Educating Through Philosophy: Critical Thinking and Meaningful Dialogue
by
Abstract
This paper highlights the value of philosophy as a tool for reflection and critical thinking, emphasising its epistemological dimension as a lifelong approach to inquiry and scientific reasoning. The central research question concerns the importance of educating through philosophy, fostering conceptual understanding, the pursuit of truth, the construction of arguments, and engagement in a philosophical dialogue within educational curricula that incorporate philosophy for children. Part of the argument focuses on highlighting the presence of philosophical education since antiquity. The conclusions indicate that children perceive philosophy as a distinct way of thinking, corresponding to concepts and justified beliefs. The framework of the paper’s approach is based on ancient Greek philosophy, the Socratic method, the homo mensura protagorean principle, the intellectual movement of the Sophistic Enlightenment, and the Platonic dialectic. The study’s primary contribution lies in promoting “inquiry into the meaning of concepts,” a key benefit of the P4C (Philosophy for Children) initiative, which fosters critical and philosophical thinking skills of growing importance in the modern world.
Published in
Licensing Information
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non–Commercial No Derivatives License which permits noncommercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of the Publisher must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work.
