The Routledge International Handbook of Philosophy for Children

Maughn Rollins Gregory, Joanna Haynes, Karin Murris, Maughn Rollins Gregory, Joanna Haynes, Karin Murris

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9781138847675
• eBook ISBN: 9781317537472
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

This rich and diverse collection offers a range of perspectives and practices of Philosophy for Children (P4C). P4C has become a significant educational and philosophical movement with growing impact on schools and educational policy. Its community of inquiry pedagogy has been taken up in community, adult, higher, further and informal educational settings around the world.

The internationally sourced chapters offer research findings as well as insights into debates provoked by bringing children's voices into moral and political arenas and to philosophy and the broader educational issues this raises, for example:

• historical perspectives on the field
• democratic participation and epistemic, pedagogical and political relationships
• philosophy as a subject and philosophy as a practice
• philosophical teaching across the curriculum
• embodied enquiry, emotions and space
• knowledge, truth and philosophical progress
• resources and texts for philosophical inquiry
• ethos and values of P4C practice and research.

The Routledge International Handbook of Philosophy for Children will spark new discussions and identify emerging questions and themes in this diverse and controversial field. It is an accessible, engaging and provocative read for all students, researchers, academics and educators who have an interest in Philosophy for Children, its educational philosophy and its pedagogy.

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PART I

The democratic nature of Philosophy for Children

Introduction

The community of philosophical inquiry (CoI) has developed as the signature pedagogy of Philosophy for Children and an expression of its democratic values. In theory, it offers a framework for collaborative exploration of significant questions, for freedom of thought and speech, for participatory dialogue, and for collaborative self-governance. In practice, P4C presents major challenges. This section of the Handbook asks: ‘What claims can be made for P4C in respect of education for democratic citizenship?,’ ‘What are the conditions for, and obstacles to, participation in communities of philosophical enquiry?,’ and ‘Is the CoI a community of talk or action?’ The chapters here are preoccupied, on the one hand, with the potential of P4C’s methods and educational project and, on the other hand, the limitations of the community of inquiry, its micro-politics, the ‘blind spots’ of facilitators, and the constraints of classrooms.

In ‘The community of philosophical inquiry: A pedagogical proposal for advancing democracy,’ Pat Hannam and Eugenio Echeverria draw on John Dewey’s explication of democracy as well as concepts of freedom, plurality and action in the political philosophy of Hannah Arendt. They argue that the community of philosophical inquiry is a model of educational praxis which can advance conditions necessary for democracy, because of its invitation to participants to think deeply and listen to each other in a form of open and intentional deliberation, understood as growing over time, and strengthening the possibility for good judgment. They illustrate this argument with accounts of P4C projects in the UK, in Mexico and in a number of Latin American countries: applications of CPI in schooling, youth and community contexts.

In ‘“No go areas”: racism and discomfort in the community of inquiry,’ Darren Chetty and Judith Suissa raise questions about the practice of Philosophy for Children from the experience of teaching philosophy in racially diverse school and university classrooms. Drawing on the critical philosophy of race, critical whiteness studies and social justice pedagogy, they argue that, despite references to equality and diversity, there are significant omissions in P4C literature and practice related to questions of race and racism. They propose that engaging with, and staying with, the discomfort prompted by discussions around race and racism is vital to any serious reflection and/or action on the democratic and social justice values of P4C.

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Students’ engagement with questions of racism and conflict is also a theme of Amber Makaiau’s chapter, ‘A citizen’s education: The Philosophy for Children Hawai‘i approach to deliberative pedagogy.’ This chapter offers an account of the author’s qualitative case study of her practice in Hawai‘i, which was informed by Myles Horton and Paolo Freire’s notion of a citizen’s education. In working out the relationship between a high school citizenship curriculum developed through a CoI approach and wider issues of young people’s participation in a democracy, Makaiau reflects on the relationships between social justice, classroom dialogue and a community of action.

In the final chapter of this section, ‘Authority, democracy and philosophy: The nature and role of authority in a philosophical community of inquiry,’ Olivier Michaud and Riku Välitalo consider the paradox of educational authority in an approach such as P4C, purporting to be related to democratic education. They ask whether, by abandoning the traditional authoritative position in the classroom, the CoI facilitator is abandoning any form of authority or, rather, transforming authority into something else. They are concerned to discover the shape this takes and, following Dewey, propose a model of shared authority.

