Introduction

Philosophy for Children
Philosophy for children began in America in the 1960's and was developed from the ideas and writings of Matthew Lipman. In Philosophy for Children students begin by reading specially written texts in the form of stories. These stories are about fictional children who discover how to reason more effectively. Afterwards children in the classroom then discuss the issues raised. The following debate encourages children to begin to think more effectively and become more reflective.1

Although we gather our starting points from a wider range of sources including; authentic storybooks, drama and role-play, art, video and real life experiences, the essential format and the aims of philosophy with children remain the same.

The Role of Philosophy at Tuckswood
At Tuckswood philosophical debate underpins the ideas and values of the way we believe our school should be. We aim to create an environment, which provides opportunities for everyone working in it (adults and children) to be the best they can. Children need to feel safe and happy and have the freedom to explore ideas, and ask questions if they are to make a useful contribution to all areas of school life. Philosophy is also an important way of teaching and developing thinking skills. Thinking skills are now embedded in the National Curriculum and complement the key skills. They are identified as crucial because: "by using thinking skills pupils can focus on 'knowing how' as well as 'knowing what' - (they are effectively) learning how to learn."2

Philosophy and the Curriculum
Philosophy lessons take place once a week in every classroom in the school. The length of the lesson depends on the age of the children and the topic being discussed, typically they last for between forty minutes and an hour and half. It is untrue that young children can only concentrate for short periods of time and we have found that one of the major benefits of philosophy sessions is that the children's sustained listening skills and concentration levels improve considerably.

Although it is a distinct lesson, the teaching of philosophy has a positive impact all areas of the curriculum3 including:

• English En1: Speaking, listening, group discussion and interaction, language variation.
  
• Maths Ma1: Problem solving.
  
• Science Sc1: Scientific enquiry, investigation skills, ideas and evidence.
  
• Information & Communication Technology: Develop ideas, exchanging and sharing information.
  
• History: Historical enquiry and interpretation. Geography: Enquiry skills.
  
• Art & Design: Exploring and developing ideas, evaluating and developing work.
  
• Music: Appraising skills, listening, and applying knowledge.
  
• Physical Education: Evaluating and improving performance.
  
• PSHE & Citizenship: Developing confidence and responsibility and making the most of their abilities, preparing to play an active role as citizens, developing good relationships and respecting the differences between people.

Creating a New Balance
It is important that philosophy, thinking skills and other forms of creative education are not taught at the expense of literacy and numeracy but rather as complementary skills. In recent years there has been a tendency to stress the importance of basic skills and this has been reflected in a reorganising of the school day to accommodate the introduction of the literacy and numeracy hours. We strongly support the need for high standards in these areas. But it is important to strike a balance between teaching children the basic skills in reading, writing and maths and giving them the opportunities to be creative and explore their own ideas and capabilities.

This has been recognised by the Government, in its 1997 White Paper, Excellence in Schools:

If we are to prepare successfully for the twenty-first century we will have to do more than just improve literacy and numeracy skills. We need a broad, flexible and motivating education that recognises the different talents of all children and delivers excellence for everyone.4

Philosophy provides an arena for discussion, for asking questions and for seeking possible answers. It gives children the time and opportunity to think, talk and be really listened to. It demonstrates the difference between a disagreement and a personal attack. Philosophy teaches children to respect the ideas and opinions of others and to listen and build on those ideas, to be collaborative and to stand up for what they believe in.

"Each child has a spark in him/her. It is the responsibility of the people and institutions around each child to find out what would ignite that spark."
Howard Gardner

"Intellectual virtue is based on how we ought to behave with others... both wishing to improve the quality of our beliefs. It is seeking truth, seeking more critically defensible views, or just learning from each other."
Victor Quinn

Aims

Life Long Learning
As a school it is our aim to develop the ëwhole' child, to help him or her to realise their full potential and to become a lifelong learner. As Ken Robinson (1999) has pointed out, a prerequisite for life long learning is sustained motivation towards self-improvement.5 Children need to develop an enjoyment of learning and a desire to explore ideas through discussion and enquiry. Our aim in philosophy is to give children the opportunity to develop the necessary skills and understanding that will enable them to do this and to create a community of enquiry where children have the freedom to ask questions.

In order to create this community we aim:

• To create an environment where children feel happy to share their ideas and beliefs with others. To discuss these ideas and either defend them or change them if convinced by the arguments of others.
• To develop a respect for the ideas, thoughts and beliefs of others. To listen and not interrupt and to begin to build on those ideas.
• To improve the quality of those ideas, thoughts and beliefs through discussion and critical evaluation.
• To create some understanding of the learning process, to think about thinking and to evaluate learning, so children can become more independent learners.
• To create an environment where children really feel that they are being listened to. Where their ideas and feelings are not dismissed as trivial or unimportant.
• To give children a sense of ownership and autonomy over their ideas.
• To allow children the opportunity to work as part of a group, discussing and working together to meet a challenge.
• To promote an understanding of the importance of giving good reasons for an argument and not being simply dogmatic.

Questions
Children are asked a great number of questions in the classroom. These can fall into a number of categories (Victor Quinn has named thirteen), but it is simpler here to identify just two.

