We have introduced Philosophy 4 Children in our school (P4C for short). It allows children time to think and formulate questions. They then can discuss their ideas, thoughts and feelings about a topic. It helps them to become more articulate, give reasons for their opinions, to listen to others and to agree and disagree respectfully.
The link below will take you to a website that has a new interesting picture each day to discuss.
First look carefully at the picture. Then try to think of as many questions as you can linked to the picture. You can use the questioning matrix (see below) to help to generate a range of questions. The colour coding shows the level of the question: green – level 1, yellow – level 2, red – level 3, blue – level 4.
Next read through all the questions you have generated and choose 1 for discussion. This could be the most memorable, a common theme that keeps coming up or a particular level of question.
Then take turns to share thoughts, ideas and feelings. Never talk over each other and try to use sentences like “ I agree with that because….. I disagree with that because…. Also…..That reminds me of……”
You can have these discussions as often as you like.
On the Poble365.com website there are also ideas for drawing and writing.