Book Review: Maria Miraglia reviews Roberto Franzini Tibaldeo, Matthew Lipman and Ann Margaret Sharp: Philosophy for Children’s Educational Revolution

Abstract

Introduction: If I had to define this volume with only one expression, I would use the word “dense”. When I read an essay, I usually highlight or underline the salient points to consider for a more systematic study. However, as I was reading, I realized that I was underlining pretty much the whole text. Indeed, there is no part in which the difficult journey of the reconstruction of the pedagogical methodology and the fruitful encounter between Lipman and Sharp is not worthy of note, with the author adding, paragraph after paragraph, an important element for the understanding of the complexity and novelty that the construction of the curriculum of Philosophy for Children (henceforth P4C) has constituted initially in the USA and later in the rest of the world. To address the “educational revolution” of P4C, Tibaldeo travels through the times and the spaces it has occupied (and still occupies). And he does so with a style worthy of a thriller writer, who gradually reveals the unfolding of the plot until its completion. In just a hundred pages, all the reasonings, doubts, sources and theoretical and practical attempts which have characterized the growth of the curriculum to its present form are masterfully described.