Reddit reviews Harry Stottlemeier's Discovery: Reasoning About Reasoning
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> I studied engineering where you assume the worst and plan accordingly to make sure that never happens. As it is said about making products idiot-proof, the world is always making a better idiot. If you assume the worst and have plans to contain it or make sure it never happens, chances are it won't screw up too badly, while if you just hope for the best, you are just asking for something to go wrong.
Why are the only options assuming the worst and hoping for the best? This is a false dichotomy.
> If a doctor screws up, a patient can die. If an engineer screws up, a lot of people can die. If a the state enforces a certain education system and screws up, a whole generation, and maybe the next few as well, can be screwed up mentally. If you do not take that into account as a possibility and account for it accordingly then I got nothing else to say.
But that's kind of the point here: we don't, based on that fear, ban the doctor from performing surgeries or forbid the engineer to build high-rise structures. Risk is to be managed with proper oversight, not invoked to clamp down on all possibility of failure in a paranoia of fear.
In the context of education, this comes in the form of curriculum planning, lesson observations and review, and feedback from parents (or even students directly). Sure, one could build in a more oppressive system of oversight if there is a legitimate fear of radicalisation or even a more prosaic clash of values (as is the case in terms of sexuality or religious education, for example), but by and large a lack of trust in teachers is not a particularly good sign for an education system.
> I did the IB program in Australia and in it we had Theory of Knowledge which is basically philosophy. At year 11/12 which is about the equivalent of our JC, my experience with it is that most of my classmates were not interested in it and basically everyone bullshitted their way through it. At the end of the IB program I can say pretty confidently that most of them can throw out counter arguments based on nitpicking of the type of arguments that are used but are barely able to come up with their own arguments and reasoning. It might be different in the IB in Singapore, but I doubt its any better thanks to our tendency for rote learning. Of course there would be the exceptions, but as a whole most of us did not benefit from it.
That's fair enough, but one of the problems with ToK (or KI at the 'A'-levels for Singapore) is the immediate pressure of producing results in a high-stakes grading system. Part of the argument for introducing philosophy at lower levels is that there isn't this pressure to produce tangible results, and allows for a slower, more considered approach to critical thinking and philosophical reflection.
> As I've said earlier, at the very most, philosophy should be only taught when the students are older and are more discerning, and I gave the range of upper sec (sec 4 maybe) to JC level, and I'd personally prefer it to be in the JC level. What age range would you then propose? From my experience most kids at that age or younger have no appetite for philosophy and thus they will probably either drown it out and focus on other subjects/hobbies or they will learn it by rote. Either way, they as a whole would not benefit much from it. Too early and the chance of screwing up their minds is there while not being effective, while if done so at a later age, the students might be able to better understand and discern for themselves. The basics of questioning, reasoning and understanding can be taught without having philosophy classes/materials, so there is no need to specifically 'teach philosophy' to young kids.
First off, I would reiterate that I agree that philosophy is in no way necessary for teaching critical thinking and indeed should be inherent in the teaching of every subject; my contention with your argument is that you exaggerate the risk of teaching it while quite uncharitably dismissing its benefits without even really bothering to address just what those benefits could be.
More substantially, much thinking about philosophy's pedagogical role, especially at younger ages (i.e. grade/primary school), is that critical-thinking skills are less important than critical-thinking dispositions. Some of the problems you point to, such as a lack of interest and sincerity in the arguments offered, are arguably a problem of prioritising skills (or even content) over dispositions.
Such dispositions or habits of mind include:
Note that because this is about inculcating intellectual virtues or values (rather than any particular philosophical content), limiting this to older students on the grounds of them being more discerning actually doesn't make that much sense; if anything, the idea is to put in place structures that makes them more discerning.
To put it another way: the premise here is that the 'philosophising' element is already inherent in younger children with their tendency to ask why. Philosophy programmes for younger children thus emphasises putting in place structures of thinking (usually through the use of questioning and ground rules for discussion) to guide that natural curiosity into a more disciplined, reflective practice. Note that this means that focusing on substantial philosophical ideas as content is often a secondary concern; rather, they are used because they are seen as conducive to producing a reflective response.
To further add on to the point, examples of more bite-sized philosophy as triggers for discussion include texts like Baggini's and Lipman's. The latter is a direct inspiration for the movement known as Philosophy for Children (P4C), which actually has an in-depth entry in the SEP addressing in much greater depth some of the issues you have raised.