Philosophy for Children
Philosophy for Children
Philosophy for Children
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ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF<br />
PHILOSOPHY OF<br />
EDUCATION<br />
<strong>Philosophy</strong> <strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong><br />
stella@filo.uba.ar<br />
President of the Research Centre in <strong>Philosophy</strong> <strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong> - Argentina<br />
<strong>Philosophy</strong> <strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong> is an educational proposal that makes possible children and<br />
teenagers develop their complex thinking, there<strong>for</strong>e their reasoning abilities, their critical<br />
thinking, their creative thinking and their caring thinking. It’s a systematic and progressive<br />
program especially designed to be worked with children from 4 till 18 years old in<br />
research communities. Considering the children’s interest and the topics that most instigates<br />
them, and carried out with methodological work, carefully planned and proved, that<br />
recovers their curiosity and wonder, the goal is to develop and stimulate the high order<br />
thinking in the community of inquiry. This program takes place in communities where<br />
its members work hard in order to be capable of understanding different points of view<br />
besides the intent of finding out the meaning of the world and of the society which they<br />
live in.<br />
The US philosopher Mathew Lipman, created <strong>Philosophy</strong> <strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong> in 1969, and<br />
nowadays more than 50 countries from all continents has applied its program. The goal<br />
has nothing to do with trying to convert these children and teenagers into professional<br />
philosophers, but instead, its aim is to develop and preserve their critical, creative and<br />
caring thinking and attitude. The program is based on:<br />
http://www.ffst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/<br />
1. A bunch of philosophical texts, written by philosophers that works at <strong>Philosophy</strong><br />
<strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong>, both in theory as well as practice. These reading texts represents the<br />
basis on which the philosophical discussion is built. The texts were thought and<br />
written in order to achieve the discussion, there<strong>for</strong>e, they are written with a didactic<br />
intention (that’s why we just don’t use any kind of text from the corpus of the<br />
literature, and that’s why we refuse to call them ”tales” or ”novels”. Although we<br />
avoid to use any kind of texts, we obviously use some carefully as an extra material<br />
<strong>for</strong> some discussion that are already taking place, and that was previously instigated<br />
by those philosophical texts mentioned be<strong>for</strong>e. In the same way, we sometimes use<br />
pictures, literature texts, films or any-other source we think is well suited).<br />
2. Manuals <strong>for</strong> teachers where they may find various discussion plans and exercises<br />
that facilitates the achievement of the proposed goal. Besides being a possible<br />
guide book with some suggestion, it was also written and planned to be a help<br />
M. Peters, P. Ghiraldelli, B. Žarnić, A. Gibbons (eds.)<br />
Encyclopaedia of <strong>Philosophy</strong> of Education<br />
http://www.ffst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA
<strong>for</strong> the teachers any time they need. The writing of these books presumes that we<br />
find ourselves in the presence of a program that’s not only philosophical but as<br />
well educational, which demands an ethical commitment of giving continuity to the<br />
teacher’s <strong>for</strong>mation and total chances, by the teachers and schools, to put into effect<br />
the program.<br />
3. A <strong>for</strong>mation program <strong>for</strong> teachers, that will allow them to extract all the possibilities<br />
from the texts, assuring them that the task that’s being per<strong>for</strong>med is the development<br />
of the complex thought and the philosophical discussion and not something<br />
”similar” (scientific and religious discussion, or group therapy).<br />
4. Pedagogic methodology that tends to trans<strong>for</strong>m the class into an community of<br />
inquiry.<br />
Curriculum<br />
The philosophical issues are presented in a daily language. The program has been structured<br />
in different levels, that corresponds to different ages and courses. It presents a<br />
sequential order, in such a way that the same plot is restudied in a deeper way in a higher<br />
level, and at the same time new subjects are introduced.<br />
According to the possibilities, and the children’s interests and necessities, it’s possible<br />
