Educational Concerns Built On Generalizations

In the excerpt from “The Banking Concept of Education” the author, Paulo Freire explains the critical flaw in the current education system. He continues by offering his believed solution to this problem. The two concepts Freire discusses in this excerpt are the “banking concept” of education and the “problem-posing method” of education. The “banking concept” is talked about rather negatively, whereas the “problem-posing method” is talked about highly. Freire believes in the “problem-posing method” and that students should have free-will to a certain extent in the classroom with less authoritative power from the teacher during discussions.

Mark Edmundson speaks out about the apparent decline of college level education in his article, “On the Uses of a Liberal Education: As Lite Entertainment for Bored College Students”. Edmundson believes liberal education is declining due to students losing passion and colleges selling students what they want: a good time.

Students are not taught important and necessary life skills when they are preparing for a test. They study the material so that they can be informed to regurgitate the material on paper for the purpose of passing a test. Test taking students are not encouraged to think outside the box because their answer might be incorrect.

Freire and Rodriguez would not agree that the process of education has to be certain way. Freire believes that banking education oppresses the students and to be free of oppression we, “must abandon the educational goal of deposit-making and replace it with” problem-posing education (323). On the other hand, Rodriguez’s father saw that education, even banking, “could enable a person to escape from a life of mere labor” (Rodriguez 522). Rodriguez embraced the deposits of information from his teachers. “Any book they told me to read, I read – then waited for them to tell me which books I enjoyed” (Rodriguez 518-19). Rodriguez was so into the banking concept of education that not only did he let the teachers deposit information in him, but also feelings. This type of learning may have made it take longer for Rodriguez to think critically; however, banking education did give him skills that

In today’s society students aren’t pushed in high school to pursue their full potential, which makes students think they don’t need to put hard work into school making them lazy. The outcome of this is bad grades and upset parents making them believe they aren’t smart and that is why they are getting the grades they are receiving. In actuality these students aren’t being pushed and the teachers aren’t tapping into their talents to show them the full academic potential they have.

The greatest thing about humans is that they have the ability to think. Thinking is what differs people from each other and makes people who they are. Freire understands the importance of thinking and wants to start a discussion on the school systems attempt to restrict thinking. This is what he tries to do in his article, something that he does pretty well. He believes the school system solely cares about facts and numbers. The teachers feed their students information and expect them to memorize it, and spit it back on paper. “The reason the banking system continues to thrive is to serve the purpose of the authority, whose peace of mind rests on how well the oppressed fit in the world created by the oppressors, and how little they question it (Freire, page 219). Educators have to understand that the classroom is a leveled playing field, teaching and learning simultaneously through discussions with each other.

In Paulo Freire’s article, “The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education,” he discusses how there is an absence of imagination and critical thinking in the “banking” method of education. Paulo Freire contends that the “banking” method of instruction is not a viable strategy to educate students. In the film, Dead Poets Society, directed by Peter Weir, Mr. Keating, an English professor in the film, liberates the student 's mind by making them confront the issues exhibited to them. The "problem-posing" strategy was utilized as a part of the film, yet since the students’ were used to the "banking" method, they did not know how to face the issue, rather they found another approach to dispose of it. “Problem-posing” method demonstrates that the "banking" method is by no means the only type of instruction out there. Weir’s film and Freire’s article demonstrate how well a teacher-student relationship can be when using the “problem-posing” method and the“banking” method, in other to understand Freire’s explicit and implicit message.

In Pedagogy of the Oppressed Paulo Freire mentions the teacher-student contradiction. The contradiction is when students are controlled by teachers. The teachers have the authority over the students, which puts the students in a position that lacks freedom to experience their identity as humans. This contradiction exists due to the banking concept of education. Freire states that the banking concept encourages the contradiction between teachers and students. The banking concept rejects students as individuals and sees them as objects. As a result of the rejection as individuals, students are unable to speak or act upon their own

Freire is describing the negative effects the banking concept can have on a student. This form of education slowly wears them down until they eventually forsake their ambition and accept the mundane “reality” they are being taught.

In “The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education,” from the Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Revised Edition, Paulo Freire discusses two different types of education: “banking” and problem-posing. The banking concept of education is when teachers “make deposits which the students patiently receive, memorize, and repeat” (318), and ‘problem posing’ is when the teachers and students are equal. Instead of being treated as human beings that have their own thoughts and ideas, students are treated as containers that are simply filled by a powerful being, a teacher. In school, teachers are dominants that provide knowledge to the students, the subordinates; the knowledge that students learn are limited to what they’re taught by teachers. Similarly, in Kurt Wimmer’s ‘Equilibrium’, Librians are treated as reservoirs for knowledge.

Freire begins Chapter 2 of Pedagogy of the Oppressed by stating his interpretation of the educational system between teacher and student, focusing primarily on the “banking” system, which is exceptionally biased due to oppressive teachers who direct their own misguided inquiries upon their oppressed students. Freire continues on by maintaining “knowledge is a gift bestowed by those

Philosopher and educator Paulo Freire once said, “Education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity or it becomes the practice of freedom, the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world.” In Freire’s work of “the Banking Concept of Concept”, he describes how the education system is failing to help student find success in the real world as well as it provides a framework for the “teachers” to oppress the “students” through the distribution of power.

On the second page of Paolo Freire’s article the third paragraph caught my attention. I agree with his statement that the oppressor will use the banking concept to educate his or students. I often feel that professors I have had think that their students have been “indoctrinated” by their parents over the past eighteen years, and it is now their job to educate them on what they believe is truth pertaining to the subject, and change their mentality like the paragraph stated. With that said any other worldview brought into the classroom that conflicts with the professors is usually not taken seriously, thrown out, or even mocked. The irony of this I believe is that most college professors claim to be liberal in their outlook and thinking. I believe

Reader Response to “Pedagogy of the Oppressed” by Paulo Freire In “Pedagogy of the Oppressed”, Paulo Freire describes what he calls the “banking concept” of education. He then argues as to why we should not use the banking concept of education as teachers. The banking concept is when a teacher believes they are a genius on his or her content subject and treats the children’s minds as banks. The teacher just deposits his or her knowledge into the children’s minds without posing any real challenges or chance for student growth.

In his essay “The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education”, Paulo Freire condemns the current beliefs about education, and argues strongly to support his own, new, and somewhat radical ideas about how he believes education should work. It is clear from his writing that he wishes to convey very strong feelings in this essay. At the very beginning, after a very brief description of the “current” education, he states that “education is suffering from narration sickness” (212), and later continues to say that in our current system “[words] become a hollow, alienated, and alienating verbosity” (212). These statements, especially at the very beginning of the author’s analysis, convey an amount of