Teaching Philosophy to Children? Absolutely!
In this TEDx talk, Peter Worley of The Philosophy Foundation defends the notion that children can do philosophy:"Children CAN do philosophy, but they tend to struggle when they're on their own, or when there's just two of them, because they lack the variety of responses that are necessary to sustain a philosophical conversation. However, if you take 20 children...then they start to have the variety of responses that are needed, and with a little bit of facilitation, they can also have the right kinds of responses.
"...[Children] learn to have what Socrates called the 'silent dialogue', this conversation that we have in our own heads when we think things through."
- Peter Worley, TEDx talk 'Plato Not Playdoh'
So here's the real question: Why should children (or anyone else, for that matter) learn to think in this way?
ReplyDeleteBecause then our mind thinks in a dialectical way, which means, that we're going to challenge/examine our own thinking - whether it is something we have learned or it is something we thought ourself. The goal is, to deepen the understanding of yourself and the world around you byou learning critical thinking and formulate not just an opinion, but strong arguments for your statements. I think, it's a little bit like Platos Cave and, to counter your question: do we want to be blind and not going on an adventure to find something like truth?
ReplyDelete