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1

THE COMMUNITY OF PHILOSOPHICAL INQUIRY (P4C)

A pedagogical proposal for advancing democracy

Eugenio Echeverria and Patricia Hannam

Introduction

This chapter aims to make a contribution to the educational debate about the democratic nature of the Community of Philosophical Inquiry (CPI). It recognizes that there is disagreement theoretically and in practice about what this actually means and engages with two particular lines of argument. The authors support the proposal that the CPI is a model of educational praxis which can enable the conditions necessary for democracy to exist (see Sharp and Splitter 1995; Lipman 1998a). By this we mean that the CPI offers an important educative possibility for not only advancing communicative rather than individualistic notions of autonomy (Code 2006), but also for advancing the conditions necessary for social justice and especially freedom (Arendt 1998) to be possible. Lipman’s (for example 1998a) and Sharp’s (for example 2009) view, which we support, was that philosophy, because of its capacity to enable people to think more deeply (Lipman 1998a: 7), would help to form the necessary social dispositions in children and young people that would enable them to improve their capacity to make good judgments (see Sharp 2007), and consequently the capacity for decision making necessary in a democracy.

Building the argument for the CPI from Lipman and Sharp and their view that it should be understood as democratic praxis, by drawing on Dewey and Arendt, this chapter concludes that the CPI can make a significant difference to the life of a plural democracy. Through examples, we demonstrate that the CPI can equip children and young people with the tools to become more critical and to develop a more social and global consciousness (Hannam and Echeverria 2009), thus enabling them to enter the world of adults to take an active role in ‘the shaping of a democratic society’ (Sharp 1993: 343)

In what ways is the Community of Philosophical Inquiry democratic?

An investigation of the literature (for example Thompson and Echeverria 1987; Kohan 2002, 2011; Vansieleghem 2005; Biesta 2011) reveals two broad areas of disagreement regarding the democratic nature of the CPI. The first is about the possibilities of philosophy in education and whether it has the capacity to ‘produce an individual with certain qualities and skills’ (Biesta 2011: 317; see also Kohan 2002: 11). The second area of disagreement is educational and around the ‘instrumentalist tendencies in the educational use of philosophy’ (Biesta 2011: 317), or as Vansieleghem (2005) expresses it a possible ‘instrumentalized nature’ (p. 19) of the CPI. Murris (2008: 675) considers Lipman to have shared this concern. Although it is not possible in the confines of this chapter to enter into the full discussion here, the problem turns in part around whether the CPI should be understood in instrumentalist terms. This is because of concern that an instrumentalized view, where outcomes are pre-determined and thus possibly linked with coercive tendencies, cannot be congruent with an educative process aiming to advance democratic ways of being.

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This chapter argues that the CPI, in the Lipman/Sharp tradition (see for example Lipman 1988, 1993a, 1998a, 2003; and Sharp 1993, 2007), sometimes known as ‘Philosophy for Children’ or ‘P4C,’ is best understood as an educative praxis with democratic purposes. By praxis we mean an intervention that intentionally opens up the conditions for change, and the deliberate change intended is to enable children and young people to exist in the world as an integral part of a well-informed democratic citizenry. Our point is that the process at work in the CPI, especially the extended dialogue inquiring into a philosophical question, can contribute to the cultivation of a well-informed democratic citizenry. This is because of its capacity to engage people of all ages in conceptual controversy, through clear thinking in dialogue with others, and ultimately it is because philosophy is a ‘horn of plenty’ (see Lipman 1998a: 6) with these kinds of facets. The authors understand citizenship as a way of existing in a plural democracy, rather than something to be possessed in a phenomenological sense. Democratic living is therefore understood as a way of living that connects individuals to each other and their society, and to an awareness of the need for social reconstruction. The authors share Lipman’s (see for example Lipman 1998a, 2003) and Sharp’s intention for the CPI to be understood as democratic education and not only as education for democracy. We understand education for democracy as something with a presupposed and agreed set of values, beliefs, morals and perceptions to be talked about and learnt in school (see Burgh 2010). The CPI we understand rather as an opportunity for people to live and experiment with deliberative democracy, bringing it into existence in a range of ways within and beyond the school walls. Indeed, Lipman (1998a) cites Dewey’s notion of deliberation as an ‘imaginative rehearsal for future activities’ (p. 7) and this idea strongly informs the argument in this chapter.

Lipman drew on Dewey and we also highlight his position in developing our argument here. For Dewey (see for example 1966) democracy was more than a form of government, ‘it is a mode of associated living, of conjoint, communicated experience’ (quoted in Lipman 2003). When Dewey talks about a strong democracy, what he means is a process of community formation founded on deliberative communication. This is very similar to what we see happening in schools that include the CPI within their pedagogical project. The intention (see for example Lipman 1998b) of the dialogical discussions is to build together, to try to understand each other and in cases when views are opposed to try to reach a position where all benefit from the outcome in the end. The concern is not only for participation but also the quality of participation: to recognize possibilities for the range of voices both within and beyond the community. What is often found in situations where the CPI is at work, is development of dispositions necessary to live well in a democracy such as a willingness to listen, to be open to alternatives and a readiness to reason as a means to confront and resolve complex issues.

