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The Philosophical and Theoretical Background of an 

Educator Working with P4C: How Much Philosophy? 

 
 

Félix García Moriyón and Tom Lardner   
 

 

Introduction 

 

 common response from teachers when involved for the first time with 
theP4C program is related to their lack of background in philosophy. "How 
can I use philosophy in my classroom if I have studied so little of it?" A 

necessary assumption of the program, such as it was developed by Lipman and Sharp in the 
IAPC, at this point is that any teacher can learn to facilitate a philosophic discussion, with 
the help of the manuals and sufficient experience in workshop and ongoing seminars. 

 In the current use of the P4C educational approach, most, if not all teacher guides 
—those who offer training courses to other teachers in preparing them to facilitate 
philosophical inquiry in their classes—have a solid philosophical background. This is the 
case, of course, in Spain. However, this clearly does not apply to regular teachers who attend 
P4C workshops. Usually, a standard workshop focuses on methodological requirements, 
offers good examples of a philosophical dialogue in the context of a community of 
philosophical inquiry, and uses philosophical resources such as stories and teachers' 
manuals. Workshops also seek to awaken the philosophical ear of teachers. This is a good 
starting point, but we believe that it is not enough to sustain the implementation of 
philosophical inquiry at public schools or at any other educational settings in the long run. 

 The question of how much familiarity with philosophy is required of a teacher 
wanting to do philosophy with his/her students after the workshop has not been seriously 
addressed, although the design of the introductory sessions and the first workshops aim to 
foster some initial familiarity. We begin by describing the valuable philosophical skills and 
disposition that teachers receive in an introductory workshop, and we underline the skills 
that teacher guides need to introduce—step by step—to a novice teacher for leading 
philosophical inquiry.  We then move on to offer some ideas to address the basic problem 
of weak philosophical background: follow-up seminars, workshops and guided 
philosophical reading to help them improve their philosophical background. 

 

 

A 



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First Steps into the Area of Philosophy 

Philosophy in Awareness Sessions 

The first step in this process is an awareness session, which can be done in various 
ways. A short, comprehensive lecture about the program may be followed by a question 
and response session. Or much better: after a short presentation (no longer than 10 
minutes), a modelling session may be done, followed again by questions and discussion. In 
either case, participants will be exposed to various philosophical ideas, which for many 
might be the first contact with philosophical inquiry in their lives. The main issue arising 
will be, "Why do philosophy?" To answer this question, the teacher guide must have a clear 
grasp of the philosophical assumptions behind the program itself. Should a model session 
be done, the guide will be called upon to highlight and follow up on responses from 
participants of a philosophical nature. 

Philosophy in Workshops, Seminars and Modeling; the "Ear" for Philosophical 

Discussion 

 After more than thirty years conducting introductory P4C workshops according to 
the basic model of Lipman and Sharp, basic to the method of facilitating such a discussion 
is the ability to hear or notice statements and/or questions from participants laden with 
philosophical possibilities.1 Although non-philosophers do not normally have familiarity 
with academic philosophy, they have had experience with “popular” philosophy. People are 
concerned about the meaning of their own life and of the world they are living in, and daily 
life offers them plenty of situations that require critical, creative and caring thinking. Thus, 
in the dialogue prompted by an initial didactic resource presented by the teacher guide, the 
guide must then model a philosophical discussion. For this, s/he must be skilled in 
philosophical inquiry. The ability to model the facilitation of philosophical inquiry is 
acquired from years of reading, discussing, and doing philosophy. While a knowledge of 
names, history and terminology is not vital, experience with the kind of inquiry and 
discourse native to philosophy is a must. They have to introduce new teachers into a certain 
approach to inquiry. This involves a delight in questioning accepted assumptions, a feeling 
of comfort (perhaps even exhilaration) with the perplexing, a demand for good reasons and 
clear and valid argument in trying to address such perplexity, a strong sense of curiosity and 
wonder, and a willingness to engage in dialogue (and all that that assumes, such as the 
willingness to call one's own beliefs into at least temporary question, willingness to doubt 
what seems indubitable, willingness to listen sympathetically to opposing viewpoints, etc.). 

In modeling for teachers in their classes, the guide must display as many instances of 
opening up dialogue as possible. In sessions with teachers, the guide must be keenly alert 
to such opportunities. He or she should miss few openings and use these for development 
of discussion. There is rarely time to go into each possible area in depth, but each response 
or question from a teacher which is pregnant with philosophical possibility merits at least 
a follow up question or two. Few things are more effective in developing the teacher's 
philosophical "ear" than to have the guide follow up and elaborate on one of their 

 
1 Chirouter E., Gagnom M. et Michaudo O. : Editorial. Nº spécial symposium ACFAS. Dyotime, 95 

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statements or questions. In Plato´s dialogue Meno, Socrates is called the torpedo fish: he 
is always stunning to people with his following up and puzzling questions.2 The teacher’s 
guide builds a rigorous dialogue which is at the same time ironic and caring.3 This requires 
a strong philosophical background on the part of the teacher guide. 

Of course, teacher guides can face these demanding tasks thanks to their familiarity 
with academic philosophy, as well as to the fact that they are accustomed to reading 
philosophical literature and classic philosophers. In the study of philosophy, one learns to 
see the problematic aspects of knowledge claims in whatever discipline. Philosophy has a 
history of doing this, and in that history has developed a host of approaches to the long list 
of common problems. Thus, an extended study of philosophy not only equips a teacher 
guide with the various general tools of inquiry, but also with a sensitivity to philosophical 
questions as they arise in general discourse. One develops an "ear" to questions of potential 
philosophical depth combined with the philosophical "tools" useful in developing these 
questions through follow up questioning. 