to organise the following schedule, that is supposed to be worked in a spiral manner and<br />
which plots should be recaptured each time more deeply.<br />
1. First approach to the methodological basic points that tends to develop the ability<br />
of communication, of expression, participation and co-operation among the kids.<br />
Concepts like ambiguity , identity, name, family, tastes, truth, lies are introduced.<br />
http://www.ffst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/<br />
2. It’s focused on the acquisition of language, attending to the rational <strong>for</strong>ms that are<br />
implicit in the kid’s daily conversation. Also puts emphasise on the intensification<br />
of the perceptive consciousness, on sharing perspectives through the philosophical<br />
discussion, in the similarities, distinctions and classifications and by thinking over<br />
it’s own daily experience.<br />
3. As soon as the kids are already familiar to the knowledge of a plural and dynamic<br />
(constant changes) reality, they are prepared to start thinking about the language.<br />
At this stage, the semantics and syntactics structures, the detection of speech vagueness,<br />
the discussion of concepts that establishes relation and philosophical notion,<br />
such as, casualness, space, individual, class, are paid more attention.<br />
4. The students are introduced into the logic field, going through not only the language,<br />
but specific areas as ethical and social research as well. All this work, as<br />
always occurs in the program, goes on according to the kids’ interests, and in no<br />
way, logic is ”taught”. Our task with the program is to work as midwives: the child<br />
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that is to be born is in the students and not in us (at least not at the moment in which<br />
we are supposed to co-ordinate the philosophical discussion, in which, as adults, we<br />
shouldn’t give our opinion, but instead make questions in order to help the students<br />
in this wisdombirth). The main reason to have <strong>for</strong>mal logic in the curriculum is to<br />
help the students finding out they can think about their own thoughts in an organised<br />
way. Formal logic contains the criteria in which one can discriminate between the<br />
valid reasoning and any other kind which it isn’t, and in this sense, it’s an important<br />
subject among all science and essential when thinking education as a way to improve<br />
the thoughts. At this phase, from a variety of situation and on the detection<br />
of applications that shows how it can be used, the discoveries and awareness of the<br />
<strong>for</strong>mal logic rules are focused. As the kids are already familiar to their own language,<br />
a <strong>for</strong>mal logic system useful <strong>for</strong> this is syllogistic logic, which main features<br />
are: consistency, or lack of contradictions, logic consequence, or the way in which,<br />
according to the rules, allows to go from one sentence to others and coherence, or<br />
the way in which the rules are in accordance in a whole united and systematic. Because<br />
of the limited application of this kind of logic, the focus on good reason are<br />
also worked, introducing in<strong>for</strong>mal logic, that permits to evaluate one’s thoughts and<br />
others in relation to the actions and happenings. This focus doesn’t present any particular<br />
rule besides insisting on the search <strong>for</strong> good reasons in a particular situation<br />
and appreciate the reasons that were offered. It’s worked with the kids accomplishing<br />
impartiality, objectivity, respect <strong>for</strong> people, being a primary aim helping the<br />
members of the research community to discover a great number of applications a<br />
structured deliberative thought presents and stimulate them to use the reflections<br />
thought actively in their lives. The main ef<strong>for</strong>t in this teaching consists in maintaining<br />
the research process and stimulate reasons’ assessment. With this process, that<br />
is supposed to be worked in a transverse way, ethical and social research field are<br />
developed.<br />
http://www.ffst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/<br />
5. The emphasis are put on the deepness of the philosophic specialisation as ethic,<br />
aesthetic, metaphysic and gnoseologic research.<br />
Each unity of the program – texts <strong>for</strong> the students and the extra material <strong>for</strong> the teachers<br />
is a thematic group that gradually introduces to the class group the personal and dialogic<br />
thought. Even though the units present a graduation in the questions difficulties that<br />
are presented, each one is independent from the other and can be administrated during<br />
one or two years to the same class group.<br />
The main objective of each book in the program is to supply the readers with elements<br />
