17.07.2026
Until last year, the Swiss Philosophy Olympiad did not organise any preparation for the final. Participants were encouraged to study the evaluation criteria and documents containing tips, or to ask their philosophy teachers for feedback on previous essays. In the spring of 2026, the idea of offering essay coaching arose spontaneously. Thanks to the growing voluntary involvement of former participants and students in the Swiss Philosophy Olympiad, there was sufficient capacity to assign a coach to every finalist.
But is essay writing actually something that can be learned? If so – how? In the survey conducted after the essay coaching sessions, participants were encouraged to reflect on these questions. In their responses, they distinguished between individual components of essay writing, such as formulating sound arguments or structuring a text. Essay writing thus emerged as a mosaic of various skills that could be specifically improved through modular exercises, depending on the learners’ individual strengths and weaknesses.
The Swiss Philosophy Olympiad is organised by students in their spare time, and our resources are limited. This is why the English version of this list is currently only available as an AI-generated translation. You can support us: if you spot an error or awkward wording, simply request editing access and help us improve the document – and if you have a method to share with your colleagues, please feel free to add it:
About the author: Lara Gafner is the president of the Swiss Philosophy Olympiad, is currently training to become a philosophy teacher, and will be teaching at Gymnasium Thun in the coming school year. This version of the collection of teaching methods was produced for an assignment as part of the subject didactics course at the Pädagogische Hochschule Bern.
