Abstract

MENDONCA, Dina  and  COSTA-CARVALHO, Magda. The richness of questions in philosophy for children. child.philo [online]. 2019, vol.15, e43353.  Epub June 30, 2019. ISSN 1984-5987.  https://doi.org/10.12957/childphilo.2019.43353.

This paper argues that the various approaches within philosophy for children should purposefully integrate the exploration of questioning by children, instead of only presenting children with prepared questions as starting points for an inquiry session. This is particularly relevant since philosophy for children is one of the few educational settings that offer a space for children to question, as well as to explore the variation of their questions and the impact their questions have in their lives. We state that this purposeful integration of questions made by the children does justice to the inheritance of different philosophical traditions. It also reinforces questions as a privileged way for human beings to relate to the world. Thus, more than simply a methodological step in the design of a community of inquiry session, we claim that questions are a fundamental educational resource. Questions are also a central part of thinking and inquiry in a philosophical session with children. Therefore, the paper proposes a new way to leverage these tools, arguing that defining philosophy as an obsession to overcome opacity and aim for transparency (Caeiro, 2015) can help participants of the community of inquiry to identify questions that may empower dialogue in a philosophical way.

Keywords : community of inquiry; questions; opacity; transparency..

        · abstract in Portuguese | Spanish     · text in English     · English ( pdf )