Tonight, make a little 3D block house for an imaginary creature: a doorway to welcome them home, a roof to keep them dry, and one detail inspired by a Magic experiment. Finish with a saved house you can reopen and a design choice your child can explain.

Time and age: about 30 minutes together, ages 5–12.

Bring: a computer or tablet that runs Blocks, an internet connection for Magic, and paper and pencils for a quick sketch. An adult stays alongside the child.

Before you start

• Keep it fictional. The adult types only invented objects into Magic, never names, addresses, schools or other personal details. Magic sends your exact text to SiliconFlow without removing names. This free project needs no account or work upload; the printables need no child's name or photo.
• Know the allowance. Free Magic allows three successful AI generations a day per network (counted by a salted IP hash), shared by everyone on the same Wi-Fi; ready-made shelf matches do not count. It resets at midnight UTC. The service also has a site-wide daily limit of 500 generations; members have no personal daily limit. If Magic is unavailable or today's allowance is used, build your detail by hand and try Magic another day.
• Save before Magic. A new Magic build replaces the canvas; it does not merge an object into your saved house. Magic tries to save the current canvas to My Builds before generation; save and check your own version first. Only “Let AI finish” adds to the current build. Later, reload your house and add a detail by hand; there is no need to merge two saved files.
• Make room and keep your work. My Builds holds 12 free builds or 20 for members. When full, use My Builds → Export to keep an existing build on your device, then free a slot. The Export build button appears only after a save failure: keep that canvas open and export it. Builds and project progress live in this device's current browser; clearing browser data can lose them. The task ticks are your family's report, not an inspection of the child's build.
• Choose your own activity. Open Free Build for this house; today's mission may ask for something else. Hugo asks for a cozy doghouse. No mission star is needed here. Magic Build can return a ready-made shelf model for familiar requests, so a match is not evidence of fresh AI generation. An unfinished Magic model can be completed by placing the invited blocks yourself or using its finish action.

1. 🏠 Build the house first · about 12 minutes

Parent, read aloud: “Let's build a house for an imaginary creature. Where is the door? How will it stay dry? You choose the shape; I can help with the controls.”

Child: Sketch a doorway and roof. Open Blocks from this page and choose Free Build. Pick a color, then place a floor, walls and roof with the on-screen controls. Leave a doorway. Turn the view to see two sides. Show your adult one choice you made, then save your first version and find it in My Builds.

In your hands: A small house you designed, with a doorway, a roof and a first saved version. A few blocks are enough to give your creature a home.

2. ✨ Try a Magic idea · about 10 minutes

Parent, read aloud: “Would our creature like a purple spiral staircase or an orange teapot beside the house? Let's try describing one, look at what comes back, and choose a detail to make our own.”

Child: Choose an object and tell your adult its shape and color. Return to the mode menu and choose Magic Build. Your adult enters “purple spiral staircase” or “orange teapot.” Compare the result with your idea: what would you keep or change? Try placing any invited blocks. Then open My Builds, load your house and build a small stairway or another detail inspired by the experiment. Save the updated version.

In your hands: Your house with one new detail, plus a comparison you can describe: “We asked for this; we chose to build that.” A hand-built idea counts too.

3. 💾 Save and explain · about 8 minutes

Parent, read aloud: “Let's find our house again and give our creature a tour. Which part did you decide? Which suggestion did we change?”

Child: Save the final version, find it in My Builds and reopen it. If you used the export route in the start notes instead, find that file on your device. Point to one feature and explain why it belongs there. Return to this page, tick the three tasks and press We finished.

In your hands: A house kept on your family device and a short tour in your child's own words. You can print the completion certificate to remember making it together.

When the design gets tricky

• So many ideas: pick just a doorway, a roof and one special feature. Give a bigger idea its own sketch for another day.
• An odd-looking result: put the sketch beside it and name one difference. Your child can borrow a useful shape or invent a better one.

Three questions about AI

1. What did AI do? Was this fresh AI generation, a ready-made model, or a hand-built fallback?
2. What did we do ourselves? Name a design decision and a block we placed.
3. Where did AI get something wrong? What did we check or change? If we did not get an AI result, what would we check next time?

The page's Print task checklist gives you a paper companion for the activity. After finishing, the certificate is a little reminder of what you made together.