We would like to assume that the classroom teacher can develop this "ear" and these 
skills through sufficient exposure to modeling and experience in seminar sessions (as well 
as their own classroom experience). Yet we believe that that this does not occur as 
frequently as needed. The philosophical ear teachers discover in their first workshop 
provides only a first step for leading a very demanding activity, one that calls on people to 
maintain a sensitivity to the problematic aspects of reality, to pay careful attention to 
precision in the use of concepts and to rigor in formal and informal reasoning, and to 
accept doubt and amazement as permanent features of their daily lives. The classroom 
teacher may also have difficulty asking the provocative questions that follow up on their 
students' answers or statements. Meanwhile, they may not be able to discover the 
philosophical conundrums that lie beneath the surface of everyday problems or concerns. 

In short, the training the teachers receive in the workshop is good, but not sufficient. 
These teachers do not need to reach the same philosophical level as their guide, but they 
do need more philosophical material than they receive in a 25-hour workshop, the normal 
initial workshop in Mendham, Madrid, Accuto, Ghent or Varna. It is the responsibility of 
those who oversee disseminating the program and training teachers to offer them the 
possibility to grow as philosophers, to reach some middle ground between popular and 
academic philosophy.  

The best training model, from our own experience, is a workshop in a primary, 
secondary or high school, for a group of 20-25 teachers working in that school. Then, we 
organize specific sessions every two or three weeks, with the teachers’ guide leading a session 
with a specific group from the school or with the teacher doing the session and the teachers’ 
guide as an external observer. After the school day, at a meeting, all the teachers involved 
in the project share ideas, do's and don'ts. Of course, this is an ideal model, and it is not 
easy to get funding and support, but it is the “eutopic” model we should aim for. 

 
2 García Moriyón, F. “Del rey filosofo al pez torpedo: metáforas sobre la enseñanza de la filosofía.” Cuestiones 
de filosofía.  Núm. 14 (2012). 
3 García Moriyón, F. “Ironía y pensamiento cuidadoso en fpn.” Childhood & Philosophy, Rio de Janeiro, v. 21, 
maio 2021, pp. 1-22. 



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Philosophy in the Presentation of Theory 

In workshops with teachers, the guide should include some elements of 
theoretical/philosophical explanation. In modeling for teachers in their classes, the guide 
must display as many instances of opening the dialogue as possible. In sessions with 
teachers, the guide must be keenly alert to such opportunities, those that come up with 
specific questions from the teachers. He or she should not miss few openings for the 
development of discussion. There is rarely time to go into each possible area in depth, but 
each response or question from a teacher which is pregnant with philosophical possibility 
merits at least more than one follow up question. Few things are more effective in 
developing the teacher's philosophical "ear" than to have the guide follow up and elaborate 
on one of their statements or questions. A teacher guide should not shrug off such a 
question. Nor should she lecture and dictate, or simply quote some philosopher. Yet when 
a question is directed at one's knowledge of philosophy, s/he has the responsibility to 
respond. Indeed, the best approach may be to open a discussion of the question to the 
whole class, helping them to get a better understanding of the topic by introducing some 
references to influential philosophers, classical or contemporary. 

To be able to explore and clarify those questions, a background in philosophy is 
indispensable for the teacher guide. First and foremost, a certain clear understanding of 
Dewey's work is assumed. While this is necessary, it is not sufficient to ensure a clear ability 
to explain the program. A familiarity with the history of philosophical ideas about 
education ranging from Plato to Durkheim, from Kant to Rousseau to Mead is invaluable. 
When discussing in the community of inquiry, an acquaintance with Peirce is implied, 
while the educational value of dialogue is supported by readings from Plato and Augustine 
to Freire and Ricoeur (and hermeneutics).4 

Thus, if at any moment teachers ask for an explanation of a particular issue which 
arises in the discussion, they may be curious for more background. Teachers may express 
that curiosity with questions. 

Other Workshop Experiences that Illustrate How to Address the Need to Develop a 

Philosophical Background 

We know that at present there are different approaches to the use of philosophical 
dialogue in formal and informal education. Of course, we develop this topic from the 
practical and theoretical tradition of the IAPC institution, and we take for granted that 
there are family resemblances between the “classical IAPC approach” and more recent 
styles.5 In any case, there are other aspects in the running of a workshop with teachers 
which call for a degree of philosophical expertise. One of the most interesting, widely 

 
4Valuable bibliographies concerning P4C can be found in Lipman, Matthew, Sharp, Ann Margaret, and 
Oscanyan, Frederick (1980). Philosophy in the Classroom, Temple University Press, and Lipman's Philosophy Goes 
to School, Temple University Press, Phil., (1988); Gregory, M. (2014). Etat’s Unis d’Amérique: thirty years of 
philosophical and empirical research in philosophy for children: an overview. Access as of 28/10/2020 on 
http://www.educ-revues.fr/DIOTIME/AffichageDocument.aspx?iddoc=32857&pos=8. 

5García-Moriyón, F., Duthie, E. & Robles, R. (Ed.) (2018): Parecidos de familia. Propuestas actuales en Filosofía 
para Niños / Family resemblances. Current proposals in Philosophy for Children. Madrid. Anaya.  

