ANALYTIC TEACHING AND PHILOSOPHICAL PRAXISVOLUME 36 (2015-16)

The Philosophy for Children Hawai‘i Approach to Deliberative
Pedagogy: A Promising Practice for Preparing Pre-Service Social
Studies Teachers in the College of Education
Amber Strong Makaiau

W

ith the introduction of the College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) Framework for Social
Studies State Standards (2013), the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) has
given new direction to K-12 social studies education in the United States. Among thenotable changes is the expectation that primary and secondary teachers will use a deliberative
pedagogy (Longo, 2013; Carcasson, 2013; Manosevitch, 2013; Molnar-Main & Kingseed, 2013) toteach elementary and high school social studies. While this is excellent news for advocates ofdemocratic education (Dewey 1916; Freire 1970; Apple & Beane, 1995; Gutman 1987; Vinson
2006; Parker, 2010; The Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools, 2011; Hess & McAvoy, 2015)
it presents new challenges to colleges of education, which will take on much of the responsibility
for introducing deliberative pedagogy to pre-service teacher candidates who did not have theopportunity to experience a deliberative pedagogy as part of their own K-12 schooling.
The purpose of this paper is to offer the philosophy for children Hawai‘i (p4cHI) approach todeliberative pedagogy as a promising practice for colleges of education that are looking to provide
pre-service social studies teachers with strategies for employing a deliberative pedagogy in the K-12setting. P4cHI is a method of teaching that I have used for over fifteen years in my work as a highschool social studies teacher, legislative internship program coordinator, and most recently in myposition as a teacher educator in the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa. To introduce the p4cHI
approach to deliberative pedagogy I begin with a brief overview of the history of p4cHI and theconnection between p4cHI and the wilder field of deliberative pedagogy. Next, I draw from myexperiences to explain how p4cHI works in the context of teaching deliberative pedagogy in thecollege of education. I share: (a) how p4cHI supports teachers in fostering respectful and ethicalcivic relationships, (b) tools used by p4cHI practitioners to distribute power and open up space formultiple perspectives, (c) p4cHI strategies for promoting dialogue, deliberation, inquiry, and civic
action, and, (d) challenges faced by pre-service teachers as they move towards implementing adeliberative pedagogy in K-12 classrooms outside of the university. At the article’s conclusion I circle
back to the idea that in order to develop a deliberative pedagogy of their very own, pre-service
teachers must have opportunities to experience (Dewey, 1929) deliberative pedagogy in the college ofeducation.

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ANALYTIC TEACHING AND PHILOSOPHICAL PRAXISVOLUME 36 (2015-16)

PHILOSOPHY FOR CHILDREN, P4CHI AND DELIBERATIVE PEDAGOGYWith roots reaching deeply into American Pragmatism and the thought of philosophers such as
John Dewey and William James, Philosophy for Children (P4C) is a widely respected international
movement in education. It was started around 1969 when Matthew Lipman, a Colombia University
philosophy professor, observed that children did not think as well as they could or should in a
democratic society (Lipman, 1988). To address these issues Lipman created a curriculum thatincorporated the skills of logic and reasoning found in the practice of philosophy to improvestudents’ thinking in the K-12 setting. In an effort to extend Lipman’s original curriculum and vision
to a variety of geo-cultural contexts, a number of P4C Centers have been established worldwide.
Among these centers is the Uehiro Academy for Philosophy and Ethics in Education (UAPEE)
at the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa. The UAPEE is the home of p4cHI, which is Thomas Jackson’s(2001; Makaiau & Miller, 2012) culturally responsive offshoot of Lipman’s original approach. The
goal of p4cHI is to move school culture from a top-down model to a community-based, participatorymodel grounded in sound pedagogy and effective educational philosophy. To accomplish this goal,
p4cHI practitioners convert traditional classrooms into intellectually safe communities of inquiry
where students and teachers develop their abilities to think for themselves in responsible ways.
Although it wasn’t labeled as such, p4cHI has always been conceptualized and practiced as adeliberative pedagogy. Based off the ideas found in Democracy and Education (Dewey, 1916), p4cHI
provides individuals with the “experience of dialoguing with others as equals, [and] participating inshared public inquiry [so] that they [are] able to eventually take an active role in the shaping of ademocratic society” (Sharp, 1993, p. 343). It is a pedagogy, which carries out the notion that
democratic education is more than just a content area that can be transmitted via power point,lecture, and closed-ended questioning at the end of a civics text book. Instead, it is characterized by“reflection and action upon the world in order to transform it” (Freire, 1970, p.33). Throughdialogue and deep thinking, students and teachers deliberate “problems of democracy” (Matthews,2014, p. xvii), and work together to make a positive impact on the lives of citizens (Horton & Freire,1990; Matthews, 1994; Gastil & Levine, 2005; Nabatchi, Gastil, Weiksner, Leighninger, 2012). It isan overall approach to education that transcends discipline, age, and grade level by incorporating“deliberative decision making with teaching and learning” (Longo, 2013, p. 49) into a student’s
entire schooling experience.
Defined by both a theoretical framework and actual set of classroom strategies, the p4cHI
approach to deliberative pedagogy aims to produce a number of observable outcomes. Students andteachers who practice p4cHI are seen:asking meaningful, relevant, and purposeful philosophical questions;
exploring questions, topics, and problems of democracy that are important andinteresting;accessing sources of information representing multiple viewpoints and cultural
backgrounds;
thinking about complex issues with diverse groups of people;
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reasoning for themselves;engaging in deliberative dialogue;
listening with empathy;
treating others with respect;reading and writing;and taking responsible action when it is just and necessary.

