Sophie project

About SOPHIE

It is often said that education is a right and not a privilege. This should not be just a declaration, but a guiding principle of axiomatic value in every society. It is of the outmost importance that every educator has this at the forefront of their mind. It is an educator’s civic and moral duty to make sure that every child exercises this right to its full potential. This duty probably carries the most weight in early school education, because the elementary school system is the backbone of every democratic society. It is a key factor in the process of primary socialization, an environment where the child acquires the fundamental social and learning skills and appropriates the values that are the building blocks for a compassionate, tolerant, independent and critical thinker – a responsible and engaged citizen that understands the importance of his/her role in the community.

Introducing Philosophy with Children (PwC) in the curriculum of primary schools is still one of the primary recommendations for early education in order to develop critical thinking, accept democratic values, achieve gender equality and develop skills for peaceful intercultural dialogue. In 2016, UNESCO opened a Chair for practicing PwC, understanding this discipline as a basis for intercultural dialogue and social transformation. Matthew Lipman’s pioneering endeavors in the 1970s have shown that children who have had the opportunity to learn philosophy from an early age thrive in two important ways: they are capable of clear, precise, reasoned, and critical thinking, but they are also open to the ideas and attitudes of others. This discipline has evolved over the decades, but with the recent rapid technological development, the changing educational practices in the new (post) pandemic world and the increasing needs for wider social inclusion, there is a need for transformation of the curriculum for PwC following exactly these educational and cultural changes.

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