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recognized, and an approach that provides strong criticisms of the environment of teachers 
familiar with P4C, is that of Oscar Brenifier.6 

 In fact, a session or two during a workshop reserved exclusively to questioning and 
explanation is valuable. In such a session (perhaps using a page or two from one of the 
bibliographies of the novels),7 the philosophical kernels are isolated and expanded upon, 
illuminating the various elements of the issue, its origin and historical development. Such 
a discussion is important with teachers, who may tend to miss the philosophy in P4C if 
exposed only to model discussion sessions. This, of course, requires philosophical 
background on the part of the teacher guide. Other questions will address the teachers' 
interest in psychological aspects of child development and critical thinking. Exploring those 
topics with teachers would be very useful or may even be necessary to get a full 
understanding of the scope of the educational approach we are addressing. 

At times in a workshop, the teacher guide will attempt to explain the structure of the 
program, i.e., the various emphases in each novel, how the issues recur with a highlight on 
certain aspects. In so doing, the guide will need some background in the philosophies of 
mind and language. There are certain assumptions about concept formation and language 
acquisition inspired by Vygotsky and Mead, especially to the programs for young children. 
Here is where a philosophical and psychological background merge in the explanation. 

When running a workshop, one difficulty may emerge, especially in countries where 
all teachers receive at least a small amount of philosophy in their high school education. 
The problem becomes more complicated if primary school teachers with no philosophical 
training and secondary school teachers with philosophical training participate in the same 
workshop. These teachers take the discussion to a more abstract and technical level that is 
not understandable for primary school teachers.  

A teacher guide does not want to stifle such an inquiry by demanding that things be 
kept "simple". On the other hand, s/he wants to avoid the separation that may take place, 
and the possible alienation which some of the teachers may experience when feeling "left 
out" of the inquiry. 

An effective strategy in such a case is to bridge the gap between the participants. This 
can be accomplished in several ways. The guide can ask each participant to explain their 
ideas until all are satisfied that they understand the point being made. Or s/he can try to 
forge this link himself. By illuminating the connection between technical and abstract 
philosophical points and basic human questions, the teachers’ guide can go a long way 
toward making the teacher without philosophical training aware of the program. So, we do 
not want to discourage those with training, but it is very important that their contributions 
reach people with less philosophical training. And this requires that the teacher guide has 
an acceptable philosophical background. 

 
6 Brenifier, O. (2020): The art of Philosophical. Alcofibras   
https://www.academia.edu/56681360/The_art_of_philosophical_practice 
7 Interested guides should contact the IAPC for copies of these source bibliographies. Such a bibliography for 
Harry can be found in Studies in Philosophy for Children, Sharp and Reed, eds., Temple University Press, Phil., 
1992. 



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Addressing Core Questions 

 

In mentioning the connection between abstract, technical philosophy and basic 
human questions— between popular and academic philosophy—we have arrived at the heart 
of the matter in getting the "idea" of P4C across to teachers. Another area we want to 
mention related to the guide's philosophical background lies here. The guide should be 
able to converse easily around the following questions: What is a philosophical discussion? 
How does it differ from other types of discussions? What model, or definition of philosophy 
are we assuming in the program? What is the difference between teaching and doing 
philosophy?, and finally, a question of tremendous importance to the “inquiring” approach 
to education... Why question everything? (isn't this dangerous?). Of course, those are not 
questions that need a clear answer from the guide, but rather questions that should provoke 
a philosophical inquiry, to get a deeper understanding from the people involved.8 

What is a Philosophical Discussion? 

Let us look at these questions one at a time, though they are interrelated. A 
"philosophical" discussion is not an easy thing to isolate, though we are hinging everything 
on a teacher's ability to differentiate it from other types of discussions. It certainly is more 
than a discussion which does not converge with a definite answer. It is more than an endless 
list of questions. As this is such an important question, it deserves further analysis.9 

While a descriptive account of a philosophical discussion will be subject to 
disagreement (for it itself is a philosophical question), we may hope to provide an outline 
and list of qualities of such a discussion. Such a list can be used not only by the practitioner, 
but more importantly in workshops or seminars after a model session. Participants can 
reflect on the discussion to see if these qualities were present, and in what way.10 

Let us begin with the more general aspects. First, philosophy employs a kind of 
second order thinking. Although it must consider data offered by other disciplines, 
particularly empirical evidence from the sciences, it focuses on the way such data are offered 
and presented to us. It focuses on their meaning and relationship with other data, in the 
search for a global and coherent frame of reference with which to understand ourselves and 
the world. 

A philosophical discussion attempts to do this using approaches to belief and 
knowledge claims which call them into question. Speaking broadly, a philosophical 
discussion goes in one or two directions, which we could label regresses or progresses. From 
one direction, we look underneath our base of knowledge, to the underlying assumptions 

 
8 Rezniskaya, A. & Wilkinson (2015). “Professional Development in Dialogic Teaching: Helping Teachers 
Promote Argument Literacy in Their Classrooms.” In The SAGE Handbook of Learning Publisher: Sage 
Publications, Eds., David Scott, Eleanore Hargreaves. 
9 More on this question can be found in Lipman, M., Margaret Sharp, A. & Oscanyan, F.S. (1980). Philosophy 
in the Classroom (Philadelphia: Temple University Press), esp. Chap. 7. And, in Lipman, M. (2003). Thinking 
in Education. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2nd ed. 
10 García Moriyón, F. “Philosophical Inquiry in Education.” In: Peters M. (eds) Encyclopedia of Educational 
Philosophy and Theory. Springer, Singapore 2016  https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-287-532-7_162-1. 