In the next section I will share how I’ve used a number of p4cHI strategies to both accomplish theeducational outcomes listed above and teach pre-service social studies teachers methods forpracticing deliberative pedagogy in the K-12 setting.
DELIBERATIVE PEDAGOGY IN THE COLLEGE OF EDUCATION
Dewey (1916) argued against seeing teaching as the transmission of ready-made ideas to students,and such is the case with teaching about deliberative pedagogy in the college of education. P4cHI is
not a prescriptive practice that can be easily passed on through a traditional power point or lecture.
Instead it is a theory of education and set of classroom practices that must be experienced by teachers,
and then molded by them to fit their particular teaching style and context. It is for these reasonsthat I use the p4cHI approach to deliberative pedagogy to teach about the p4cHI approach to deliberativepedagogy. Organized into four main sub-headings, the following are brief examples of what the p4cHI
approach to deliberative pedagogy looks like in my classroom at a large public research universitythat services multi-ethnic students from across the U.S. and Pacific Rim.

Respectful and Ethical Civic Relationships
One of the defining features of the p4cHI approach to deliberative pedagogy is students andteachers working together to create “intellectually safe” (Jackson, 2001, p. 460) classroom
communities of inquiry. I start this work on the first day of class when I challenge my social studies
teacher candidates to come up with examples and counter-examples of what an intellectually safe
learning environment looks like. Not only does this activity help us to establish norms for respectfuland ethical civic relationships, but it also introduces my students to the idea that “democraticdispositions –to be open-minded, to trust others, to be committed to finding a common ground thattranscends difference– do not happen by default” (Flanagan, 2013, p. 163). Instead, they must betaught, and as my pre-service social studies teachers reflect on their own experience of co-constructing
the definition of intellectual safety with their classmates, they come to see how defining, modeling,
and practicing respectful and ethical civic relationships must be ongoing activities in a democratic
classroom.

Distributing Power and Accessing Multiple Perspectives
Another key feature of the p4cHI approach to deliberative pedagogy is the “community ball”(Jackson, 2001, pp. 460 – 461). Seated in a circle, my students and I use the community ball tomediate turn taking and open up space for multiple perspectives to be heard during our classroom
deliberations and inquiry. The rules of the community ball are: (1) only the person with thecommunity ball speaks, (2) the person with the community ball chooses who speaks next, and (3)3ANALYTIC TEACHING AND PHILOSOPHICAL PRAXISVOLUME 36 (2015-16)

you always have the right to pass. Put in place to shift the traditional power structures found in mostclassrooms, the rules of the community ball help to cultivate and nurture a collaborative civic spacein which no one perspective is dominant, and every voice is valued. They also work to redefineteachers and students as co-inquirers (Freire, 1970) who recognize that in order for the work of ademocracy to move forward, everyone must constantly be learning together (Matthews, 2014).

