Why Philosophy Is Best Taught Chronologically

How to best teach philosophy so students can understand and appreciate its importance.

One of the biggest challenges for philosophy professors is reaching students who have little to no background or interest in philosophy. In the US, philosophy is seldom taught in high school and many students see a college Intro to Philosophy course as nothing but a general distribution requirement to get out of the way as quickly and painlessly as possible. Knowing this, most intro textbooks approach students with a dumbed-down, jazzed up, collection of “hey kids, look at this wild idea.” The results are underwhelming and too many students remain with the impression that philosophy is just this weird detached field of no real importance.

In my over twenty years of teaching philosophy, I’ve seen quite a few introductory textbooks. The publishers, who charge outrageous prices to students, are very keen to send them to me, hoping I will adopt them for my courses. Almost every single intro to philosophy textbook, like over 95% of them, presents philosophy topically. They divide philosophy into five or six broad topics and give students a few snippets of writings from philosophers on the topics. This…