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which form the foundation on which our structure of beliefs is based. We seek to find the 
things we take for granted, which normally go unquestioned, and discover if after careful 
scrutiny we still have strong cause to accept these assumptions. Since this process can 
conceivably create on infinite regress of questioning, we can call it regresses. It need not, of 
course, lead to infinite regress, but only to the point at which we can reasonably accept 
certain assumptions. Philosophy doesn't seek to erode all foundations for belief and 
accepted knowledge. Rather, it works to make us more realistic and confident in what we 
claim to know. 

In the other direction, philosophy seeks to speculate on where our stated beliefs may 
lead us; when we state something, what does this claim commit us to accepting as its 
consequence? In other words, what do our claims imply? This process also can go on, 
progressing through possible inference, infinitely. Such progress, though, is also limited to 
reasonable stopping points.11 

Thus, philosophy can be unsettling, but done with integrity in a community of 
inquiry and can clearly improve the quality of one's thinking. We can become unsettled 
when confronted with the realization of faulty underlying assumptions which had been 
supporting important beliefs. We also may not like to realize the consequential positions a 
certain claim can commit us to. But either way, as Socrates told Meno, we are better off if 
we are spurred by these reflections and findings to want to know more, to want to engage 
in further inquiry.12 

A philosophical discussion, then, may deal with what we already claim to fully know, 
to possibly discover that we were mistaken. Here we expose a problematic wherein some 
may not even recognize there is a problem—something children do often in an act which is 
usually written off by adults as due to ignorance. We may show ambiguities where there 
appeared to be concrete meaning or show vagueness where clarity was initially apparent. 
Or we may take an issue apparently simple and show that it is more complicated than meets 
the eye. 

From another viewpoint, we may discuss what is generally agreed to being a vague, 
uncertain, "grey area". Here, our philosophical attempt will be to clarify, make it more 
understandable, more worthy of acceptance as knowledge. Thus, in a philosophical 
discussion, we may pry apart a settled area or converge towards meaning where vagueness 
is present. 

A philosophical discussion is difficult to characterize in terms of content, for virtually 
any content, when treated in a certain way, can be philosophy. The philosophical frame of 
reference is very wide; even when focusing, the perspective remains broad. Yet this terrain 
has shown itself to commonly fall into one of several categories, such as, for example, the 
nature of reality, truth, goodness, beauty, meaning and right. Various subdivisions of these 
categories are space and time, the mind-body relationship, personal identity, society, nature, 

 
11 Golding, Clinton (2013). “We Made Progress: Collective Epistemic Progress in Dialogue without 
Consensus.” In Journal of Philosophy of Education, Vol. 47, No. 3. 
12 Morris, K (2008). “Philosophy with Children, The Stingray and the Educative Value of Disequilibrium.” 
In: Special Issue of Journal of Philosophy of Education, Vol. 42, No. 3, 2008; Brenifier, O. (2008) Caring thinking 
about caring thinking. Access in http://www.buf.no/en/read/txt/?page=ob-ct00. 

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culture, what is a person, experience, reason, freedom, justice, rights, language and mind, 
etc. While to the non-philosopher these terms may sound specialized, in fact they describe 
areas for questioning which arise commonly when people reflect openly about their life, 
the world, and the relationship between the two. An important part of knowing what 
comprises a "philosophical" discussion lies in the ability to perceive instances of these 
examples in "everyday" language. 

Since philosophy deals with obviously open, perplexing and troubling areas of our 
experience, or tends to create these qualities if they were not perceived before, it is very 
concerned with language, with clarity of expression. Not content with an easy acceptance 
of possibly ambiguous or vague terms, a philosophical discussion consistently seeks 
clarification. Just as the navigator wants a reliable, well working, easy-to-read compass when 
traversing an unknown, foggy or stormy area, so the participants in a philosophical 
discussion want clearly understood language. They simply cannot afford the loss of meaning 
due to unclear language. Such concern over word use is one of the qualities of a 
philosophical discussion which translates into thinking skills. Language acquisition and 
concept formation are inextricably linked. Laboring over verbal points makes us more 
aware of the words we use; indeed, helps us to acquire a stronger command over language. 
As we do this, our concept formation skills are also sharpened. Important for all of us, this 
is especially vital for children. A teacher guide would do well to emphasize this essential 
point to teachers. 

To push the earlier metaphor one step further, a careful navigator is always alert to 
the condition of his equipment. In the same way, participants in a philosophical discussion 
must be vigilant as to how they are thinking. In a philosophical discussion, reflection on 
the thinking process is a constant. 

Boiled down, although we could add some more philosophical characteristics, we 
believe that the short list of behaviors attributed to George Ghanatakos13  captures well the 
common behaviors found in a philosophical discussion. Such a discussion should include: 

— calls for clarification 

— reasons offered in support of claims made 

— assumptions revealed or probed 

— inferences or implications recognized or pursued 

— questions of truth or claims raised. 

— examples given 

— counter examples given 

With the above in mind, we have another example of the necessity of a philosophical 
background for the teacher guide. For while the "answer" to the question of what a 
philosophical discussion is can be slippery and vague, one is qualified to lead a discussion 

 
13 Jackson, Tom, "Teacher Training, the Preferred Format," Analytic Teaching, Vol. 10, No. 2, May 1990. 



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around it or to explain the question, only after substantial experience with such discussions 
(in reading, research, writing and dialogue). 

