A new open-access study published on 10 March 2026 in the journal AI, Brain and Child proposes Blockchain-Enhanced AI Literacy, or BEAL, a framework developed by Meysam Abedi, Ismaila Temitayo Sanusi and Markku Tukiainen that embeds a blockchain directly into the learning environment so children can see who created a piece of AI content, when it was made, and whether an expert checked it. The authors argue blockchain’s decentralization, immutability and transparency can serve as a pedagogical tool rather than an administrative one, turning the ledger into a front-end learning interface: children click a “Verify Source” button on AI-generated content and a visual timeline appears showing the creator, the date, and whether the item has been reviewed. The design rests on three principles—Tangible Trust, Experiential Privacy and Explainable Systems—and three layers: a user interface with an AI Storyteller, a Content Verifier and a “My Data Vault” dashboard; a logic and pedagogy layer holding a local on-device AI model, an explainability engine and smart contracts; and a trust and privacy layer containing the blockchain ledger, a federated learning aggregator and a differential privacy module. The study followed a design-based research approach adapted to pilot scale, with one comprehensive cycle involving experts and one involving children; in the first cycle, a panel of 10 to 12 experts evaluated a low-fidelity alpha prototype, and feedback on pedagogical effectiveness was