Philosophy for Children: Training of Teachers for the Singapore Programme

Abstract

Introduction:  The Philosophy for Children (P4C) project was initiated in January 1992 in two schools in Singapore: Pandan Primary and Bedok South Secondary.  A primary 5 class in Pandan Elementary did Pixie (Lipman, 1981) and a Secondary 2 class in Bedok South did Harry (Lipman, 1974).  In January 1993, two additional schools, Henry Park Primary and Raffles Girls Secondary, joined the programme.  I selected the P4C programme, developed by Matthew Lipman, a former professor of philosophy at Columbia, as I felt from a cognitive psychology perspective, that it was an excellent thinking programme.  Its strength lies in teaching children how to think through dialogue, through creating a community of inquiry in the classroom.  While most thinking programmes teach heuristics, the P4C programme works towards facilitating students to discuss philosophical issues for which there are no right or wrong answers (Lipman, 1991).