Not My Photo

Snap! A snail. Snap! A welly. Snap! Dad's nose.

Then Ash photographs Maya mid-yawn, with her mouth absolutely enormous, and laughs and laughs.

The story

It is a sunny day in Kettlebridge and Dad has let Ash hold the phone. Ash is five and photographing everything.

Then he looks at the picture of his big sister. "Hang on a minute! Maya does not look like THAT."

Maya looks. Maya does not laugh. "That is a photo of ME," she says. "It is mine. And you did not ask."

Ash's tummy goes funny, so he does the big, strong move. He runs to Dad. "A photo of Maya belongs to Maya," says Dad. "Ask before you snap. Ask before you show."

"Sorry, Maya. Can I press the bin?" Bye bye, yawn photo.

The tell

If a photo is of somebody else, it is theirs.

Then the story does the thing that makes it stick. Ash asks properly, and Maya says yes to a photo she chose. He asks Biscuit too, who wags, which counts. He asks again before showing them to Nan. Permission stops being a rule and turns into something he does three times in a row, cheerfully, in the space of four spreads.

Reading it together

A picture book for early readers aged 5 to 7, with clear repeated language for a child reading alone and a grown-up reading aloud. Sixteen spreads and two minutes of words, fully self-contained if a child has not met the others.

Suits Reception, Year 1 and Year 2, or kindergarten and first grade.

For parents, carers and teachers

There is no live AI in this book and no data is collected from any reader. Every word was written and checked by people.

It opens easy classroom conversations about photos, sharing, permission and respect. It is one of the very few online safety ideas a five-year-old can practise the same afternoon, with a real camera and a real sibling.

Good for

Internet safety for kids framed as kindness rather than danger, which is the version that actually gets used. Online privacy for kids, starting with other people's privacy, which is the half that usually gets skipped. Cyber safety for kids at the age when a phone camera is the first device they ever touch.

Photographs of children travel further than anyone expects. A child who asks first is doing the simplest form of deepfake protection there is, and a quiet piece of AI safety for kids, years before anybody has to explain what a model is.

What your child will be able to do

Be kind with photos. Ask before you snap, ask before you show.

Curriculum

Mapped to the statutory online safety and digital literacy strands of the curricula of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland: the National Curriculum for England (Computing, and statutory Relationships and Health Education), the Curriculum for Wales (Digital Competence Framework), Scotland's Curriculum for Excellence (Technologies, and Health and Wellbeing), and the Northern Ireland Curriculum (Using ICT, and Personal Development and Mutual Understanding). Not endorsed or accredited by any government body.

The series

Book 4 of 6 in Little Safety Spotters, for ages 5 to 7. The others are The Shark on the Screen, My Name Is Mine, The Funny Feeling, The Screen Got It Wrong and That Sounds Like Nan. All six together in Safety Spotters: Six Ash Stories.

Available as an ebook and a paperback.

Free activity sheets and conversation prompts for this story at safetyspotters.com

Is it real? Let's ask.