To be sure, in asserting that the ‘community of inquiry constitutes a praxis’, Sharp (1993: 342) indicates she regards the ‘reflective communal action’ itself as a ‘means of personal and moral transformation’ (ibid.) leading to a growth in the emotional maturity (Sharp 2007) necessary for democratic living. It is clear, however, that Lipman also saw the CPI as representing ‘education of the future as a form of life that has not yet been realized and as a kind of praxis’ (1988: 17). Nevertheless, the question remains as to whether this is an intentional outcome of CPIs. For if this outcome is in some way contrived, there remains a risk of the accusation of coercion and this being education for a fixed idea of democracy rather than democratic education. At this point we look to Arendt to see whether her work on speech and action can help us explain how the inquiry itself is enabling ‘political’ action (Arendt 1998). Arendt develops an argument distinguishing action from work or labour. Work and labour, although necessary for life, are not enough since it is ‘men and not Man’ (p. 7) who live on the earth; it is action that enables each of our uniqueness to exist. For ‘if men were endlessly reproducible repetitions of the same model, whose nature or essence was the same for all and as predictable as the nature or essence of any other thing’ we would be replicas and not human beings. So it is that she insists that ‘(p)lurality is the condition of human action because we are all the same, that is, human, in such a way that nobody is ever the same as anyone else who ever lived, lives, or will live’ (p. 8). It is precisely this plurality that is found in the CPI and because of this, action is possible.

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Nevertheless, as Lipman (1993b) explains, the practicality of the CPI owes very much to Dewey. According to Dewey an idea must be tested and final judgment withheld until it has been applied to the situation or state of affairs for which it was intended. Furthermore, ‘no inquirer can keep what he finds to himself or turn it into a merely private account’ (Dewey 1999: 75). Thus there is an interesting consequence of bringing Dewey’s thinking together with Arendt. It becomes possible to conceptualize the testing of ideas through speech in the dialogue, by the unique people comprising the plurality which is the CPI, and understood in Arendtian terms as action. Further, since it is action in the condition of plurality that makes the political space possible, the CPI can itself be understood as part of the public or political sphere.

The philosophical position of the Community of Philosophical Inquiry

There is broad consensus that the CPI is a proposal which has a particular philosophical position in relation to education (for example Lipman 1988, 1991, 1993a; Rojas (in press)). This means it has a position not only regarding philosophy, drawing heavily but not exclusively on pragmatism, but also and importantly, regarding the purpose of education, enabling the CPI to bridge both worlds without compromising either. Our position is that philosophy, understood as a discipline that comes out of the need to wonder about and question reality, means our ways of understanding and knowing and existing in that reality such as ‘reflection, deliberation and action’ (De la Garza 1995: 65) are central. Also that the CPI not only has a philosophical position on education theoretically, but also in relation to educational practice; that is, what actually happens in school and beyond. Taken together the CPI has the potential to be both an epistemic and a curriculum trigger, whereby the adults interacting with the children in their CPIs bring children to attend, reflect and deliberate together on and about questions that matter to them. Here deliberation is understood as related to action in Arendtian terms (see for example Arendt 1961, 1998), and will result in personal and political transformation (Sharp 1993) as discussed above (Sharp 2007).

This form of deliberation needs to be understood as growing over time between those who participate in the enquiry. An important part of the epistemic nature of the CPI is falliblism, which in practice looks like a willingness to be humble (see for example Gregory 2011: 207), a kind of doubt and openness to new ideas. Theoretically falliblism is an important part of the epistemological theory known as pragmatism, and it underpinned Lipman’s (1998b) and Sharp’s work as they formulated Philosophy for Children. In the environment of the CPI in a school, this entails an...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• The Routledge International Handbook of Philosophy for Children
• The Routledge International Handbook Series
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• About the Editors
• List of Contributors
• Editorial Introduction
• Acknowledgements
• Part I The Democratic Nature of Philosophy for Children
• Part II Children and Childhood in Philosophy for Children
• Part III What is Philosophical About Philosophy for Children?
• Part IV The Community of Inquiry in Action: Epistemology and Pedagogy
• Part V The Aesthetics of Philosophy for Children: Bodies and Spaces
• Part VI Philosophical Texts and Philosophy for Children
• Part VII Philosophy in Schools
• Part VIII Research Directions and Methods in Philosophy for Children
• Index