What is Philosophy for Children?
Philosophy for Children or P4C is an approach to teaching and learning which aims to enhance children’s communication and thinking skills, increase their self-awareness and self-esteem and, in turn, improve their academic attainment.
During P4C sessions, children are taught how to create their own philosophical questions and they then choose one that is the focus of an enquiry. The underlying principle is for children to experience rational and reasonable dialogue, and develop skills which enable them to navigate discussions and debates about things that matter to them.
Our aims
Through the teaching of P4C, we aim to encourage children to:
P4C at Pleasant Street
Each half term classes take part in a Diversity Morning where work is based around themes from the PSHE and SRE curriculum. The themes in the texts are used as a stimulus for P4C enquiries, giving the children a chance to think about and discuss key principles. This offers the opportunity for children to think more deeply and philosophically, encouraging them to develop skills of diplomacy and an awareness of others, which can be carried with them throughout their life.
This term for diversity day Reception explored the word “incredible” the class discussed what they think the word means, then listened to the story about how sometimes we might feel we want to be a different person when in fact we are just as incredible as we are. The children discussed what makes them incredible and they created some fantastic rainbows to celebrate their individuality.
During diversity day Nursery discussed the different emotions we can feel. We looked at some images of emotions and spoke about what makes us feel happy, sad, angry etc. Nursery then used a variety of different resources to create faces with different emotions.
In Diversity Day yesterday class 6 looked at a story called ‘What do you do with a problem?’ We talked about how our problems are not as bad as we think and if we confront them (usually by talking to someone about them) we can overcome them. We explored different problems we might come across and helped each other find ways to solve them.
We reflected privately on the story then shared our reflections before choosing our question of the day… ‘Do you always need to overcome your fears?’
Today during Diversity Day we read the book ‘I am Enough’ and we have learnt that the book promotes self-acceptance, self-esteem, and empowerment. The book tells us about the importance of accepting ourselves as we are, celebrating our uniqueness, and recognising our worthiness. Our question today was ‘What does it mean to be enough?’ we enjoyed sharing our thoughts and ideas during our P4C.
For Diversity Day we read the book “Night Shift” by Debi Gliori. The book shows us how depression and affect an individuals life and how they see things. The girl faces many difficulties however shows us there is an escape although it may not be easy.
2
Today we found out about the life and events of Martin Luther King Jr. We shared the book ‘Martin’s Big Words’ and listened to some of his famous speech. We spoke about our dreams for ourselves and the world. In P4C we discussed the question – should you always treat everyone the same?
The children listened to the story ”Unique and Wonderful” for diversity day today. The class had a discussion about what makes us unique and wonderful, the class talked about hair, eyes and our skin colour. The class then created some fantastic portraits and discussed why they are unique.
The class held a wonderful P4C session today using Floella Benjamin’s book ‘Coming to England’ as our stimulus. The children decided on the question ‘Is it ever ok to have an opinion if it means hurting somebody’s feelings?’
The children produced a great assembly speaking about the Windrush Generation, using the book ‘Coming to England’.
Today we read the book “Pelé”. We learnt and spoke about making a difference, how to overcome barriers and be resilient in life.
During diversity day Reception enjoyed a story called “You Are Brilliant”, we discussed what makes us brilliant and then we drew a self portrait of us and described why we are brilliant.
In class 3 we read ‘Two Monsters’ which is about two monsters who live on opposite sides of the mountain. They see different things and don’t communicate. We learnt how they stopped fighting and got along.
In Diversity Day yesterday class 6 read the book ‘Can I Build Another Me?’ It’s a story about a boy who builds a robot version of himself. We discussed whether we should all be the same and why it’s important that we have differences so we can learn from each other. We then created pieces of work to show how we’re all different and how we like (and dislike) different things.
Today we read the book “The Way Back Home”. We spoke about friendship and how to welcome new students in our school.
