A Theoretical Foundation for Moral Education in the Community of Ethical Inquiry

The community of ethical inquiry is a special approach of Philosophy for Children (P4C) in moral education. This paper shows, by the analytical and analogical method, that how the community of inquiry may lead to moral development in children. In other words, we will study theoretical basics of moral development in P4C. For this purpose, we analyze reasonableness and autonomy, critical thinking and consistency as the consequent of critical thinking, creative thinking, and moral imagination as the consequent of creative thinking, caring thinking, habituation, situational, and reflecting about ethical concepts in the community of ethical inquiry. By this analysis, we will show: first, how the community of ethical inquiry can affect on these factors; second, what these factors means in here and what differences are between here and other approaches that emphasize on them; third, how the community of ethical inquiry can develop all of these factors comprehensively. We will try to show that the community of ethical inquiry is a new approach in moral education, should not reduce to any of previous approaches in this field, the most important trait is its comprehensiveness to cover all major factors in moral education.