Research on using generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) chatbots in learning environments continues to underpin research in and out of academia. However, GenAI text-to-video (T2V) models have not been adequately investigated in academia, mostly due to their novelty. That means their potential to improve learning remains to be determined. This study contributes to bridging this gap by investigating how GenAI T2V models can foster idea generation during brainstorming. The participants are two groups (experiment and control) of college freshmen, with one group presented with AI-generated videos during brainstorming. Data gathered from the participants' screen recordings, individual notes, a questionnaire, and an assessment of brainstormed ideas to determine whether the participants in the experiment group benefited from the background and narrative elements of the AI-generated videos showed that more ideas were generated within a shorter time, and the videos were perceived to be useful and of high quality. Though the findings did not overwhelmingly support an empirically informed case for deploying GenAI T2V models in descriptive writing, they have significant implications for teachers, students, and institutions of higher learning.