Comments on: Why we should teach philosophy to kids

By: Benoit Essiambre

Benoit Essiambre — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

That’s very interesting. Schools should teach children about ways to reason, learn and be creative with knowledge. Too often, when they try to teach effective learning methods, they tell the students that learning is about shutting down distractions and isolating themselves with compulsory literature to concentrate and slowly absorb material hours at a time. Although spending time studying helps to learn, if the person doing it doesn’t know how to ask themselves the right questions allowing them to understand and remember, studying can become very ineffective, discouraging and boring. The Socratic method allows children to learn how to learn. I cringe when I see educators trying to improve their programs by prescribing more time studying or receiving lectures. In my opinion it’s disrespectful to tell children to spend a lot of time studying without providing them the means to make their efforts useful and efficient. Children are not stupid. They do value their time and notice when adults force them to waste it.

By: carl heneghan

carl heneghan — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

When evaluating information on interventions one should consider the biases introduced by the use of non randomized controlled trials. In healthcare results are over inflated on average by 40% when inadequate randomization procedures occur. For those interested in historical biases in research the James Lind library offers one of the best resources for discovering how research can literally pull the wool over your eyes. That is not to say that the teaching of philosophy is a bad thing. However, the following issues are important, how pragmatic and how practical is the intervention? Often replication proves impossible. In healthcare what we would want to know is the clinical significance not the statistical significance. The two are very different; the same applies in education, what benefit can you expect to obtain for your child? Often it is very little. In determining whether an intervention is worth pursuing the principles of critical appraisal should be applied.

By: Ken Dzugan

Ken Dzugan — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

For those that are intrigued about using the Socratic method in schools I suggest that you read Mortimer Adler’s “The Paideia Proposal: An Educational Manifiesto.” Written in 1982, it was a radical redesign for schools built around a weekly Socratic Seminar. There are a few–far too few–Paideia schools in existence today and several Centers that train teachers in becoming Paideia teachers. The first book was followed by “Paideia Problems and Possibilities: A Consideration of the Questions Raised by The Paideia Proposal,” in 1983 and the “The Paideia Program: An Educational Syllabus,” in 1984. To Learn more about Dr Adler and his work in Education, Philosophy, Adult Learning and many other areas visit the Center for the Study of The Great Ideas website and http://www.TheGreatIdeas.org.

Ken Dzugan, Senior Fellow and Archivist
Center for the Study of The Great Ideas

By: Kartik Agaram

Kartik Agaram — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

The title is misleading, I think. The improvements are due to the socratic method of question and answer, and not what it is used to teach.