Grab a cup of tea, put your feet up, throw out a big question, and (with sincerity) ask “What do you think?” In this case, silence is gold

We’d like to remind parents, caregivers and teachers: you deserve this feeling too, this comfort, this connection. You deserve to be able to admit you don’t know. You deserve to have time and space to ask big questions, and to bond with others through dialogue. You deserve to the security of knowing that, like the many, many humans before you who have lived through trying circumstances, that there are ways to think your way through things, to come out on the other side with even bigger and better ideas.

Philosophy encourages the development of many 21st century skills and promotes social-emotional learning. The development of patience is a benefit that shouldn’t be overlooked. Whose kid couldn’t use a few moments to sit and reflect now and then? Whose kid wouldn’t benefit from a break from the frantic speed of their current lifestyle? What adult, for that matter, wouldn’t like to take a breath and slow down every so often?

Kids have never been privy to so much at such an early age as they are now, and they very badly need to know how to filter and find what’s true, what’s important, what’s helpful, and pass on things that are just interesting. They need to know when and how to act on this information.

Perhaps when we shy away from teaching critical thinking to our kids, it’s because we’re seeing it through the smoggy lenses of our grown-up definition. We’re so afraid of our kids not trusting us, talking back to us, and being unhappily skeptical about everything that we forget what it feels like for a little thinker to be critical. For a child, critical thinking is an exploration, a collaboration, and even an adventure.

Your kids’ extra screen time doesn’t have to be a source of guilt or a disaster. If your kids go for quality over quantity, there are fun and enriching ways to turn television, movies, games, and apps into learning opportunities.

Philosophy may have a reputation for being all about essays and debates, but when it comes to young thinkers, it needn’t be limited to just one or two avenues of learning. There are as many ways to approach big questions as there are children to ask them.

Experiences outrank simple stuff any day of the week (or any time of the year). They tend to stick better than the latest toy trends, and they have more widespread, lasting benefits to a child. We’d like to humbly suggest that this year, you give your child something that really will keep on giving: philosophical dialogue.

What needs to be established isn’t whether children can do philosophy, but how they do it. Needless to say, philosophy is different when it comes from the mouths of babes.

It really doesn’t take much to spark curiosity in a kid. They spend their days lit up with questions and quandaries, and aren’t afraid to share and explore. It’s this drive and enthusiasm that helps them develop and navigate the world.

It’s also what makes them natural philosophers.

Yes, even philosophers have a special day, and this is it!

Today, we celebrate the asking of big questions, the curiosity behind them, and the patient and creative stream of thought with which we work through them. Around these parts, we also celebrate the little thinkers who seem to effortlessly embrace philosophy, and the big thinkers who encourage them.

Whether it’s mentally, emotionally or socially, we want our kids to be ready to make the most of their time on the world stage, and there’s no better (or more fun) way to do that then to engage them as wee philosophers.

Why, as parents, do we have such a hard time looking like fools in front of our kids? Why, after centuries of wise fools, haven’t we embraced the notion that sometimes, in order to dig out important ideas, we might have to be a little foolish ourselves?

Their reality includes social media, interactive learning, and the expectation that they’ll be innovative in their way of thinking. All of these things hinge on being able to not just coexist, but to thrive as a group.

As luck would have it, doing philosophy with your kids can help with this vital skill.

Historically speaking, philosophy is just jam-packed with amazing thinkers with fascinating ideas (and fascinating lives). It would be such a shame for little thinkers to miss out on this veritable banquet of thinking just because we assume they’re too little.

A desire for lifelong learning, and the skills to actually support it, might be the best thing we can instill in our little thinkers, and reinforce in ourselves.

Why not equip our kids with the critical thinking skills needed to navigate these choppy waters, and form useful habits when they’re still malleable?

Robots (or at least the idea of them), have been fascinating thinkers for more than two thousand years, because of what they are, what they can do, and what they represent for us as humans. If you’ve got a little thinker who’s fascinated with robots, there are all kinds of questions that can spark some amazing conversations, and encourage critical, creative thought.

Wherever you’re at, and wherever you were a year ago, it’s all good. We want to assure you that your kids learned, are learning, and that you did and continue to do a great job. It really is true that youngsters have brains like sponges, and anything and everything they encounter presents them with a new opportunity to think. It’s also true that kids are natural philosophers, and whether or not they’re in a classroom, the questions will still keep rolling in, and they’ll still keep finding new and amazing answers to them.

Perhaps your little thinker has shown leadership potential (and we don’t mean just the average bossiness). Perhaps they haven’t, but you still want them to understand the concept, so they can choose their leaders more effectively. Leadership is an important subject for any child, for a number of reasons, and one that’s actually fun to discuss.