Category: Teaching
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A Good Offense (updated)
When it comes to teaching philosophy, how offensive may we be, and in what ways? Recent discussions here, particularly regarding teaching same-sex marriage, have…
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Same-Sex Marriage and Philosophy Revisited
“How Academic Philosophers Are Trying to End the Gay-Marriage Debate—and Getting it Wrong” is the title of a new article in the National Review. Written by…
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How Do You Want Your Students To Assess You?
Most colleges and universities have students fill out forms to evaluate their instructors’ performance at the end of the term. Semesters are just beginning…
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Mapping Philosophical Arguments
The students sit in pairs at a computer terminal, and after reading Cullen’s synopsis of a particular argument, they try to map it. The…
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Inclusive Philosophy Classroom Best Practices Site
A new website, Best Practices for the Inclusive Philosophy Classroom, has launched. It is an interdepartmental project, started by Minorities and Philosophy (MAP), which…
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Teaching As If Our Students Were Not Future Philosophers
Since most of our undergraduate students are planning to go to graduate school in philosophy and become professional philosophers, it makes sense that the undergraduate philosophy curriculum is typically filled…
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Philosophy of Police Violence and Mass Incarceration
Lisa Guenther, associate professor of philosophy at Vanderbilt University, has developed a new philosophy course, “Police Violence and Mass Incarceration,” which she will be…
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Laptops, Tablets, and Phones in the Classroom
I settled on my New Year’s resolution while giving a lecture to 85 masters students. It was one kid who unintentionally suggested the idea. He was…
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Philosophy To Be Taught In Ireland’s Secondary Schools
Philosophy will become a part of the secondary school curriculum in Ireland, according to an announcement by Minister of Education Jan O’Sullivan, reported in…
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Philosophy at Community College
In the Tusculan Disputations, Cicero famously says, “Socrates was the first to call philosophy down from the heavens and set her in our cities,…
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Virtual Worlds and Video Games in Philosophy Teaching
Do any of you use virtual worlds or video games in your teaching of philosophy, and if so, how? In conversation the other day…
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Teaching on Same-Sex Marriage
Most colleges offer lower-level philosophy courses on contemporary moral problems, one of the aims of which is to teach students how to think philosophically about assorted social and…
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More Details Emerge on Boxill’s Role in UNC Scandal
As was reported last month, a detailed investigation at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill revealed an academic fraud scandal in which…
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How To Fail Philosophy Exams
Bob Hargrave was, I am told, a much-loved lecturer in philosophy at Oxford University (he died in 2012). Among his pedagogical contributions is a…
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Group Work in Philosophy Class
Here are problems with group-work that I have observed or heard about multiple times from students: the members of the group (unless the group…
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Brilliant Combination of Teaching and Outreach (updated)
Mount Holyoke philosophy professor Thomas Wartenberg and College President Lynn Pasquerella co-teach a course called “Philosophy for Children.” An article at masslive.com describes it: As part of…
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Assessment and Philosophy Courses
Most of the discussions regarding “assessment” are fine examples of exactly what we do not want to see college producing: vague and uniform truisms,…
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Philosophy Professor Implicated in UNC Academic Fraud Investigation (several updates)
Philosophy professor Jan Boxill was named as an active participant in an academic fraud scheme in a 136-page report issued earlier today by the University…
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Telling Your Students Your Beliefs
Adam See (Brooklyn College) wrote a letter to his philosophy students at the end of the past semester. It begins: Dear students, I am no…