Output feels generic** — they skipped their own material in Block 9, Step 1 ### Energy Management - **Morning** — quick wins early (assistant setup, memory working) - **Block 4** — the comparison at the end is the morning's payoff; make sure everyone runs both versions - **Post-lunch** — "what surprised you about your values?" gets the energy back - **Block 9** — celebrate when someone reads their scene out loud - **End** — the vibe authorship reveal is the close. Don't bury it under logistics. ### If Someone's Stuck for a Story Idea - "A museum curator must prove human art has value when AI creates all beauty" - "A detective investigates a crime committed by their future self" - "The last human on a generation ship wakes to find AI has evolved consciousness" - "Two rival mages are forced to share a single familiar" --- ## The Key Insight **AI doesn't replace creativity. It raises the value of taste.** What AI is good at: generating options quickly · following structure · maintaining consistency when prompted well · combining things unexpectedly What humans are good at: knowing which option is best · emotional depth and subtext · editing · making the decisions that matter The catch: **you can only get good output if you can describe what good means.** That's what the critical vocabulary is for, and it's why this class spends the morning on analysis rather than on prompts. --- ## Next Suggested Courses - **Data Activism** — turn data into power (this is where the data work lives now) - **Business Automation** — the same agent patterns, applied to operations - **Prompt Engineering** — add Python and deeper control - **No-Code Intro to Agents** — build autonomous agents visually --- *Last updated: August 2026* ## More recordings for this class - [Setting Up Your AI Assistant: A Step-by-Step Guide 🤖](https://www.loom.com/share/feeef3c20bf0448ab34b36bc2b209460) — Configure an AI assistant with custom instructions, memory, and a user-interviewing workflow - [Understanding Meta-Language in Storytelling](https://www.loom.com/share/6ff5a24dc0f4400ba17ca90ac5d20e4c) — Apply narrative meta-language like story circles and dramatic plots to generate structured fiction - [Creating Compelling Multi-Step Artifacts: Frameworks for Writers and Creators](https://www.loom.com/share/c85a514b3a074d57b522ac144b61b528) — Generate and refine a story outline, characters, and chapters using narrative frameworks and AI