For diversity day, class 5 read the book “my strong mind” by Niels Van Have. The story is about a young girl who faces her own personal challenges by teaching her brain to have a positive mental attitude.
Reception have celebrated Diversity Day this term by reading the story ‘All are Welcome’, this book explores welcoming everybody into the class no matter what, they have a space in our school. The children were read the story and they had a discussion of how we can welcome new children into our school, the children explained that they can be friendly and treat everyone the same. The children wrote messages of how they can be welcoming to others.
For Diversity day class 3 read the book “Talking is not my thing” which is about a autistic girl who uses non verbal communication to communicate. We explored different ways we can communicate and what ways we can help.
Reception have celebrated diversity day this term by reading the story “The same but different too”. Reception discussed with their partners what is the same but different about the characters on the front cover of the story, together we then read the story and discussed with our partners what is the same but different about us in class. Reception then drew and wrote sentences about what is the same about us and somebody else and what is different too.
Well done to all the children today, completing our Diversity Day work using the book ‘Specs for Rex’. The children discussed how it is ok to be different and everybody has something unique about themselves. In the story, Rex was worried about wearing new glasses, but he soon found they had positive effects!!
For diversity day this term Reception read the story ‘It’s okay to be different’ which had a positive messages of acceptance and promotes confidence for all. Reception then had a circle time where they all discussed that’s it’s okay to be themselves. Reception then drew and wrote a sentence as to why it’s okay to be something which was then shared in assembly.
This diversity day, we used the story ‘Walk Tall’ as our stimulus to explore the P4C question ‘Do people always know that they are bully?”
During Diversity Day class 3 looked at the book “Buster the Bully” by Maisha Oso. The book is about a fish that picks on and bullies other little fish. He then goes out to sea and gets bullied by a shark and killer whale. The book gives both perspectives of being the bully and bullied. We discussed what it feels like to be bullied.
Using Tom Percival’s ‘Meesha Makes Friends’ as a stimulus, the children produced some excellent instructions of how to make friends before completing a P4C session with the question ‘Should there be rules for making friends? Would rules make it easier?’
For Diversity Day we read ‘Ruby’s Worry’. We thought about the different themes in our story and discussed what a worry is. We spoke about what we can do when we feel worried and thought about the different people we can share our worries with.
Our P4C question was ‘Is it ever useful to worry?’
Class 6 explored emotions in diversity day. We looked at what depression is and ways of making ourselves and others feel better.
During Diversity Day class 4 looked at “a shelter for sadness” by Anne Booth. The book is about a small boy who creates a shelter for his sadness, a safe space where Sadness is welcome, where it can curl up small, or be as big as it can be, where it can be noisy or quiet, or anything in between. The boy can visit the shelter whenever he needs to, every day, sometimes every hour, and the two of them will cry and talk or just sit, saying nothing. We discussed whether you should ever pretend you don’t feel a certain emotion.
For diversity day this term we have read a lovely story called ‘When sadness comes to call’, we discussed what makes us sad some times and that it’s okay to be sad and be accepting of it. The children drew pictures of what makes them sad.
Such rich discussions this morning during Diversity Day! We thought about the impact of Martin Luther King’s life and speech, then formulated a question for the class!!
For diversity day we read a lovely story called “the colours of us”, we discussed the colours of people’s skin and how it makes us unique and we then created self portraits.
During Diversity Day class 4 had the pleasure of reading ‘The Patchwork Path’ by Bettye Stroud. We discussed the word ‘Equality’ and what this represented. Class 4 then enjoyed creating our own patchwork quilt.
For Diversity Day we read the book Moses, a moving story of Harriet Tubman who bravely and selflessly led her people from slavery to freedom. We reflected (privately) on the story, formulated some questions and built on our ideas.
Today, we celebrated Diversity Day. In Nursery we read a wonderful book called “Marvellous Me”. This text allowed our children to consider how they’re different from their classmates, but how each of them are Marvellous in their own unique way.
