This thesis is not a unidimensional presentation of P4C. Hence, this chapter discusses oppositional views, such as those presented by some developmental psychologists. The P4C movement is in agreement with a specific narrative of childhood. An effective implementation of P4C requires the teacher to see the child as an agent and competent, passing control to the child and this narrative of childhood is distinctively different by the way developmental psychologists perceive children.
Developmental psychologists perceive children as ‘developing’ and childhood as ‘becoming’ instead of ‘being’ (Lyle, 2017). Therefore, children are expected to be able to complete specific cognitive tasks at a specific age. This is also compatible with the idea that children should only ever be taught in the school in a way that it is age appropriate. Hence, the focus of this section is the refutation of the arguments that developmental psychologists made.
This contradiction between P4C and developmentalism with Piaget being its main advocate has been discussed extensively by Gareth Matthews (1978; 1984; 1994)
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when P4C was still a new movement. If the developmental stages of Piaget were accepted, that would mean that P4C cannot be effectively taught. Matthews (1978) highlighted that the results of Piaget experiments establish what the majority of the children can do at a specific age. The way the experiments are conducted and the aim of establishing developmental stages based on the majority of the students results in exclusion of unique or rarely repeated responses. The philosophical puzzlement which might occasionally occur is not incorporated in the developmental stages of Piaget.
Matthews recognised the characteristics which make the theory of Piaget attractive (Matthews, 1994): arresting results, which are replicable and demonstrate an age-related sequence. However, Matthews explained that thinking should not be perceived developmentally in the same way that walking would be. Children might be developmentally unready for walking, but they are not developmentally immature for thinking. Matthews provided his readers with a lot of examples were young children naturally philosophise (Matthews, 1984).
Moreover, Matthews identified a significant flaw in the theory of Piaget. By accepting the developmental stages, Piaget discussed the transition of less to more sophisticated replies. This notion includes an assumption implying that the adults are able to provide more sophisticated replies than children (Matthews, 1978). In this sense, as Lyle (2017) argued, childhood is perceived as a preparation for adulthood. Taking this assumption for granted is erroneous according to Matthews. Matthews counter-argued the developmental stages of Piaget and the transition to more sophisticated answers by presenting two different examples. In the book Growing Up
with Philosophy, Matthews discussed the developmental stages concerning the
development of thought, while later he devoted a complete chapter for the development of thinking concerning conservation in his book Philosophy of Childhood. At this point, I will introduce and evaluate his arguments. I consider these arguments particularly important, because they can be considered a defense of P4C movement in opposition to developmentalism.
Concerning the question ‘what do you think with’ set by Piaget (Matthews, 1978)his developmental stages suggest that the children at stage one believe that they think with the mouth, at the stage two (age 8) they believe that they think with the brain, while at stage three (age 11-12) their thought is no longer materialised. Matthews matched each of these responses with philosophical theories: stage one response with Plato’s inner speech and the writing of behaviourist Watson, stage two
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with identity theory and the idea that mental events are identical to brain events and stage three with classical dualistic theories. By suggesting this parallel between developmental stages and philosophical theories, Matthews’ argument tries to show that there is no naive or less sophisticated reply. On the contrary, each response is sophisticated, and it demonstrates a philosophical puzzlement. It might also be the case that younger children are more puzzled and as they grow up they tend to conform by adopting responses accepted by society.
Similarly, Matthews (1994) discussed the association between different child responses concerning conservation of substance, weight and volume at different ages and philosophical theories. For example, he associated the egocentrically related responses at stage one with the theory of Protagoras, according to which “man is the measure of all things” (p.48). In this argument of Matthews the egocentric perception of children at this stage does not appear as naive.
However, the second argument of Matthews is not equally convincing. Matthews defined extreme and moderate egocentrism, as a lack of interest or failure of a person to recognise the feelings of other and demonstrated that Piaget did not examine whether the young children imagine how things (and specifically the clay in the conservation experiment) feel. Matthews believed that this is how egocentrism should be defined and that the experiments of Piaget did not capture this element. However, Piaget did not define egocentrism in the same way. Piaget referred to egocentrism of the child as the phase that ‘the things are considered to depend solely on his personal activity’ (Piaget, 1999, p. 366). This has many implications. For example, during that stage space is perceived as a function of the child’s own body instead of locating the body in space (Piaget, 1999, p. 204). The experiments of Piaget were consistent with the definition of egocentrism in his theory and therefore introducing a different definition and accusing Piaget of not measuring the elements of the new definition is not a convincing critique of his theory.
Matthews concluded his chapter with what I perceive as his strongest argument critique of Piaget’s conservation experiment. He discussed whether the conservation of substance, weight and volume can be questioned. It is energy and mass which is conserved at the end, not substance. The weight varies if we are not in the Earth and finally even the example of volume conservation can be questioned. By saying this, Matthews makes a clear point and questions whether it is valid for the stage during
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which students accept ambiguous statements to be accepted as the ultimate stage of cognitive development.
To sum up, Matthews developed a critique of developmental theory. He demonstrated in his work different examples of philosophical puzzlement in children’s discourse. This discourse is not repeatable, and the theory of Piaget, which is mostly normative, fails to capture it. The assumption of moving from less to more sophisticated cognitive stages fails by considering that the adults are not always reasoning and holding correct beliefs and by considering that the replies of students during Piaget experiments can be associated with different philosophical theories.
Lipman (1976; 1982; 1987) also made references to Piaget’s work and his developmental stages which support that students in primary school are restricted only to concrete reasoning and experience. He suggested that developmental psychologists focus only on what students can do without intervention.
To summarise, the contradiction between developmental stages and P4C is an important theoretical debate, since the acceptance of the first might lead to questioning the effectiveness of the second. Nevertheless, Piaget’s theory can only be correct when there is no intervention. What Piaget considers as less sophisticated or wrong responses can be questioned. The fact that children usually provide specific answers at specific ages does not exclude the possibility of changing these stages by using intervention programmes, such as P4C.