ChatEDU – The AI & Education Podcast

The Best Response to AI is a Library Card | Check-In 14

Mar 26, 2026
A critique of teaching AI skills before ensuring basic literacy and critical reading. A defense of long-form literature as training for sustained attention and judgment. An introduction to a Slow AI Public Library that uses a quiz to recommend books to rebuild empathy, patience, and reading stamina. A personal test-drive of the quiz and a call to try the recommended reads.
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INSIGHT

AI Literacy Assumes Reading Skills You Might Not Have

  • Current AI literacy efforts assume users already read critically and evaluate evidence.
  • Liz Raddy highlights that frameworks ignore skills like spotting weak arguments and holding ambiguity, making AI outputs hard to vet.
INSIGHT

Deep Reading Rebuilds Attention That AI Erodes

  • Reading long-form literature builds sustained attention and cognitive muscles AI prompting erodes.
  • Liz contrasts AI's ability to generate fluent text with its weakness at producing the deeper thinking that makes texts worth reading.
ADVICE

Use Books To Rebuild Judgment And Empathy

  • Fight shallow fast prompting by prescribing books tailored to rebuild judgment, empathy, and patience.
  • The Slow AI Public Library uses a short quiz to recommend specific books that resist adaptive, preference-driven content.
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