Contributions of Philosophy for/with Children to Teaching and Learning in EGB and Polimodal Education

Abstract

The educational reform and its implementation through the Federal Education Law extended the teaching of philosophy in comparison with the previous system. In the former curriculum, philosophy was present only in the baccalaureate track, with somewhat greater space in the baccalaureate with a teacher-training orientation; commercial and industrial schools did not include such studies.

In the Basic Common Contents formulated by the national authorities for the entire Argentine educational system, a broad space is devoted to philosophical knowledge. This is evident both in Ethical and Citizenship Education, present from EGB through the completion of secondary studies, and in Philosophy and Philosophical Issues in the Polimodal level, among other contributions provided by the EDI.

Given this panorama, an improvement in the teaching of philosophy at the secondary level might have been expected. However, it is reasonable to think that philosophical teaching still suffers from the same difficulties affecting secondary education in general: lack of preparation for university entrance, for insertion into the world of work, and for life in relation with others.

At present, both in general and in Tucumán in particular, there is growing interest in the teaching of this discipline in EGB through philosophy with children and through participation in workshops and seminars with adolescents. An experience carried out in our province shows this tendency with encouraging results.

In this paper, we propose to analyze the concepts, strategies, and procedures of philosophy for/with children that may prove effective for the teaching and learning of philosophy in the specific spaces of EGB 3 and the Polimodal level within our educational system. To this end, we refer to theoretical contributions by specialists and to the analysis of some relevant experiences in this field.