Teaching and/or Doing Philosophy 

In discussing the difference between teaching and doing philosophy, light is shed on 
the definition of philosophy we are employing in P4C. What is it to do, rather than teach 
philosophy? To do philosophy is to think and discuss in the ways referred to many times in 
this paper. Our assumption is that almost everyone can do this, including, obviously, young 
children. To teach philosophy, in the sense in which many people may perceive it, is to 
present a history of ideas and complex terminology to be mastered (or learned) by the 
students. The two are quite different. A teacher being guided into the program must be 
able to perceive this well, or s/he will feel inadequate in working with the program. 

A note of caution here. We compare the terms "teach" and "do" in relation to 
philosophy not to suggest yet another dichotomy. In fact, to teach philosophy well is, in a 
sense, to do philosophy. Our intention is not to disparage the word "teach." We are 
concerned with what may be a common conception of teaching, which is to "tell about." 
Facilitating inquiry with children is not about talking to them about philosophical ideas. It 
is to leave behind the banking approach to education denounced by Pablo Freire.14 It is 
rather to guide them in probing open-ended and puzzling questions. As much as possible, 
it should be the students who explain, question, and challenge each other's ideas.15 The 
teacher's job with children is simply to guide them in these areas of inquiry, hint at 
problematic aspects, and help them move forward in their investigation when they have 
reached an impasse or an oversimplified answer. In a certain sense, children are 
philosophers.16 

When working with older, high school age students, such guidance may include 
opportunities to enrich the inquiry with some traditional philosophical background. If 
such a background is continuous with the direction of the inquiry as established in the 
group and does not stand out as something separate and isolated, it is indeed consistent 
with the overall approach. Teacher guides who work with teachers having philosophical 
backgrounds do not want to discourage such teachers from employing this background 
properly in their facilitation. When working with Philosophy for Children, we are still 
philosophy "teachers," committed to a different style of teaching. 

Yet the guide must be clear to distinguish when the use of such background deviates 
from the desired approach. If, for example, the teacher plans a lecture on Kantian ethics 
and uses Lisa solely as a springboard for that lecture, then the goals of the program are not 
being pursued. However, should the students' inquiry lead them into a discussion of how 

 
14 Kohan, Walter: Paulo Freire más que nunca: una biografía filosófica / Walter Kohan. - 1ª ed. Ciudad Autónoma 
de Buenos Aires: CLACSO, 2020. 
15 Kizel, A. (2021). “The facilitator as self-liberator and enabler: ethical responsibility in communities of 
philosophical inquiry,” Childhood & Philosophy, Rio de Janeiro, v. 17, fev., pp. 1- 20. 
16 Gopnik, A. (2009). The Philosophical Baby: What Children's Minds Tell Us About Truth, Love, and the Meaning 
of Life. New York. Farrar, Strau and Giroux. 



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reason should guide our actions, and/or how this might be done, then touching on Kant's 
formulations might be appropriate.  

In any case, many teachers being introduced to the program will be unfamiliar with 
such things. The point here is that a guide must help them to feel confident and secure in 
facilitating philosophical discussions, although they may not have the background to 
provide such enrichment. If children can philosophize, teachers can guide such 
philosophical inquiries. As Gareth Mathews writes, teachers need patience and willingness 
to think about the questions children want to explore.17 The teacher guide's job is to present 
what we mean by philosophy in such a way as the teachers can realize this point. We need 
not throw away the word "teach" to do this. 

To recapitulate, contrasting teaching with doing philosophy can be valuable in the 
attempt to illuminate what we mean by bringing philosophy to elementary and middle 
school classrooms. This does not preclude, however, the introduction of philosophical 
ideas by the teacher in proper areas. In fact, within a high school philosophy course, a 
combination of traditional and P4C approaches may be desirable. That is the case, for 
example, in Spain18, Canada, France, Mexico... and many other countries where philosophy 
is present in the official high school curriculum. In such philosophy courses, which have a 
more traditional set of aims in terms of presenting philosophy as a discipline, the P4C 
program is employed in a way somewhat different than that being described. In addition 
to creating a community of inquiry and the dispositions therein implied, as well as helping 
to develop various critical and creative thinking skills, philosophy teachers at the high 
school level should introduce —if needed to go deeper into the philosophical dialogue— 
some “academic” philosophical material. In this context, philosophy teachers need to bring 
philosophical issues closer to the lives of the students and lead them into a philosophical 
dialogue rather than a mute note-taking approach to the discipline. In such situations, a 
more thorough knowledge of philosophy on the part of the teacher is assumed, as well as 
more use of classical texts in the classroom. Nevertheless, this is not content to be 
memorized by students, but rather is part of the philosophical dialogue. Students do 
philosophy through learning philosophical content and learn that content by doing 
philosophy.19 

One last point should be made. The above discussion relates differently to different 
kinds of teachers. Teachers who have a philosophical background may tend to push the 
discussion with children into typical philosophical areas, bypassing real life issues every day. 
They may be too strong handed, missing connections with the students' actual experience. 
Such teachers may need to be guided away from typical philosophical presentation. On the 
other hand, teachers with little to no philosophical background may tend to bypass the 
everyday philosophical issues for discussion. Such teachers will need to be led in the 
opposite direction towards a more philosophical orientation. In this regard, the guide can 

 
17 Matthews, Gareth, B., (1980). Philosophy and the Young Child, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 
pp. 84-85. 