capable of making them aware of their own thoughts and the way in which one’s thoughts<br />
may work in their lives. The book is, there<strong>for</strong>e, the starting point <strong>for</strong> the philosophical<br />
discussion.<br />
On the following page there is a <strong>Philosophy</strong> <strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong> program schedule, with the<br />
details about the texts, teacher’s manual, area belonging to and a frame with the application’s<br />
school’s levels.<br />
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Aproach to the philosophical discussion instruments<br />
In Introducción a Filosofía para Nińos. [Be<strong>for</strong>e working with the texts.]<br />
STUDENT’S TEACHER’S GUIDE- AREACOURSEAGE ALLOWANCE<br />
BOOK<br />
BOOK<br />
AGE<br />
Lis<br />
Wondering at my experience<br />
Introduction- Initial- 5 - 6 4 - 7<br />
Language 1st year<br />
<strong>Philosophy</strong><br />
Rebeca Discovering the world Language 2nd.- 6 - 8 6 – 8<br />
Phi-<br />
3rd .<br />
los-<br />
year<br />
o-<br />
phy<br />
Thinking, stories,gation<br />
Ethic and Social Investi-<br />
Ethic4th.-5th<br />
9 - 10 9–11<br />
and<br />
Social<br />
Science<br />
year<br />
Lisa Ethic Investigation Logic6th . – 11 - 12 10 - 12<br />
and 7th year<br />
Ethic<br />
Suki Writing: how and why Logic8th<br />
13 - 14 12 - 14<br />
and – 9th<br />
Aes-<br />
year<br />
http://www.ffst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/<br />
Golden city Going towards my assumption<br />
thetic<br />
Metaphysic High<br />
and school<br />
Gnoseologic<br />
15 –17 14 –18<br />
Community of Inquiry<br />
As the aim of <strong>Philosophy</strong> <strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong> is to prompt a philosophical behaviour and the<br />
children have a remarkable tendency to the verbal expression, the most appropriate pedagogic<br />
methodology is the philosophical discussion. Starting from various sources the<br />
dialogue is instigated from the basic level, once it’s an appropriate environment <strong>for</strong> the<br />
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children to express mutually their ideas, learning to listen to their partners’ response, they<br />
over come the feeling that what they have to say is absurd or out of place, confirming it<br />
with the classmates, in such a way that the experience from others is a teaching.<br />
Trans<strong>for</strong>ming the class into an community of inquiry is considered to be essential in<br />
order to stimulate the kids on thinking and behaving in a higher level than the one they<br />
would have per<strong>for</strong>med alone: a genuine community of inquiry is based on the mutual<br />
respect and on the member’s volunteer commitment to search <strong>for</strong> something in common.<br />
For ”inquiring” we understand the constant in the self correction exploration of plots that<br />
at the same time are realised as something important and problematic. From this theoretic<br />
perspective, to learn something is to learn it again with the same discovery spirit that was<br />
once experienced when it was discovered, or with the same spirit of invention that was<br />
predominant when it was invented.<br />
By the philosophical discussion in the centre of the community of inquiry, the children<br />
may achieve their own point of view and their own conclusions. <strong>Philosophy</strong> insists on the<br />
strict logic, but only as a mean to produce a more effective thinking, and not in the sense of<br />
achieving a total concordance among all the ideas. The program emphasis the discussion<br />
process and not the achievement of a particular conclusion (the process is worth, not the<br />
product). Even though no philosophical subjects are taught, the teacher must use the typical<br />
philosophical way of thinking and questioning. Gradually, the students begin to find<br />
out that a philosophical discussion presents a different pattern from any other discussion,<br />
they start to realise that they can share ideas, experience and perspectives among each<br />
other. They start to appreciate other’s point of view and realise the importance to give<br />
reasons that support their opinion. It makes sense, then, the objectivity, and the necessity<br />
of examining carefully the problems instead of getting satisfied with only expressing their<br />
ideas in a raw and superficial way, or making a monologue pretending to be a dialogue. It<br />
makes sense the philosophical discussion in an community of inquiry.<br />
http://www.ffst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/<br />
Objectives<br />
The children get wondered and ask themselves not only about them, but also about the<br />
world and the society in which they live in, and they have the necessity to find a meaningful<br />
