What's it all about?

WHO? The project started out as a pilot, run by partners Lancashire Global Education Centre (LGEC) and Cumbria Development Education Centre (CDEC).

WHY? To test the effectiveness of Global Citizenship activities and Philosophy for Children (P4C) as tools to engage socially excluded young people in their own learning, and encourage them to become active responsible citizens.

HOW? The partners shared planning ideas and activities, but ran separate programmes according to their expertise, and their assessments of the needs in their different Pupil Referral Units (PRUs).

WHAT? LGEC focussed on trialing as many Global Citizenship topics as possible as stimuli for philosophical discussions, whilst CDEC combined the P4C methodology with experiential learning and Critical Skills.

KEY LEARNING OUTCOME

Philosophy for Children gives an added dimension to the Citizenship curriculum, by making the topics more meaningful for the pupils, by encouraging them to ask questions, open minds, challenge each others' views, therefore reaching deeper levels of understanding.

It became clear that P4C should be used in conjunction with other participative methodologies for the students to develop a fuller understanding of the topics.