Teacher's Guide for "Wonder."

"Wonder" is at the same time a story about a boy meeting a vagabond in a park in the
city and a philosophical text. The story is there to stimulate the reading and to make an
everyday-background for the talks between the vagabond and the boy. The dog Wonder is
also important, as it interprets the dialogue the "doggy" way.
The important task for the teacher is to make his/her students interested in finding the
philosophical passages and in discussing the topics and issues. The goal is not to find
statements, that can be compared to well-known philosophers or the history of
philosophy. P4c is there to help the students think and express themselves
independently, to help them make arguments for their statements, and to help them
finding their own opinions.
So it is a heavy task for the teacher – a mental challenge, but also a wonderful
experience to have a good relationship to the students. The teacher has to see
her/himself as a catalyst for the philosophical dialogue. There are no final answers to the
topics mentioned in the text – no one is cleverer than the other. Philosophy as such is a
questioning science, which does not give answers, but shows different paths you can
choose to find your own opinion – and to discover how you are deep down as a living
human being.
Thus, philosophy is the breathing soul of living and thinking. That is the reason why the
following suggestions to the way of questioning and leading the dialogue ARE
suggestions. When you start class you never know, where the dialogues will take you –
but the suggestions can be useful in order to push the dialogue forward.

RELIGION AND ETHICS

"Well, I sometimes hear ------"

Try to make the students tell how the vagabond and how Steven see religion.
Make every student try.
Open a discussion about the different statements and write key-words on the board.
Make your students give examples from their own life or from what they have read
elsewhere.
Try to work your way to definitions:
How would you define religion (originally the word means knowledge)?
How would you define ethics?
Discuss again.
Try to follow the mainstream of your students and not your own.

For the vagabond religion is like a play on a stage with different roles.
What do you think about that?
Make every student try.

The vagabond thinks, that religion takes away wonder.
What could he possibly mean?
What do you mean?
Why?

For Steven religion is a push for him to think about Life.
So he sees religion as a step in his development.
How do you see this?

KNOWING ONESELF

"No, religion gives me more ----"

Steven can use religion in order to know himself better.

Is it important to know oneself?
Why/why not?
Can one say that knowing oneself is a presupposition for the ability of loving and caring
for other people?
Make every student try.
Do you have to be an adult to be able to know yourself?
Can philosophy be a help?
Religion?
Other people?
Friendship?

TRUTH

"So you mean ---"

Can we talk about one single truth?
Or do we have our own truth, i.e. truth is subjective?
Discuss and try to make the students go deep down into this question.

Religion is talking about truth.
What about philosophy?
Does it only show you part of the way?
Or?

MYTH VS. REALITY

"Yes, I have heard that, too ----"

In this small dialogue Steven and the vagabond try to discuss the differences between
logic and myth/religion.

Is there a huge gap between these two elements?
Has logic anything to do in the universe of religion?
Or vice versa?
Is it so, that religion and logic represent two different truths?
Try to take a very deep dialogue about this.
Make every student give it a try.
Every student has something to contribute with.

Steven says, that you have to find the ethics in yourself.
What is an I?
The same as a soul? Are we born with it?
Does it develop all the way through Life?

Such dialogues touch the deepest of your students' minds, and you as a catalyst for
these dialogues are touching their subconsciousness, so philosophy used in this way has
a deep impact, also subconsciously, on your students' minds. These dialogues work
behind what is conscious, behind language, and behind emotions. In this way p4c is
extremely important for the next generation of children and the future of society and
mankind. A subconscious insight in the most profound philosophical topics will later
develop into a certain knowledge of one's own being, one's responsibility, and one's
understanding of other people.
Try to find your own way through this, and use my suggestions and suggested questions
as an inspiration for getting on with p4c.
If you have not tried before, you'll experience a greater motivation in your students.

Towards the end of the essay Steven see philosophy as the deepest of everything. Then
comes subconsciousness, then ethics, then religion.
So in his opinion philosophy is deeper than religion.
Take a very deep discussion about that.

And remember Raimund R. Popper's philosophy:
We do not know anything, we are only assuming.

Seen from the dog Wonder's point of view:
It's much easier to be a dog.
If Wonder were able to speak, she might have said:
Is it so difficult to be human? I'll stay a dog!!!

Per Jespersen Back

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©Per Jespersen