reference frame to the puzzling realities. They try to clarify the environment by a<br />
scientific explanation, through some kind of history capable of supplying a useful interpretation<br />
in the symbolic ambit or <strong>for</strong>mulating the matter philosophically in a questioning<br />
manner. Some of the questions they usually ask are; ”What is the mind?”, ”What is reality?”<br />
, ”What are the things?”, ”What is goodness?”, What is fairness?”, based on what<br />
we know, ”what can we find out?”, and they can be considered philosophical questions<br />
(once the questions or the concepts aren’t philosophicals by itself, but in the meaning net<br />
that the research community assigns).<br />
<strong>Philosophy</strong> <strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong> proposes to promote a distinct pedagogic modality since the<br />
philosophy, in which the in<strong>for</strong>mative and the <strong>for</strong>mative make part of the same unity. The<br />
aims do not end with the development of cognitive abilities (neither is tried to develop<br />
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in steps the cognitive ability in order to accomplish next the complex thinking. As the<br />
complex thinking is developed the cognitive abilities are achieved) otherwise is orientated<br />
to <strong>for</strong>m reasonable people, in which involves a sociability instance in the reasoning<br />
.Besides the development of cognitive abilities ( abilities in reasoning, in inquiring , in<br />
conceptual analysis, in interpretation) and the work with philosophical concepts (”truth”,<br />
”justice”, ”beauty”, ”goodness”, ”language”, ”liberty”, ”identity”), the program is worried<br />
about behaviours and habits such as; developing the ability of self-correction, learning<br />
how to listen to other people, paying attention and trying hard in order to understand,<br />
asking <strong>for</strong> and giving reasons, among others. Obviously the <strong>for</strong>mative phase overtakes<br />
the philosophical domain as these abilities also belong to other areas of the knowledge.<br />
Nevertheless, these habits and behaviours are crucial <strong>for</strong> the existence of a democratic<br />
society.<br />
It’s important to teach the children how to think <strong>for</strong> themselves, so that they are capable<br />
of renovating creatively and carefully the society in which they live in, and at the<br />
same time be able to grow up in a critical, careful and creative way. By saying that education<br />
must allow the students to develop the instruments they need in order to evaluate<br />
carefully, creatively and critically the social expectations, it means that education must<br />
tend to develop human beings capable of evaluating the world and oneself, as well as<br />
expressing fluently and creatively besides caring <strong>for</strong> others.<br />
On the following some of the specific aims of <strong>Philosophy</strong> <strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong>:<br />
• <strong>Children</strong> and teenagers develop their reasoning capacity (derive inference of different<br />
kind, classify and categorize , work with coherence and contradiction, <strong>for</strong>mulate<br />
questions, identify assumptions, <strong>for</strong>mulate cause-effect relation, knowing and<br />
avoiding - or at least know how to use – language vagueness, distinguish ambiguities,<br />
recognize interdependence between means and results, define terms, identify<br />
and use criterion, exemplify, built hypothesis, context, anticipate, predict and estimate<br />
the consequences, generalize, find out in<strong>for</strong>mal deceitfulness, normalize daily<br />
language phrases);<br />
http://www.ffst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/<br />
• Develop one’s creative thinking;<br />
• Familiarize oneself with the practice of the caring thinking;<br />
• Develop one’s capacity to find out the meanings of experience (find out connections,<br />
alternatives, offer some reasons, relations between part-whole and whole-part, detect<br />
and recongnize incoherence).<br />
To achieve the development and co-ordination of these thinking abilities it’s required<br />
a gradual and systematic process, nevertheless, it’s needed a cognitive aptitude <strong>for</strong> implementing<br />
those, further than the abilities themselves. This aptitude is consisted of cooperation,<br />
trust, self-appreciation, attention, respect <strong>for</strong> people, among others. <strong>Philosophy</strong><br />
<strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong> believes these attitudes are stimulated when the class is trans<strong>for</strong>med into a<br />
dialogic seminar committed to inquiry. It’s assumed that dialogue produces cogitation;<br />
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people who participate in a dialogue have to cogitate, to concentrate in what is being said,<br />
