Plato Was Wrong!: Footnotes on Doing Philosophy with Young People

by David A. Shapiro

This book is a compendium of lesson plans for classroom exercises designed to foster philosophical inquiry with young people. It introduces the reader to a wide range of activities for exploring philosophical questions and problems with children from preschool age through high-school. There are lessons for a full-range of topics in philosophy, including metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, and aesthetics, and each is intended to help foster a supportive and caring classroom community of inquiry. All of the activities have been used on numerous occasions and include reflections on what teachers who employ the lesson might expect when doing so. Using this book, teachers, parents, and others can successfully being fostering philosophical inquiry with young people of all ages.

Genres: Philosophy, Education

184 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2012

Reviews

[Brian Charest · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a really wonderful book for parents and teachers interested in enaging kids in discussions and debates about important philosophical questions. What may surprise you the most, once you get into this, is how much children will enjoy asking and being asked these questions. Kenneth Koch, in Rose, Where Did You Get That Red? , says that every poem has an idea or a question at its center, and he uses this central poetry idea to help children read and ask questions about canonical poetry. He then invites children to write their own poetry, based on their readings and understandings of these (what some might consider too complex for children) poems. I think the same can be said and done with most children's literature, and my sense is that this book really operates on a similar premise: at the center of any good story is an interesting idea or question. This book, then, can help you get young people thinking about important questions about the nature of goodness, friendship, reality, consciousness, etc. by inviting young people to come up with their own questions about the stories they read.

[Peter Worley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great book for introducing children to the activity and the state of philosophy and philosophising. I say 'state' because there are two important ways to get children engaged with philosophy. The first is to present them with stories or puzzles that bring the philosophy to their attention by getting them to think about it; the other is through experience. When you experience something like a game, exercise or activity this wrenches you into a state of philosophising rather than asking you 'to think about' a situation or scenario. The two are very different though both equally valid. This book approaches philosophy through engendering a state of philosophy. Really great and quite different.

My only reservation is how wordy it is and how much the reader needs to get the flavour of how to run the session rather than following a lesson plan - this demands a great deal more from the would be facilitator. However, well worth the effort and the trials and errors!

[Doni · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was resistant to reading this book because I didn't want to detract from the entrée of reading and discussing a book. But after witnessing how Dave could change the room's atmosphere with his energizers, it persuaded me to give it a chance. This book is chock-full of good ideas from an experienced teacher.