Teaching Philosophy

Volume 36, Issue 4, December 2013

Student-Centered Discussions in Introductory Philosophy
A Case Study on the Nature of Art

There are many teaching techniques designed to elicit student participation in a philosophy classroom. In this paper I present a student-centered discussion model that makes the students directly responsible for most aspects of discussion. I used this model in a first year seminar devoted to the nature of art, and I explain how this collaborative model has certain advantages over other collaborative learning models, how I implemented it in the course, and the results I observed. The model I discuss here is similar in some ways to other collaborative learning techniques, but I highlight some of its unique features and discuss how it might be implemented in other philosophy courses.