I recently got to tick a big item off my “things-I-really-really-want-to-do-that-will-probably-never happen” list when I had the honor of being a guest on Partially Examined Life, the one-of-a-kind philosophy podcast I gushed about several years ago when I first discovered Wes, Mark, Seth and Dylan during my One Year philosophy BA project.
That blog post includes an autograph from Seth Paskin himself, and since it went up I have had the chance to see the Fab 4 in action when they talked de Tocqueville at Brown University, not to mention becoming friends with my fellow Boston-area resident Wes Alwan.
This week and next, the five of us talk about John Dewey, the man who – among countless other achievements – created the concept of critical thinking, a subject that became my life’s work before I discovered its origin point.
Given the ethos of PEL, I tried to avoid unprompted self-promotion during the show, but if anyone is interested, here are some links to topics mentioned during the ‘cast:
Critical Thinking – My latest book in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series
LogicCheck – A site I created, modeled after fact-checking sites like FactCheck.org and Politifact, that checks the reasoning behind the news
CriticalVoter – My how-to guide that uses election politics to teach practical critical thinking skills
Degree of Freedom – Home to my One Year MOOC BA project, covered in a blog that includes many entries on philosophy
Critical Thinking High Leverage Practices – A framework I created for fellow educators on how to integrate critical-thinking skills development into the teaching of any subject
The only downside of our discussion was that it had to end, but if anyone wants to pick it up where we left off, or is interested in talking shop about education, critical-thinking, online learning or anything else, drop me a line!