18 García Moriyón, F., Miranda Alonso, T. and Sainz Benítez de Lugo, L. (2014) Filosofía 1º Madrid. SM. 
19 García Moriyón, F. (2006). Pregunto, dialogo, aprendo. Como hacer filosofía en el aula. Madrid, Ediciones de la 
Torre. 



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suggest more philosophical enrichment for such teachers (always, or course, linked to the 
classroom work). 

Justifying Philosophy 

To non-philosophers, such inquiry as we are suggesting may often sound dangerous, 
or simply an exercise in silliness. "Why question everything" is a common question from 
teachers and parents together, with little to no philosophical background. In the first place, 
such teachers make the assumption that calling into question apparently settled ideas or 
beliefs leads inevitably to a runaway skepticism and a groundless relativism. If philosophy 
is not seen as a danger for children, it may be seen as a waste of time. Why spend precious 
class time talking about silly questions that have no answer instead of learning more 
“useful” disciplines,20 or which have no answer acceptable enough for children (which can 
be provided quickly by the teacher)? Worse still, philosophy is a very abstract discipline that 
cannot be approached before the end of adolescence. 

A teacher guide must be able to answer such questions, for they are good questions 
and reach the heart of the program. The guide must be prepared to explain that 
philosophical inquiry, when done properly, does not lead to a rejection of beliefs which 
have a solid foundation of reasons. It does not lead to empty skepticism, but to a healthy 
and wise one. Family beliefs are not rejected so much as investigated and strengthened. 
Children do not conclude that there is no truth, or that no one can be believed, but rather 
that ideas and beliefs are stronger and weaker depending on evidence and strong argument. 
They are led to see that, although many of the topics of inquiry may not conclude with a 
definite answer, there are better and worse "answers." In fact, the world apart from school 
rarely boasts of certainty, and when students become accustomed to uncertainty, they are 
wiser for it. When this is understood, one can see that philosophical inquiry is anything 
but silly or unnecessary. Consequently, classroom teachers, after the workshop, will be able 
to properly deal with the same resistance and criticism at their schools. 

Since the time of Socrates, many have been resistant or simply hostile to 
philosophical inquiry. They fear its effect on the belief systems of those who engage in it, 
and further, on the systems of belief that are seen to hold together social institutions. A 
different fear is concerned with the effects such inquiry can have on one's happiness and 
mental stability. If not, like Meno, made numb by the sting of philosophy, they may, like 
the Athenian assembly, be made angry and vindictive by it. Irony and other rhetorical 
resources used to provoke cognitive disequilibrium are very important in philosophical 
dialogue, if applied properly and carefully.21 However, for many people, even for philosophy 
teachers, it can become a dangerous tool that harms those attending the Socratic dialogue, 
much more so if they are children, when the teacher becomes too caustic and does not care 
enough about their students' state of mind.22 These are not phenomena reserved to ancient 
Greece but have their manifestations in contemporary society. If they are not so evident, it 
is because of the insignificant place philosophy has taken in modern times. However, when 

 
20 Nussbaum, M. (2010). Not for profit. Why Democracy Needs the Humanities. Princeton. Princeton Univ. Press. 
21 Reznitskaya, A. The Emperor Has No Clothes: The Pedagogical Failure of Oscar Brenifier’s Act. (In press). 
22 Garcia Moriyon, F. “Ironía y pensamiento cuidadoso en fpn.” Childhood & Philosophy, Rio de Janeiro, v. 21, 
maio 2021, pp. 1 – 22. 



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bringing philosophy to communities, a teacher guide or classroom teacher may be 
confronted with reactions from students, parents, or the larger concerned public. 

Parents and/or teachers may worry about children falling into an empty relativism, 
uncontrolled skepticism, or despairing nihilism directed at the values the community 
wishes to see continued into the next generation. We cannot ignore these claims, assuming 
them to be the ravings of intolerant and unenlightened dogmatists. There is a certain 
validity to this criticism. When one becomes involved in philosophical discussion, the 
shadow of doubt spreads over almost everything, even the deepest and most important 
beliefs. If this process of thinking is triggered, it can snowball. Commonly, people involved 
for the first time in this kind of dialogue realize that the assumptions and consequences of 
their ideas really matter, while at the same time discovering how dogmatic or relativistic 
they may be (along with the consequences of this). The more you introduce yourself to 
philosophical procedures, the more you may feel that you must change your most deeply 
held ideas and beliefs.  

Obviously, we are not intending such things for children. We intend, as stated above, 
to open a world of wonder that was not apparent before (or to preserve the one held by 
children already). We intend to increase the meaning apparent in the students' experience.  
We intend to make the beliefs of the children and the community more secure, thanks to 
reflection on previous assumptions and implications. We also want to foster in children 
what the word philosophy literally means: a strong love of truth, a personal and 
communitarian commitment to the search for truth and meaning, guided by critical, 
creative and careful thinking. What we must keep in mind is that the fruit of our work 
could conceivably go either way. 

We claim that P4C will tend to strengthen, rather than erode beliefs which have a 
sound foundation. What can we say about beliefs which would not pass such a test? Or 
about prejudices and deeply rooted cognitive biases? Suppose, for example, that the 
program was being used in a community with a large white supremacist population, or with 
a significant number of families on the extreme right of the political spectrum. Such a belief 
system is founded on some very shaky assumptions, and often blind to the implications of 
these assumptions. In situations like this, philosophical inquiry stands a good chance of 
eroding such beliefs. The question is, does it have this potential towards beliefs which are 
not so obviously destructive? We claim that it will not, but we must be ready to back this 
up. 