Dialogue, Deliberation, Inquiry, and Action
There are two additional strategies found in the p4cHI approach to deliberative pedagogy, which
are essential for promoting dialogue, deliberation, inquiry, and action. They are the Good Thinker’s
Tool Kit (GTTK) and Plain Vanilla. The GTTK is a set of seven philosophical moves that assists
students and teachers in generating questions, making claims, and in thinking responsibly about theproblems of democracy (Matthews, 2014). Used in concert with the GTTK, Plain Vanilla is a fivestep inquiry process that structures classroom deliberations. The five steps are: (1) read, (2) question,(3) vote, (4) dialogue, and (5) reflect (Jackson, 2001; Miller, 2014). In the 2014-15 school year alone,
my pre-service social studies teachers used the GTTK and Plain Vanilla to question and deliberatewith one another about topics such as: “Is it true that teaching is a political act? What are somecounter-examples to the notion that standards-based education reforms make the schoolingexperience of diverse populations more equitable? What about the histories of people that are left
out of the standards? What are the implications of non-Native Hawaiian social studies teachers
teaching Hawaiian history? What are the reasons for the high teacher turnover rate in Hawaii, andwhat does this imply about the profession? Is it true that what we do in our classrooms will impact
how students act in society?” To aid in their reflection, I follow up with my students at the end ofeach Plain Vanilla process by asking them to explain what they learned from one another, and how
they intended on using their new perspectives and points of view to take informed action in their K12 classrooms.

Challenges
I have learned a lot from listening to my pre-service teachers’ reflections, including the challenges
they believe they will face in implementing a deliberative pedagogy in their classrooms outside of theuniversity. As a whole they connect with the theoretical foundations that support a deliberative
pedagogy, and in the context of their own educational experience, they find the p4cHI strategies
enjoyable, engaging, and meaningful. However, when I ask them to elaborate on how they will use
these theories and strategies to shape their future practice, they voice great concerns about having
enough time for inquiry, deliberation, and informed civic action in their eventual placements ascertified K-12 classroom teachers. Worried about the external pressures being put on them byprincipals, statewide mandates, and national initiatives, they lament that they would love toimplement a deliberative pedagogy, but they don't have the time to “get through” the content thatwill be covered on our state’s high stakes exams. As I listen to what they have to say I know that theirconcerns are real, but I also know that they will be able to draw from their experiences with p4cHI
in the college of education to become K-12 classroom teachers who are “real fixers” (Matthews, 2014,p. xvii).

