ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a few examples - of practices and people - among many thousands who have played their part in the evolution of Philosophy for Children (P4C) in the UK. The models of philosophical enquiries that Socrates bequeathed, courtesy of Plato, were certainly an inspiration for Matthew Lipman in his development of P4C. The approach that Lipman has created in P4C is not about prescribing any one philosophy to children, but about encouraging them to develop their own philosophy, their own way of thinking about the world. It was surely significant that Lipman agreed for this inspiration to be recognised in the title of the 1990 BBC documentary, Socrates for Six Year Olds. This broadcast was itself seminal in the history of P4C in the UK, since it led to the founding of the network that became SAPERE, the charitable Society for Advancing Philosophical Enquiry and Reflection in Education.