The most apparent conflict is between religious faith and research, but perhaps it 
does not have to be a conflict, except in some specific cases of fundamentalist religious 
faith. We can see our beliefs as resting points, as Peirce described them, in our overall 
inquiry, accepted not out of prejudice or unquestioned authority.23 Rather, we stop at 
certain points for good reasons. After philosophical inquiry, we believe reasonably, as 
opposed to blindly, or dogmatically. There may still appear to be a conflict with faith, 
however, as the very meaning of faith seems to be unquestioned belief. 

 
23 See Peirce, Charles, S., (1958). "The Fixation of Belief", and "How to Make Our Ideas Clear", in Selected 
Writings, Dover Publications, NY, NY. 



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We avoid the destructive potential of philosophical inquiry when we keep these 
things in mind. We do not doubt for the sake of doubting or showing others wrong. We 
doubt in a careful manner, starting with ideas we are supporting, critically appraising the 
beliefs that underlie and sustain them, and arriving at a point where we can feel more 
reasonably secure about those ideas (even if, in the face of strong argument and evidence, 
we must revise them). All through this reasoning we expect to arrive at a clearer and 
sounder, more dependable body of ideas and beliefs. 

Finally, this ongoing process, while healthy as opposed to dangerous for individuals, 
holds the same for society. A society that stops asking and wondering about things destroys 
itself (or as Dewey says, stops growing, and can no longer uphold the term "civilized").24 If 
we aim towards a democratic society in the complete meaning of that term, it becomes 
compulsory to prepare the population with the ability to ask, wonder and think for 
themselves.25 Teacher guides as much as schoolteachers should have a clear understanding 
of the commitment of the program with democracy. They would do well to have the social 
aims of the program ready for explication and discussion at any time. They are a great 
motivating factor in working with P4C. 

Truth and Meaning in P4C 

We have employed above the term’s "truth" and "clearer and sounder ideas" and 
underlined philosophical commitment to the search for truth. The word "truth" is both 
powerful and ambiguous. It must be employed with great care. Philosophers are well versed 
in the various assumptions behind the word, whether those of a correspondence, 
coherence, pragmatic, linguistic or postmodern variety. Those with less experience in the 
workings of philosophy, as, for example, most elementary school teachers, are not. 

We mentioned that both faith and inquiry have a commitment to truth. By this we 
mean that both strive towards a body of ideas which provide reliable bases for action as well 
as providing meaning to our experience. In any case, we are not talking about an absolute 
truth. Rather, we use the word "truth" in the pragmatic and referential sense, that of 
warranted assertability. A claim merits the label "true" based on its being in accordance with 
the best available evidence of the time, as arrived at by the community of reasonable 
surveyors.  

The danger, however, lies not in relativism, which can be buffered by a sense of 
history and community, but rather in subjectivism. When each individual can lay claim to 
his or her truth, when their assertions are accepted as warranted based solely on their own 
independent justifications, and when such a practice is accepted as valid community-wide, 
then truth has succumbed to subjectivism, and as Dostoyevsky's character said, "everything 
is legal." In a community of inquiry, such subjectivism is curtailed. While every participant 
in the community is accorded the utmost respect, no matter how divergent his or her idea 

 
24Dewey's views on static societies and their form of education can be found, for example, in Democracy and 
Education, Macmillan Co., NY, 1916. 

25Burgh, G. (2014). Commentary on ‘Democratic pedagogy.’  Journal of Philosophy in Schools 1(1), pp.22-44. 



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may be, each idea must meet the rigorous criteria as established by the community in practice 
before it can lay claim to be warranted. 

Due to the dangerous ambiguity of the word "truth", some suggest that we replace it 
with a "quest for meaning": a quest for a richer and more clearly perceived set of 
relationships in our experience. Such a way of putting things avoids the ambiguities 
discussed above. In addition, it provides a distinct and easily presentable link to the critical 
thinking skills aspects of the program. From Elfie to Harry, skills such as distinction making 
and connection making are emphasized. However, to the layman, such a use of "meaning" 
may be no less confusing or vague. "Truth" remains a word in common parlance.  For these 
reasons we do not want to abandon the word "truth" when discussing our aims and feel 
that the effort to overcome its ambiguity is well worth it within the context of Philosophy 
for Children. 

 We must keep this in mind when having to justify the use of the program in a school 
or community. Of course, these justifications won't work in communities that are not 
interested in such social aims as we are supporting. Notwithstanding, such social aims are 
normative in all international and national educational institutions and administrations.  

 

The Continuous Training of Philosophy Teachers 

 

It is clear that the philosophical dimensions of the program need to be highlighted 
from the very beginning of teacher training. It is crucial that the initial workshop (around 
twenty-five hours long) wakes up the philosophical ear of teachers. They need to clearly 
understand that we are inviting them to join a philosophical endeavor that requires 
dialogue, active teaching, project-based learning, etc., but with a specific emphasis on 
philosophical dialogue. We are inviting them to do philosophy with children and 
adolescents in formal education, and also with adults and elderly people in non-formal and 
informal educational settings. 