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Creating Teachers Who Are Real Fixers
Real fixers, or the people who make our democracy work as it should “aren’t interested in quick
fixes. They deal with obvious problems [like failing schools]…however they sense that more
fundamental and systemic problems are behind the obvious and that these have to be dealt with”(Matthews, 2014, p. xvii). Over the years, I have observed that teachers who experience p4cHI at theuniversity become more adept at identifying those more fundamental and systemic problems, andthey use what they learn in the college of education to address these problems with a deliberative
pedagogy of their very own. As a part of this process they come to see themselves as real fixers. They
acknowledge that one of the many purposes of education is to move forward, but they also knowthat the community building and inquiry that is necessary for making meaningful progress in schools
takes time. They are “not in a rush” (Jackson, 2001, p. 465), and neither should colleges of education
be as they work to develop teachers who are prepared to address the problems of democracy(Matthews, 2014) in classrooms, schools, and communities.
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS“Can students be educated for a democracy in a non-democratic classroom” (Parker 2010, p. 11)?
The answer is no, and as educational initiatives like the (C3) Framework for Social Studies StateStandards gain momentum in promoting the use of a deliberative pedagogy in the K-12 setting,colleges of education must respond by making sure that teacher candidates have opportunities toexperience a deliberative pedagogy as a part of their teacher preparation programs. In this article I
offer p4cHI as a promising practice for colleges of education that are looking to take on this newchallenge. Adaptable to a variety of different teaching contexts, the p4cHI approach to deliberative
pedagogy fosters ethical and responsible civic relationships, provides students and teachers with thetools for distributing power and accessing multiple perspectives, and creates opportunities fordialogue, deliberation, and action. It is “an educational practice that itself is both liberatory andparticipatory, that simultaneously creates a new society and involves the people themselves in thecreation of their own knowledge” (Horton & Freire, 1990, p. xxx). I like to imagine what this newsociety will look like if students and teachers, from kindergarten to graduate school, experience adeliberative pedagogy throughout their schooling. “Perhaps we will [all] begin to remember a now
half-forgotten idea that was to guide the purposes and programs of our public schools. The idea was,and is, democracy” (Apple & Beane, 1995, p.2).
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The Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools. (2011). Guardian of democracy: The
civic mission of schools. Philadelphia, PA: Johnathan Gould.
Carcasson, M. (2013). Rethinking civic engagement on campus: The overarching potential ofdeliberative practice.” Higher Education Exchange, 37 – 48.
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Dewey, J. (1916). Democracy and education: An introduction to the philosophy of education. New York:The Free Press.
Dewey, J. (1929). Experience and education. New York, NY: MacMillan.
Flanagan, C. A. (2013). Teenage citizens: The political theories of the young. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press.
Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum.
Gastil, J., & Levine, P. The deliberative democracy handbook: Strategies for effective civic engagement in the21st century. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Gutman, A. (1987). Democratic education. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Hess, D. & McAvoy, P. (2015). The political classroom: Evidence and ethics in democratic education.
New York, NY: Routledge.
Horton, M., & F. 1990. We make the road by walking: Conversations on education and social change.
Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
Jackson, T. (2001). The art and craft of gently socratic inquiry. In A. L. Costa (Ed.)
Developing minds: A resource for teaching thinking (459 – 465). Alexandria,
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Lipman, M. (1988). Philosophy goes to school. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
Longo, N. V. (201). Deliberative pedagogy in the community: Connecting deliberative dialogue,community engagement, and democratic education. Journal of Public Deliberation, 9(2), 1 - 18.
Makaiau, A. S. & Miller, C. (2012). The philosopher’s pedagogy. Educational Perspectives,44(1 & 2), 8 – 19.
Manosevitch, E. (2013). The medium is the message: An Israeli experience with deliberative
pedagogy. Higher Education Exchange, 60 – 68.
Matthews, D. (1994). Politics for people. Chicago: University of Illinois Press.
Matthews, D. (2014). The Ecology of democracy: Finding ways to have a stronger hand in shaping ourfuture. Kettering, OH: Kettering Foundation Press.
Miller, C. E. The Plain Vanilla Process. (paper, University of Hawai‘i, Manoa, HI, May 15, 2014).
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Molnar-Main, S., & Kingseed, L. (2013). Public learning in public schools: How networks ofteachers and public partners can support civic learning. Connections. Retrieved fromhttp://kettering.org/periodicals/connections-2013-citizens-in-democratic-politics/Nabatchi, T., Gastil, J. G., Weiksner, M. & Leighninger, M. (2012). Democracy in motion: Evaluating
the practice and impact of deliberative civic engagement. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
National Council for the Social Studies. (2013). The college, career, and civic life (C3) framework forsocial studies state standards. Silver Spring, MD: The National Council for the Social Studies.
Parker, W. (2010). Social studies education e21. In W. Parker (Ed.), Social Studies Today: Researchand Practice (3 – 16). New York: Routledge.
Sharp, A.M. (1993). ‘The community of inquiry: Education for democracy’ in M. Lipman (Ed.),
Thinking children and education, ed. by M Lipman, Hunt Publishing Company, Dubuque,pp. 337 – 343.
Vinson, K. D. (2006). Opression, anti-opression, and citizenship education. In Ross,
E. W. (Ed.), The Social studies curriculum: Purposes, problems and possibilities (pp. 51 – 76).
Albany: State University of New York Press.
Address Correspondences to:
Amber Strong Makaiau
Makaiau,University of Hawai‘i at Manoa
amakaiau@hawaii.edu

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