Opening Teachers’ Minds to Philosophy: The crucial role of teacher education

Abstract

Why has the 'Philosophy for Children' movement failed to make significant educational inroads in Australia, given the commitment and ongoing efforts of philosophers and educators alike who have worked hard in recent decades to bring philosophy to our schools? In this article we single out one factor as having particular importance, namely, that, on the whole, teachers consider philosophical inquiry to be futile. We argue that the explanation rests with teachers' underlying epistemological beliefs and that openness to philosophy depends upon teachers being disposed to engage in the practices of reason-giving and reason evaluation, being aware of the epistemic value of such practices and, concomitantly, having highly developed reasoning skills. Drawing on both anecdotal evidence and wide-ranging research from within cognitive psychology, we go on to make a case for change within teacher education programmes.

On the epistemological features promoted by ‘Philosophy for Children’ and their psychological advantages when incorporated into RE

“…In accordance with the suggestion that P4C is situated in an epistemological paradigm that pertains neither to absolutism nor relativism, but rather to a combination of both of them (Bleazby 2011), several authors have quite recently made the link between P4C and the epistemological personal positions (Gagnon 2011;Knight and Collins 2013;Meyer 2010).…”

“…Rather, such a dialogue is precisely what should help pupils to develop evaluative skills such as a critical thinking, which is the evaluative and justifying process for determining what should reasonably be believed or done while considering criteria of choice and diversity of contexts (Gagnon 2011). This theoretical suggestion has actually been empirically validated on several occasions (see Hill 2000;Knight and Collins 2013;Lyle 2008;Meyer 2010). In particular, Meyer (2010) showed in a pre-post test intervention that students who attended courses that employed a dialogue-based community of enquiry approach during one semester were inclined to use more evaluativist thinking and less absolutist and relativist thinking in all the three domains of knowledge that were under consideration in the study (moral, physical science and social science).…”

“…Two divergent assertions are therefore legitimate and may be 'right', but one of them might be 'more right' than the other to the extent that it is better supported by arguments. Some authors, when describing evaluativism, emphasise that argument and evidence are the devices which enable assertions to be evaluated (Knight and Collins 2013;Kuhn, Wang, and Li 2011), while others talk more broadly about externally derived knowledge (Belenky et al 1986, as cited in Hofer 2008. Actually, the most central feature of evaluativism is the fact of evaluating, rather than the criteria chosen to do so, as expressed by Krettenauer (2005, 186) who said that different ideas and viewpoints 'can be evaluated or criticised without appealing to an ultimate truth.…”

What is ‘philosophy’? Understandings of philosophy circulating in the literature on the teaching and learning of philosophy in schools

“…In his 2018 paper, Cam seems to speak of this practice as 'higher-order thinking' (p. 62). Knight and Collins (2014) also speak about philosophy as thinking, which can be actively improved, noting that philosophy has 'a rigour and depth characteristic of good thinking' (p. 1291). For Weber and Wolf (2017), this rigour and depth manifests itself as a hermeneutic process that continuously scrapes away the layers of assumptions that adhere to our concepts, values and beliefs (p. 80).…”

Development of a Primary School Teacher on The Philosophy with Children: An Action Research

“…Moreover, some papers examined its relationship with cognitive, affective, and social skills (Daniel & Aurıac, 2011;Fisher, 2001;Gruioniu, 2013). Furthermore, some theoretical studies addressed the role and training of the teacher in philosophy with children approach (Farahani, 2014;Haynes & Murris, 2011;Knight & Collins;Lone, 2013;Wartenberg, 2009). Additionally, several studies have been conducted in Turkey on the PwC approach.…”