The social project of education always and already has a future orientation, which is filled with unrealized possibilities. In this way, educational settings serve as sites of promise and hope. This promise and hope, however, is riddled with a paradox: If the future is unknowable—and education can only occur in the known present—then how can the social project of education fulfill the promise and hope of preparing young people to realize the possibilities of an unknowable future? The purpose of this paper is to explore how educators have attempted to resolve this educating for unknown futures paradox (EUF-paradox) and push beyond it by considering whether a more expansive approach to education can broaden the horizon of what is possible in education.
ArendtH. (1958). The human condition. The University of Chicago Press.
2.
BaumeisterR. F. (2023). Pragmatic prospection, the matrix of maybe, uncertainty, and human agency. Possibility Studies & Society. https://doi.org/10.1177/27538699231178180
3.
BaumeisterR. F.VohsK. D.OettingenG. (2016). Pragmatic prospection: How and why people think about the future. Review of General Psychology, 20, 3–16. https://doi.org/10.1037/gpr0000060
4.
BeghettoR. A. (in press). Uncertainty x design: Educating for possible futures. New York: Cambridge University Press.
5.
BeghettoR. A. (2023). A new horizon for possibility thinking: A conceptual case study of Human × AI collaboration. Possibility Studies & Society. https://doi.org/10.1177/27538699231160136
BeghettoR. A.KarwowskiM.Reiter-PalmonR. (2021). Intellectual risk taking: A moderating link between creative confidence and creative behavior?Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 15(4), 637–644. https://doi.org/10.1037/aca0000323
8.
BeghettoR. A.McBainL. (2022). My favorite failure. Rowman & Littlefield.
9.
BryantR. (2022). Thresholds of possibility in uncertain times. Unpublished paper. Possibilities: A New Science of the Unlimited. A Symposium Sponsored by the John Templeton Foundation, Dublin, IR.
10.
ClaxtonG. (2008). What’s the point of school? Rediscovering the heart of education. Oneworld Publications.
11.
CraftA. (2015). Possibility thinking: From what is to what might be. In WegerifR.LiL.KaufmanJ. C. (Eds.), The Routledge international handbook of research on teaching thinking (pp. 177–191). Routledge.
12.
DatorJ. (2019). What futures studies is, and is not. In DatorJ. (Ed.), A noticer in time. Anticipation science (pp. 3–5). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-17387-6_1
13.
DeweyJ. (1910). How we think. D.C. Heath & Co.
14.
FestingerL. (1957). A theory of cognitive dissonance. Row, Peterson.
15.
GallT.ValletF.YannouB. (2022). How to visualise futures studies concepts: Revision of the futures cone. Futures, 143, 103024.
16.
GetzelsJ. W. (1964). Creative thinking, problem solving, and instruction. In HilgardE. R. (Ed.), Theories of learning and instruction (pp. 240–267). University of Chicago Press.
17.
GlăveanuV. P. (2020). Wonder: The extraordinary power of an ordinary experience. Bloomsbury Academic.
18.
GlăveanuV. P. (2021). The possible: A sociocultural theory. Oxford University Press.
19.
GlăveanuV. P.BeghettoR. A. (2016). The difference that makes a creative difference. In BeghettoR. A.SriramanB. (Eds.), Creative contradictions in education: Cross-disciplinary paradoxes and perspectives (pp. 37–54). Springer.
HolmesW.Porayska-PomstaK. (Eds.). (2022). The ethics of artificial intelligence in education: Practices, challenges, and debates. Taylor & Francis.
22.
InayatullahS. (2013). Futures studies: Theories and methods. In JunqueraF. G. (Ed.), There’s a future: Visions for a better world (pp. 33–36). BBVA.
23.
KaganJ. (1972). Motives and development. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 22, 51–66.
24.
KarwowskiM.BeghettoR. A. (2019). Creative behavior as agentic action. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 13(4), 402–415. https://doi.org/10.1037/aca0000190
ManaloE.KapurM. (2018). The role of failure in promoting thinking skills and creativity: New findings and insights about how failure can be beneficial for learning. Thinking Skills and Creativity, 30, 1–6. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tsc.2018.06.001
MulganG. (2023). Possibility space: The role of social sciences in understanding, mapping and shaping the future. Possibility Studies & Society. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/27538699231170817
32.
PólyaG. (1966). On teaching problem solving. In Conference Board of the Mathematical Sciences (Ed.), The role of axiomatics and problem solving in mathematics (pp. 123–129). Ginn.
33.
ReeceA. G.EubanksA. D.LiebscherA.BaumeisterR. (2023). Enforcing pragmatic future-mindedness cures the innovator’s bias. Journal of Applied Social Psychology. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1111/jasp.12956
34.
RenzulliJ. S.BeghettoR. A.BrandonL. E.KarwowskiM. (2021). Development of an instrument to measure opportunities for imagination, creativity, and innovation (ICI) in schools. Gifted Education International, 38, 174–193.
Samimian-DarashL. (2022). Uncertainty by design: Preparing for the future with scenario technology. Cornell University Press.
37.
SawyerR. K. (2011). (Ed.). Structure and improvisation in creative teaching. New York: Cambridge University Press.
38.
SimonH. A. (1956). Rational choice and the structure of the environment. Psychological Review, 63(2), 129–138. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0042769
39.
SimontonD. K. (2018). Defining creativity: Don’t we also need to define what is not creative?The Journal of Creative Behavior, 52(1), 80–90.
40.
SternbergR. J. (2021). Transformational creativity: The link between creativity, wisdom, and the solution of global problems. Philosophies, 6, 75. https://doi.org/10.3390/philosophies6030075
41.
TropeY.LibermanN. (2010). Construal-level theory of psychological distance. Psychological Review, 117(2), 440–463. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0018963
42.
TyackD. B.CubanL. (1995). Tinkering toward utopia: A century of public school reform. Harvard University Press.
43.
TylerR. W. (1949). Basic principles of curriculum and instruction. The University of Chicago Press.
44.
von ThienenJ.MeinelM.CorazzaG. E. (2017). A short theory of failure. Electronic Colloquium on Design Thinking Research, 17, 1–5.
45.
WigginsG.McTigheJ. (1998). Understanding by design. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
