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    Implementing Philosophy in Elementary Schools: The Washington Elementary School Philosophy Project
    Implementing Philosophy in Elementary Schools: The Washington Elementary School Philosophy Project
    Implementing Philosophy in Elementary Schools: The Washington Elementary School Philosophy Project
    Ebook94 pages1 hour

    Implementing Philosophy in Elementary Schools: The Washington Elementary School Philosophy Project

    By Ali Bassiri

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    About this ebook

    Implementing philosophy in Elementary Schools is the result of a two year collaboration project between the Washington Elementary School in San Jose, the Philosophy Department at San Jose State University, and a group of dedicated parents and volunteers. Piloted for the 2nd and 3rd grades, the result is a classroom-ready, active learning program for engaging students in critical thinking and philosophy.

    Written by teachers, professors, and the founders of the project, Principal Maria Evans and Dr. Ali Bassiri, the contents cover every aspect of preparing students for philosophy. Implementing Philosophy in Elementary Schools is the perfect supplement for districts interested in boosting oral language development, critical thinking, and persuasive writing exercises--all essential components of the Common Core Standards.

    Teachers will appreciate the easy to follow guidelines, while parents will learn how to discuss abstract topics with their children. Elementary school principals will be inspired to share this book with their staff, with an eye toward raising academic rigor for children. And, best of all, teachers will love reading comprehension strategies and discussion topics that will engage their classes in real-life dilemmas. "Implementing Philosophy in Elementary Schools" is of interest to us all--whether in class, on the playground, or around the dining room table at home.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAuthorHouse
    Release dateJun 25, 2013
    ISBN9781481766241
    Implementing Philosophy in Elementary Schools: The Washington Elementary School Philosophy Project

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      Book preview

      Implementing Philosophy in Elementary Schools - Ali Bassiri

      TABLE OF CONTENTS

      Introduction: Does Philosophy Improve Children’s Thinking?

      Chapter 1: Overview Of The Washington Elementary School Philosophy Project

      Chapter 2: Lesson Plans And Classroom Sessions

      Chapter 3: Philosophical Analysis Of Children’s Story Books

      Chapter 4: Making Everyday Discussions More Philosophical

      Chapter 5: Preparing The Classroom For Group Discussion

      Chapter 6: Assessing The Effectiveness Of Classroom Sessions

      Epilogue: Has It Been Worth It? A Principal’s Perspective

      Author Bios

      INTRODUCTION: Does Philosophy Improve Children’s Thinking?

      Thomas E. Wartenberg

      Since 2001, I have been teaching a course – Philosophy for Children – at Mount Holyoke College in which my students lead philosophy discussions at a local elementary school. I began the course at the Jackson Street Elementary School in Northampton, MA, where my son was a student. More recently, we have been working at the Martin Luther King Jr. Charter School of Excellence in Springfield, MA, a school whose students are almost all African-American and Hispanic. In fact, our eight-week philosophy class has become part of the second grade curriculum at the school.

      In order to demonstrate that elementary school children actually benefit from discussing philosophy, I undertook a research project at the Pioneer Valley Chinese Immersion Charter School in Hadley, MA. I worked with two cognitive psychologists from Boston College who knew how to effectively implement such a research program, Caren Walker and Ellen Winner. Part of the impetus behind their desire was their belief that previous studies of the impact of doing philosophy on young children had not employed the appropriate sort of experimental design. What needed to be done was to develop an experiment or research program that would be deemed adequate by the standards employed in cognitive psychology.

      First, we had to use instruments that were acknowledged to test what they sought to test and, most centrally, a control group to ensure that the changes in scores one measured in the children were not due to the maturation of the children. In addition, we had to control for the skilled teacher factor. It has been noted (Kane, Rockoff, and Staiger, 2007) that a skilled teacher has a tremendous impact upon student learner. We would have to be sure that the effect we hoped to find was not due to the skill of the philosophy teacher. Ultimately we came up with the following research project:

      We would divide a class of second graders into two groups. One group would have philosophy discussions based on a series of picture books facilitated by a student who had taken my Mount Holyoke College course, Philosophy for Children. The other group would take part in what I called an art history class, led by another former student of mine. In each art history class session, the teacher would read a picture book, but the students would be given an art project instead of taking part in a philosophy discussion. The art project asked them to create something – what that something was changed each week – in the style of the artist whose works they had seen in the picture book. After a twelve week session, the two groups were switched, so that the philosophy students would become the art history students and vice versa. The college student would stay with her group, to control for differences in their abilities if any.

      The researchers administered tests to the students three times during the year: once before we began the program; once after the first set of philosophy lessons; and once at the end of our teaching. The researchers developed a set of argumentation skills tasks based upon a method developed by Valle (2009). The children were presented with a picture book that presented conflicting sides dealing with the following child-relevant issues:

      1. metaphysical (the existence of aliens)

      2. social (boys versus girls)

      3. value (candy in school)

      4. aesthetic (classical versus rock music)

      Here is the value issue as presented in a picture book:

      Some people think that soda and candy should be sold in the lunch room in school. They think that kids should choose what they have to eat and drink. Other people think that soda and candy should not be sold in the lunch room at school. They think that adults should decide what children are allowed to eat and drink.

      The children were scored on their responses to these four questions:

      1. What do you think? Why? (4 points)

      2. Can you be sure that you are right? (1 point)

      3. Is it possible that there could be new things you could find out that could make you change your mind? (1 point0

      4. Disagreeing Alex says, No, No, No! That’s not true. Now you tell me what Alex says next. What would Alex say if he was trying to convince you that he is right? (4 points)

      The scoring was as follows:

      0 pts. Answering I don’t know

      1 pt. Choosing a side or repeating the claim (Children should not have candy in school because parents should decide what they eat)

      2 pts. Citing the word evidence or proof or providing irrelevant evidence (Children should not have candy because there is evidence that parents should decide what they eat OR Children should not have candy in school because school is for learning math)

      3 pts. Providing relevant, anecdotal evidence (Children should not have candy in school because once I got a tummy ache from too much candy)

      4 pts. For providing relevant, non-anecdotal evidence (Children should not be allowed to have candy in school because too much sugar will make them crazy and they won’t be able to sit still in class.)

      Here are the results:

      Pre-Test (before the lessons began), both groups scored approximately 15 on the argumentation test out of a possible 32 points. After the first semester intervention, the philosophy group scored an average of 21 while the art students’ scores declined slightly. At the end of the second semester, the 1st semester philosophy students scored about 22 and the 2nd semester philosophy students now raised their scores to about 21. What this shows is that taking part in a 12-week philosophy discussion improved children’s understanding of argumentation in a significant manner. This effect was durable in that it was maintained over a second semester even when there was no philosophy lesson. (A full presentation and discussion of the results can be found in [Walker, et. al. 2012]).

      When I first visited the Washington Elementary School Philosophy Project in the winter of 2012, I was very impressed. Here was a program for teaching philosophy to elementary school children that was based on my own work, but that used parents and volunteers to lead the philosophy lessons. My own innovation

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