Abstract:

Drawing on Dewey's theory of inquiry learning, Vygotsky's theory of scaffolding, and Lipman's development of Pierce's theory of communities of inquiry, it can be argued that fostering explorative classroom-dialogues via the Socratic method could be a productive pedagogical approach for both children and adults.

In the Lipman's tradition of philosophizing with children (P4C), a key principle is that the topic of the dialogue is philosophical in nature and that the facilitator refrain from suggesting answers or evaluate student responses, so as not to impede students own independent thinking. However, not all theorists agree that the topic of the dialogue must be philosophical, as is insisted by many followers of Lipman, which limits the use of this approach in schools. Inspired by the French philosopher Oscar Brenifier, Anne Schjelderup has argued that explorative dialogues, facilitated in the dialectical form of philosophical tradition, is adaptable for teaching any subject and has successfully implemented such practice in teaching various subjects across several education levels. Concurrently, other theorists have developed similar practices, such as Explorative Talks, Inquiry-Based Learning, Mathematical Talks, etc. Studies suggest such explorative dialogues positively impact student participation and academic learning.

However, explorative dialogues are uncommon in classrooms, both in Norway and globally. Establishing such practices may be challenging for teachers, possibly due to their lack of experience and the tradition of goal-directed teaching. Explorative talks are challenging to facilitate, they are unpredictable and time-consuming, so teachers need to perceive them as meaningful and significant in order to be motivated to integrate them into their own practice. One issue may be that such essentially philosophical practice is not compatible with a strictly goal-oriented pedagogical practice. If the teachers do not understand the philosophical foundation of dialectical explorative dialogues and how to facilitate them, it is difficult to prioritize time for having them.

This study aims to investigate whether making teachers aware of the underlying philosophical rationale for questioning will make them feel capable of further developing their own practice. Three teachers have received training in facilitating exploratory classroom dialogues through their own participation in a facilitated dialogue. Through the dialogues the teachers explored how to facilitate explorative dialogues amongst their own students.

The data for this research consists of transcriptions of the explorative dialogue and interviews with the participant teachers before and after the dialogue, and is currently being analyzed according to inductive thematic analysis. Preliminary findings indicated that the teachers experience the dialogue radically different from any earlier experience, they found it meaningful and exciting to participate in the dialogue and were excited to integrate such dialogues into their own practice.

The study could have implications for teacher-training. Furthermore the study more generally illuminates how pedagogical practice, in a more philosophical tradition characterized by what the Greeks referred to as praxis, can be valuable in an educational context.

Keywords:

Teacher training, dialogic teaching, Community of Inquiry, Explorative dialogues, class-room discussions, common construction of meaning, students participation, students agency, dialectic method, socratic method.