The Banking concept of Education
Pedagogy of the Opressed is the essay we read by Paulo Freiere. He believes that education is a narrative model. That teachers are simply feeding information into the student "recepticles" , and that the students really weren't learning. I can kind of identify with this. When I was in high school there were several classes I took that simply had me memorize a lot of information, but I never really learned. Freiere has thrown away the concept that "we construct the world" he says that by learning to read and write we learn a way to understand and interact with the world. This is very true, when you think about the developing countries and their literacy rate, you can't help but think how lucky we are to live in a society where we are forced to be educated up to a ceratain age.He says that man is not a conscious being, but the possessor of a consciousness. I guess this is true in a way too. That we get into such a routine after we graduate high school and college that sometimes we aren't still willing to learn. I believe that we should never stop learning, never stop growing, and never stop trying to enrich our existences.
posted by EmC_0227 at 4:21 PM
4 Comments:
I did not particularly enjoy this article. Also, I didn't agree with many of the claims in the piece. Freire definitely had a different idea about education; while his affect on the educational system may have been significant, I don't agree at all with his theory (he is clearly a conflict theorist).
I too have memorized what I had to for a class, and forgotten it the next day. However, is every class this way? Are our teachers merely "narrators?" I don't think so. Freire even says that teachers fear communication. Based on my experiences, teachers encourage opinions and communication.
I have to agree with Courtney about this article in that some of Freire's claims are a little out there. I will agree that, yes, some classes are just memorization classes and if it's something that you really don't care about, you are just going to memorize the material for the exam. However, I have had a lot of good experiences with teachers that they are not just getting up and lecturing us but are welcoming communication with them and among all of the students.
This article was so hard to follow. I felt like I had to read each sentence 3 or 4 times to really follow it. Being an education major, I thought his ideas were pretty out there and old fashioned. We are taught to really get the children involved and not just make them memorize things at a young age. It is our jobs to make sure that the students are not just reciting things that we have taught them, but they actually understand and know what they have learned.
I definitely identify with some Freiere's views on education. Obviously, anyone can memorize facts out of a book or from a teacher's lecture, but I feel like I learn more through discussion with people who might have different views or interpretations.
I also think that Emma has a good point when she refers to Freiere's statement that man is only the possessor of conciousness. After high school a lot of people get stuck in the rut of their careers and never branch out and learn something new. This I think also ties into the internet. I think a lot of senior citizens are unwilling to learn how to use the internet because it's something new and they have already stopped learning.
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