Bias, Frames, and Missing Voices · Sitting 2
Frames Are Invisible Decisions
Every question has a frame. The frame decides what counts as an answer before you think. Models are frame-keepers.
- 40 min
- Practice · Reflect
- 15–18
Parent briefing · 5 minutes, before they sit
This sitting builds on the young version. The difference is that now the student is the one framing the question, and the model is the one trapped in it. Every prompt has a frame: assumptions about what matters, who counts, what the answer should look like. The model will not break the frame for you. It will answer within it. If the frame excludes a perspective, the answer excludes it too. The skill is to audit your own prompts before you trust the output. The prompt is not a neutral request. It is a decision about what to see.
Hard edges
- Do not let the child think the model should break the frame on its own. That is not how it works. The frame-breaker is the human.
- Avoid frames about identity politics as the first drill. Start with something concrete: a product review, a history question, a problem at school.
If they say
- “The model should know what I mean.”
- It does not. It knows what you typed. If what you typed assumed the answer, the model will assume it too. That is obedience, not understanding.
- “I don't have time to audit every prompt.”
- You do not need to audit every prompt. You need to audit the ones that matter. If it matters enough to change a decision, it matters enough to check the frame.
Objective
The student can identify the frame in a model prompt, name what the frame excludes, and rewrite the prompt with a wider frame.
The prompt is a decision
When you ask a model 'is this a good college?' you have already decided that 'good' is the frame, that colleges are the subject, and that the model should judge. You have excluded the frame 'is college the right path?' without noticing. The model will not challenge that exclusion. It will give you a rating. The rating will feel thorough because it has ten criteria. All ten are inside the frame you set. The wider question — is college the right path for this person? — is invisible to the model because you did not ask it. The frame is the decision you made before you started. The first skill is to see it. The second is to ask: what did I decide before I asked?
The model will not break the frame
If you ask 'what are the best phones?' the model will compare phones. It will not ask 'do you need a phone?' It will not ask 'would a used phone serve you better?' It will not ask 'is the phone the problem?' Those are frame-breaking questions, and the model is not built to ask them. It is built to answer. That is its job. Your job is to ask: what frame did I hand it, and what did that frame exclude? If you cannot answer that, you are not using the tool. The tool is using you.
Big idea
The prompt is a decision. The model keeps it. The frame-breaker is you.
Try this~18 min total
Audit your prompt
18 min- Write a real prompt you used recently or would use. Save the output.
- Write: FRAME. What did this prompt assume? What did it exclude?
- Rewrite the prompt with a wider frame. Save the new output.
- Compare: what did the wider frame let you see that the narrow one hid?
- Talk About It: which frame is the one you would actually use, and why?
Lesson guide
Ask after you try
After both prompts are run.
- Ask the guide: 'What did my first prompt assume?' See if it can name the frame. Then ask: 'What did my second prompt assume?' Compare. The model naming the frame is a useful check, but your audit is the real test.
- Did they name the frame in the first prompt?
- Did the wider frame reveal something the narrow one hid?
- Can they describe what the model will and will not do with a frame?
8 turns left this sitting. User-started only. Never on page load.
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Currently reading WisdomForge lesson: Frames Are Invisible Decisions.
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For the child profile
Paste this into the child’s USER.md. It names the sitting so the guide knows the context. The [v:1:e8852799] tag lets you detect if the sitting’s content has changed since you paired it.
Optional: currently working on WisdomForge sitting: Bias, Frames, and Missing Voices — frames. [v:1:e8852799]
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You are a WisdomForge emerging guide sitting beside the lesson "Frames Are Invisible Decisions". The lesson is the text. You are the guide. Hint-first. Do not recite. Do not write the work. Warm, not a friend. If the topic is hard or tender, point to a trusted adult.
Tools on
- conversation
- optional parent-approved files
Ritual reminder
Real argument. Practice. Reflect. Chat. Optional narrow search or school files. Not an adult team agent.
Fresh profile only. Never clone an adult profile. No child names, photos, or school. Hint-first. User-started. The guide does not make AI safe. You may refuse it.
Dinner table
What did we ask a tool this week where we never questioned the frame we set?
Sits beside
- Thinking. Steel-manning is a frame-break: it asks you to leave your frame.
- Science. The hypothesis is a frame. The null hypothesis is the frame-break.
Integrity. Do not pretend the model broke the frame when you did. If the wider frame was your idea, say so. The model kept both frames.