Here’s a Sudanese storyteller’s opener: ‘I’m going to tell a story It’s a lie. But not everything in it is false.’ From Norma J. Livo and Sandra Rietz Storytelling Process and Practice (1986) And here is an extract from the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy’s entry on holes: ‘Naive...

Stimulus: By Steven Hoggins Jeff (the children chose the names) is playing ball outside and kicks it through a window. The owner comes out and says: "Did you break my window?" Jeff responds with, “no." Task Questions:  Did Jeff lie? What makes it a lie/not a lie? The children talked abo...

The Philosophy A paradox is a very strange thing: it is an anomaly of reasoning, and, whereas good reasoning is thought to produce sound conclusions, paradoxes can challenge this assumption. With paradoxes the reasoning may appear good but the conclusion that follows absurd. The word comes from Ancient Greek: para meaning ‘distinct from...

Starter activity I start by getting the children to play a game of 'True For You'; they should change places if what I say is true for them. After beginning with a couple of easy ones ('I am a girl', 'I am wearing red' etc) I usually include a couple of slightly harder ones ('I don't understand the rules to thi...

The Philosophy This session was designed to focus specifically on logic. There was a class who would agree to logically inconsistent statements without realising it (eg. 'Is it possible to think of nothing?' 'No' Did you think of nothing? 'Yes'). So the children are asked to say which sentences are consistent. In ...

You are going to need the book 'The Gruffalo' by Julia Donaldson for this session. The Little Brown Mouse says that she has a friend called a Gruffalo, but she knows ‘there’s no such thing as a Gruffalo’. Until, she meets one... Task Questions: Did the Little Brown Mouse tell a lie? What is lying? If...

Taken from Peter Worley's book '40 Lessons to Get Children Thinking', Bloomsbury September 2015 Equipment needed and preparation: An enclosed non-transparent box, A ball (optional - see below) Starting age: 10 years Key concept / vocabulary: Hypothesis, test, show, demonstrate, true, false, knowledge Subject lin...

Stimulus Write the following statements on the board and ask: Are these a) true, b) false, c) neither or d) both? 'I am 20. 'I am me.' 'The Simpsons is a really good programme.' 'I am shopping in Lewisham' (when the speaker is shopping, but not in Lewisham) 'This cake is made of jelly' (whe...