Possibility literacy: Navigating AI's Productive Paradoxes in Education

A framework that helps educators cultivate critical thinking, ethical reasoning, and creativity—essential skills for an AI-driven future

Thanks Kimberly!

Excerpt: "Technology has always shaped education, but artificial intelligence represents something fundamentally different. Unlike previous tools that extended human capabilities in predictable ways, AI transforms our relationship with possibility itself. It doesn't just help us do what we already do more efficiently; it reshapes what we can imagine, create, and understand.

Education has always been about possibility—expanding students' horizons, developing their capabilities, and opening pathways to new understandings. Yet our educational systems simultaneously expand and constrain these possibilities through the choices we make in curriculum design, assessment methods, and classroom structures. The arrival of artificial intelligence in education heightens this tension, creating what I call a "possibility crisis" in our classrooms.

Our conventional educational approaches have increasingly privileged compliance over creativity. Standardized assessments, rubric-driven assignments, and predetermined learning outcomes—while valuable for consistency—have narrowed the landscape of possibility. Students have learned to prioritize meeting expectations over developing authentic intellectual engagement."