Corrupting Youth: How to Facilitate Philosophical Enquiry, Volume 2

by Peter Worley, Thomas E Wartenberg (Contributor)

This book takes the principles explained in Vol.1 and describes a complete classroom practice for conducting philosophical conversations with groups (especially in schools) that has been honed over nearly twenty years of classroom experience by the author and his colleagues at The Philosophy Foundation. Although the method (known here as philosophical enquiry or ‘PhiE’ for short) has been previously described in many earlier publications, this is by far the most thorough and comprehensive account of the method to date in one place. It includes, not only a thorough explanation of the central ideas of the method complete with current updates, but many extensions to the PhiE method including writing extensions, but most importantly, the extended thinking programme. This is an extension to the PhiE method that implements metacognitive and critical thinking strategies for the participants that has been shaped by two years of reflective research conducted by The Philosophy Foundation and King’s College London.

180 pages, Hardcover

Published March 5, 2021

About the author

Peter Worley BA MA FRSA was born in the Midlands but grew up in the West Country. He failed at school the first time around and so had to do it all again later. He worked as a guitar teacher for many years before completing a philosophy degree in 2000 at UCL an MA in 2002 at Birkbeck and beginning a PhD at KCL in 2010. His interest in philosophy and teaching brought him to the world of philosophy with children and he developed his own approach to doing philosophical enquiry in the classroom called the PhiE method and this is described in his first book 'The If Machine' (Bloomsbury 2011). The book has been well received and has proved to be a must-have resource for teachers wanting to philosophise with their classes. Peter is also the author and/or editor of three other books 'The If Odyssey' (Bloomsbury 2012), 'The Philosophy Shop' (Crown House 2012), both have been short listed for the Educational Resources Awards and The Philosophy Shop won first prize in the anthology category at The New England Book Festival; he co-authored 'Thoughtings' (Crown House 2012) with Andrew Day a collection of philosophical poetry, and Peter's next book 'Once Upon an If: Storytelling for Thinking' (Bloomsbury) will be out in 2014. He has featured on television and Radio 4's The Today Programme talking about philosophy in schools and has been published in a number of educational and philosophical journals as well as lecturing on philosophy in schools at St. Mary's University in West London. He currently lives and works in South East London with his wife Emma, who helps him run the charity The Philosophy Foundation, and their daughter Katie.

Reviews

[Joeri · Rating 5 out of 5]

An indispensable practical and methodological guide for doing philosophy with children.

The methods described ensure philosophy is aimed at inviting participants to think, and only help them in how to think, and not what to think.

The vision of the book is also I again agree with: with philosophy it's not the case that there are no wrong answers, that insights and results can be arrived at, and that children can learn when a statement is closer or further from the truth, and learn how it is the validity of your logical arguments that help decide this.