to evaluate different alternatives, have to pay careful attention to the definitions and significance,<br />
to recognize different options that haven’t been aware of, and in general, have<br />
to per<strong>for</strong>m a great number of mental activities. Participants reproduce in their own thinking<br />
process the structure and the dialogue progress taken place in class. A thesis based<br />
on the social and cognitive psychology, that claims thinking is the interiorization of the<br />
dialogue. ”Dialogue” meaning not just any kind of conversation, but it’s referred to the<br />
dialogue in which aims an elaboration of the thinking from the contribution of others. For<br />
that reason, the community of inquiry is the place where the group’s self-appreciation and<br />
the process will be cared, in which the aptitude is meant to appreciate and criticise one’s<br />
reasoning as well as the mate’s. It will be trusted that the group’s procedures are reliable<br />
as they are self-corrected. When this becomes habitual, a following support is provided<br />
to the social and individual <strong>for</strong>ming character.<br />
Finally<br />
<strong>Philosophy</strong> <strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong> is an alive organism. There<strong>for</strong>e, it’s creator, Dr. Mathew Lipman,<br />
up-holds and stimulates each country or region to develop it’s own curriculum, according<br />
to the children’s interest and necessity, and the research and writing capacity of each <strong>Philosophy</strong><br />
<strong>for</strong> <strong>Children</strong> Centre. Dr. Lipman wrote his own curriculum, between 1969 and<br />
1980, which titles are; Elfie (6 to 7 years old), Kio and Gus (8-9 years old), Pixie (9-10<br />
years old), Harry Stottlemeier’s Discovery (11-12 years old), Lisa (11-12 years old), Suki<br />
(12- 14 years old) and Mark (15-18 years old). These texts, with their corresponding<br />
support manuals, constitute the traditional program. Some of the texts haven’t been used<br />
lately in some parts of the world. More than twenty years has passed since they were written,<br />
there<strong>for</strong>e some of them don’t instigate the students from the XXI century any more.<br />
Others experts from the program with their critical, creative and caring ef<strong>for</strong>t are elaborating,<br />
writing, and publishing new texts <strong>for</strong> the program (as it happens in Argentina), that<br />
respects, amplifies, and turns into more complex the initial idea. It continues to be caring,<br />
creative and critical, and from the contribution of the philosophy introduced in education<br />
since early ages, goes on thinking about the teachers, the students and in a better world<br />
<strong>for</strong> everyone.<br />
http://www.ffst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/<br />
References<br />
ACCORINTI, S., Introducción a Filosofía para Nińos, Buenos Aires, Manantial, 1999<br />
ACCORINTI, S., Trabajando en el aula. La práctica en Filosofía para Nińos, Buenos<br />
Aires, Manantial, 2000<br />
ACCORINTI, S., Lis, Buenos Aires, Manantial, 2000<br />
ACCORINTI, S., Maravillándome con mi experiencia, Buenos Aires, Manantial, 2000<br />
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CAM, P., Historias para pensar, trad. H. Pons, revisión técnica y adaptación S. Accorinti<br />
G. Arbonés, Buenos Aires, Manantial, 1999<br />
CAM, P., Manual de apoyo para acompańar a Historias para pensar, trad. H. Pons,<br />
revisión técnica G. Arbonés y S. Accorinti, Buenos Aires, Manantial, 1999<br />
LIPMAN, M. et al., La filosofía en el aula, trad. García Moriyón y otros, Madrid, De<br />
la Torre, 1993<br />
LIPMAN, M., Thinking in education, Cambridge University Press, 1991<br />
LIPMAN, M., Suki, trad César Aira, revisión técnica y adaptación G.Arbonés- S.Accorinti,<br />
Buenos Aires, Manantial, 2000<br />
LIPMAN, M., Escribir: cómo y por qué, trad. César Aira, revisión técnica y adaptación<br />
S.Accorinti- G.Arbonés, Buenos Aires, Manantial, 2000<br />
LIPMAN, M., Lisa, trad. H. Pons, revisión técnica y adaptación G. Arbonés - S.<br />
Accorinti, Buenos Aires, Manantial, 1999<br />
LIPMAN, M., Pensamiento complejo y educación, trad. V. Ferrer, Madrid, de la<br />
Torre, 1997<br />
LIPMAN, M., <strong>Philosophy</strong> goes to School, Philadelphia, Temple University Press,<br />
1988.<br />
LIPMAN, M., Thinking <strong>Children</strong> and Education, Iowa, Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company,<br />
1993.<br />
REED, R., Rebeca, trad. H. Pons, revisión técnica y adaptación G. Arbonés y S.<br />
Accorinti, Buenos Aires, Manantial, 1999<br />
Encyclopedia of <strong>Philosophy</strong> of Education<br />
25/03/2000<br />
http://www.ffst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/<br />
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