The entire P4C project calls for much more than a very good initial workshop. To 
begin with, the ideal situation is that any initial workshop be organized by a specific 
association of people involved in the dissemination and practice of the P4C educational 
program. That association takes care of the training of teachers wanting to implement the 
community of philosophical inquiries in their school, or just in their class. These 
associations also take care of the prior preparation and background of those who are 
qualified guides of new teachers. Spain, for example, has established the following 
requirements to be a qualified teacher guide: a) having completed two in-depth, 50-hour 
courses, b) having applied the program in different educational contexts and in primary 
and secondary schools; c) having a philosophical background; and d) having carried out a 
training course with the support of an accredited trainer. 

In the previous sections, we talked about the guides and especially about their role in 
the initial workshop. After that initial workshop, the ideal situation would be to organize 
a seminar with the people who decide to implement the program to monitor the 



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implementation of the program and to deepen its pedagogical and philosophical aspects. 
This seminar, which would meet every three to four weeks, offers new teachers the 
opportunity to get a better understanding of the program. If possible, the teacher guide 
should attend one of the teacher’s classroom sessions, in order to observe how the teacher 
conducts the session and provide some feedback on the strengths and weaknesses of their 
practice. It would also be very useful to offer a collection of short articles by experts in the 
program to explore specific topics. 

Sooner or later, classroom teachers will discover the need to improve their weak 
initial background in philosophy. Even more, teacher guides should stimulate this longing 
for more philosophy. Then it will be necessary to offer specific philosophy courses for them. 
There are many possibilities, but we think that three of them are fundamental: 

a) A standard introduction to philosophy course. Instead of the classical stories used 
at primary and secondary levels, the use of a typical introduction to philosophy 
text is necessary. Of course, as mentioned above, the session should follow the 
style of the community of philosophical inquiries. In Spain, we have published 
such a manual, where we combine the P4C style of teaching with the 
philosophical topics of an introduction to philosophy.26 And we have organized 
a workshop for those teachers who want to improve their philosophical 
background. There are some very interesting experiences like this one in other 
countries, for example, the workshop ‘Thinking moves,’ focusing on reasoning 
skills.27 

b) An introduction to the history of, primarily western philosophy, but enriched 
with contributions from other cultural areas. Again, in Spain, we have a narrative 
introduction to the history of philosophy, together with a manual for educators 
teaching the history of philosophy in the last year of secondary school.28 The 
teachers’ manual is very similar to the IAPC curriculum teachers’ manuals. 

c) Specific courses in ethics, focusing on the resolution of moral dilemmas and 
problems. This project is still in the initial phase of design and development.  We 
can adapt, for example, the two stories and manuals of the IAPC curriculum, 
Nous and Lisa, or develop a new proposal out of the materials that we are 
developing in Niaiá, a research group working on the resolution of moral 
problems. 

Conclusion and Discussion 

We return to the main question. How much philosophical background is required 
of a teacher guide and a classroom teacher working with P4C?29 While this question may 

 
26 García Moriyón, F., Miranda Alonso, T. y Sainz Benítez de Lugo, L. (2014). Filosofía 1º Madrid. SM. 
27 These courses are part of the training program offered by Dialogue Works: https://dialogueworks.co.uk/training/ 
28 García Moriyón, F., García González, M., Pedrero Sancho, I. (2002): Luces y sombras. El sueño de la razón en 
Occidente. Madrid: Ediciones de la Torre. 2ª ed.; García Moriyón, F., García González, M., Pedrero Sancho, 
I. (1995). Investigación histórica. Madrid: Ediciones de la Torre. 
29 Byalistok, L. (2017). “Philosophy across the Curriculum and the Question of Teacher Capacity; Or What 
Is Philosophy and Who Can Teach It”? Journal of Philosophy of Education, Vol. 51, No. 4, 2017. 

https://dialogueworks.co.uk/training/


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not be answered easily with a fixed formula, it may be addressed by the following question: 
is the person's philosophical background sufficient for the demands outlined above? Of 
course, the answer is different if we are talking of teacher guides, who need a deeper 
background like that of a university degree in philosophy, or classroom teachers, who don’t 
need to go that far. 

There will be educators with an interest in working in the program who honestly may 
have to answer in the negative. In what way may they be satisfactorily prepared? We believe 
that a program like that employed by the IAPC and ICPIC for the last forty years is a useful 
guide: Intensive work with the materials of the program (with children and with peers) 
combined with an intensive study of philosophy (many short research papers covering a 
wide variety of philosophical readings) of philosophy is a good start. Such a program, 
augmented by other philosophical coursework, could prepare an educator to effectively 
work with teachers, in substantially less time than a standard university study of the subject. 

Finally, the whole process should be based on the activity of the teaching guides. Only 
if they are strong enough in their philosophical background and in their skills to guide the 
process of training classroom teachers will these teachers be able to transform their classes 
into communities of philosophical inquiry. 

To summarize the areas where the philosophical/theoretical foundations of teacher 
guides are important, we provide the following list. A teacher guide should be able to: A) 
lead a philosophical discussion with teachers, which especially implies the ability to 1) 
recognize questions and statements of possible philosophical depth; 2) develop them with 
appropriate follow-up questions and bridge the gap between an abstract/technical 
philosophical statement or question and common experience. It is also important that they 
can B) explain the philosophical/theoretical basis of the program and provide its social, 
educational and political justification. Finally, they should be able to C) show how a 
philosophical inquiry can be guided in any given educational context.   

 
Address Correspondences to:  
Félix García Moriyón 
Email: Felix.garcia@uam.es 
 
 
Tom Lardner 
Email: atlardner@gmail.com 
 

mailto:Felix.garcia@uam.es
mailto:atlardner@gmail.com

