A Structured Study of Teaching Philosophizing in Iranian Schools

The teaching of philosophy at the three standard levels (cognitive, affective, and motor) at schools has only been limited to the first level. In fact, it has rarely ever had a tendency to progress to higher levels and only relies on memorization. Moreover, it abounds in teaching the history of different schools of philosophy. However, the new method of teaching philosophy seems to advocate the promotion of philosophizing and thinking on the part of students so that, in addition to learning the best ways in this regard, they manage to perceive the fundamental problems of life. Moreover, the new method, through following a researchoriented approach and reinforcing creative thinking, helps the children to form some insights and views the internalization of which would enable them to employ some rational and constructive strategies and tendencies in life. The present paper deals with the most important dimensions and strategies which contribute to the stability of such methods. Some of them include paying attention to writing dialogs and dialogorientedness, question-orientedness and the development of a critical mind, situationalism and necessity, process-orientedness and development of intellectual abilities, problem-orientedness and practicing problem-solving, pragmatism and modernity, and efficiency and effectiveness. Unfortunately, the teaching of philosophy in Iran does not seem to employ such strategies.