The most common are right answer questions, that is questions the teacher knows the answer to and asks to find out who else knows. These are are closed questions, and broadly come in two different varieties;

Guessing questions (questions with little point): 'Can anyone guess how many bricks there are in the great pyramid?'

And

Right answer questions (questions that make you think): 'What is it about the scarab beetle that fascinated the Egyptians so much?'

Although there is obvious value in the second kind of questioning (and little in the first), philosophical and creative questioning is of a different order. These are open questions and again come in two different varieties: 

Questions for debate (open questions that have an answer, but we need to discuss what it is): 'how would you organise a new society before it had established laws?'

And

Philosophical questions (questions that do not have a difinitive answer): 'What is the nature of evil?' 'Can a person ever be free in a society with laws', 'What is love?'

It is important to bear in mind that philosophical questions are only important as a starting point. In philosophical questioning there are no real answers, only points of agreement and what really matters is not the destination, but the journey of enquiry along the way.

Therefore, in philosophy sessions we further aim:

• To challenge children and give them questions that make them think.
• To create an environment where children ask difficult questions and stand up to authority, including teachers, not by quarrelling or insolence, but by reason and argument.
• To give children the opportunity and time to ask and think reason and debate.
• To help children develop an understanding that there are some questions to which there is no answer.

Imaginative Play
Philosophy is a form of imaginative play. Along with drama, music and other creative activities, philosophy gives children the opportunity to explore their own minds, to try out ideas and to take chances. Ken Robinson has argued that:

"Studies into the development of the brain suggest that the new-born and infant child have enormous latent capacity. The extent to which these are encouraged in the first years of life has a crucial bearing on the development of the brain itself... This is not a matter of capacity but of exposure. If these capacities are not exercised, the neurological patterning, the hard wiring of the brain, is allocated to other purposes... . Because early development provides a foundation for all subsequent learning, opportunities lost in the early years of life are difficult, if not impossible to regain. Consequently the nature of early years education is as important as the fact of it. In our terms, it is particularly important in the early years to encourage imaginative play and discovery learning as essential processes of intellectual, social and emotional development."6 Ken Robinson

Other research has shown the brain learns best when the experience engages the emotions and links with the child's values. If the lesson is exciting enough and catches the imagination then the brain will consider it important and is more likely to become engaged. Trevor Hawes and Sara Shaw have identified this process as WIIfm 'What's in it for me?'7.

In light of this we further aim:

• To provide for children throughout the school opportunities to explore ideas and emotions through imaginative play, in Philosophy and in other lessons across the curriculum, including a development in our provision of music and drama.
• To plan and teach creatively, to use imaginative approaches and to make lessons challenging and interesting

Practice

Thinking Skills
Six key skills have been identified in the introduction to National Curriculum 2000 as being important to the improvement of learning and proformance among young children. We have found Philosophy to be an effective method for teaching four of these skills:

• Communication: Speaking, listening, understanding and responding to others, particularly in group discussions. To build on the ideas of others and take thinking forward by means of a community of enquiry.
• Working with others: Contributing to small-group and whole-class discussion, and working with others to meet a challenge. Developing social skills and a growing awareness and understanding of others' needs.
• Improving own learning and performance: Pupils reflecting on and critically evaluating their work and what they have learnt and identifying ways to improve their learning and performance. Identifying the purpose of learning, reflecting on the processes of learning, assessing progress in learning, identifying obstacles or problems in learning and planning ways to improve learning.
• Problem Solving: Developing the skills and strategies that will help them to solve problems they face in learning and in life. Identifying and understanding a problem, planning ways to solve a problem, monitoring progress in tackling a problem and reviewing solutions to problems.

Philosophy is also an effective way of teaching thinking skills; these are five further skills which complement the key skills and are also embedded in the National Curriculum.8

• Information-processing skills: Locating and collecting relevant information, sorting, classifying, sequencing, comparing and contrasting, analysing part/whole relationships.
• Reasoning skills: Skills which enable pupils to give reasons for opinions and actions, to draw inferences and make deductions, to use precise language to explain what they think, and to make judgements and decisions informed by reasons or evidence.
• Enquiry skills: Skills which enable pupils to ask relevant questions, to pose and define problems, to plan what to do and how to research, to predict outcomes and anticipate consequences, and to test conclusions and improve ideas.
• Creative thinking skills: These enable pupils to generate and extend ideas, to suggest hypothesis, to apply imagination, and to look for alternative innovative outcomes.
• Evaluation skills: Skills which enable pupils to evaluate information, to judge the value of what they read, hear or do, to develop criteria for judging the value of their own and others' work or ideas, and to have confidence in their judgements.

1 http://www.montclair.edu/Pages/IAPC/IAPC.html

2 Dfee. The National Curriculum, Handbook for primary teachers in England (London, 1999) p.22.

3 The National Curriculum, Handbook for primary teachers in England (London, 1999).

4 Department for Education and Employment. Excellence in Schools (HMSO, London) 1997.

6 Department for Education and Employment. All Our Futures; Creativity, Culture & Education. (HMSO, London) 1999, pp. 76 & 77.

7 Sara Shaw & Trevor Hawes. Effective Teaching and Learning in the Primary Classroom, a practical guide to brain compatible learning. (1998).

8 Dfee. The National Curriculum, Handbook for primary teachers in England (London, 1999) p.22.