A Framework for Dialogue within Service-Learning: Lessons from Philosophy for Children

Abstract

This article argues that the field of community service-learning should adopt a “community of inquiry” model for classroom dialogue. Specifically, the author claims that communities of inquiry, as expounded by the Philosophy for Children movement, can help to overcome certain educational barriers that have been identified in both the theoretical and empirical service-learning literature by providing a general model for productive classroom dialogue. Moreover, this dialogical model, given its relative parsimony, promises to be amenable to many of the distinct (and potentially incompatible) theoretical models that inform service-learning approaches.