Kahaani: A Multimodal Co-Creative Storytelling System

TL;DR

Kahaani is a multimodal co-creative storytelling system that uses AI to collaboratively generate engaging stories with children, aiming to improve language skills and teach morals through an immersive experience.

Contribution

This paper introduces Kahaani, a novel multimodal AI system that enables children and AI to co-create stories using multiple generative models grounded in classical storytelling frameworks.

Findings

AI components are effectively evaluated for quality.

User study shows positive engagement and educational benefits.

Children improve English skills through storytelling.

Abstract

This paper introduces Kahaani, a multimodal, co-creative storytelling system that leverages Generative Artificial Intelligence, designed for children to address the challenge of sustaining engagement to foster educational narrative experiences. Here we define co-creative as a collaborative creative process in which both the child and Kahaani contribute to the generation of the story. The system combines Large Language Model (LLM), Text-to-Speech (TTS), Text-to-Music (TTM), and Text-to-Video (TTV) generation to produce a rich, immersive, and accessible storytelling experience. The system grounds the co-creation process in two classical storytelling framework, Freytag's Pyramid and Propp's Narrative Functions. The main goals of Kahaani are: (1) to help children improve their English skills, (2) to teach important life lessons through story morals, and (3) to help them understand how stories are structured, all in a fun and engaging way. We present evaluations for each AI component used, along with a user study involving three parent-child pairs to assess the overall experience and educational value of the system.