Investigation of the effect of philosophy for children (P4C)-based books on social skills and social problem-solving skills of primary school second grade students

The aim of this study was to examine the effects of Philosophy for Children (P4C)-based practise conducted with books on the social skills and social problem-solving skills of second-grade elementary school students. This study, in the experimental design of the pretest-posttest retention test control group, was conducted in two different schools, which have medium socio-economic level opportunities and provide full-day education, selected by random sampling from the primary schools affiliated to the Ministry of National Education in the province of Haliliye, Şanlıurfa, in the spring term of the 2022-2023 academic year. In this context, a class represents the experimental group (n=25 students) who participated in the practices conducted with philosophy (P4C) based books for children and the other class (n=22 students) represents the control group without any additional intervention and the study group consists of 47 second graders. "SOBECE Child Social Skills Assessment Scale" and "Social Problem-Solving Questionnaire" and "Personal Information Form" were used to collect data in line with the purpose of the study. Within the scope of the study, the data obtained from the "SOBECE Child Social Skills Assessment Scale" using the "Statistics Package Program for Social Sciences SPSS (23) using the dependent and independent groups t-test and the Social Problem-Solving Questionnaire" were also used in frequency and percentage (%) values were calculated and analyzed. As a result of the analyses, it was observed that the social skills of second-grade students in the experimental and control groups significantly differed in favor of the experimental group in the sub-dimensions of "initiating and maintaining relationships", "assertiveness", "coping with aggressive behaviors and impulses", "problem-solving skills", "planning skills" and "communicating with a group and execution of an assignment skills" as well as in the total score. On the other hand, although it was observed that the social skills of the students in the experimental and control groups in the dimension of "skills for emotions" did not differ statistically significantly according to their posttest scores, the increase between the pretest and posttest mean scores was higher in the experimental group. Furthermore, in terms of social problem-solving skills, it was found that among second-grade students in the experimental group, there was an increase in the number of students who preferred positive solution strategies in the sub-dimensions of "disobeying the rules of a game", "exclusion from the game", "physical and verbal violence", "breaking a promises", "unauthorized use of belongings", "dominating and managing friends", "not listening to each other" and "not being cooperative" in the post-test measurements. In the control group, however, it was determined that the number of students who preferred positive solution strategies in these dimensions decreased or remained the same. It was concluded that the effect of philosophy for children-based practices on social skills and social problem-solving skills for given to the experimental group continued after the application and was permanent. In the light of the results obtained, recommendations were made to develop children's skills in a versatile way and improve the skills discussed by utilizing the methods and techniques employed in practices conducted with philosophy for children-based books in primary schools.