The Banking Concept of Education vs. Problem Posing

Freire was a proponent of the problem-posing method of teaching. This method relies on one 's metacognitive awareness. It is important for the student to know where they are in their understanding of the material. Further, this method of teaching encourages self-reflection in that a student thinks of how they are thinking. The problem-posing method encourages critical thinking whereas the banking concept does not.

Lastly, people should value formal education over informal education because formal education reflects a standardized system in which society works. In the chapter “Credo,” from the novel, Hunger of Memory, Rodriguez exemplifies how formal education teaches the standard system of society through his Catholic school’s philosophy of teaching. He recalls how in his youth, the Catholic religion connected his public and private life despite the growing division of education and family because he could not differentiate between his home and church Catholicism. Rodriguez attended a Catholic school that emphasized the practice of memorization to learn about God and the Bible. Reflecting on their method of teaching, he realizes that “For contrary to more progressive notions of learning, much that is learned in a classroom must be the already known; and much that is already known must be learned before a student can achieve truly independent thought” (Richard 94). In opposing the modern concept of learning, Rodriguez discovers a universal truth about formal education in which “much that is learned in a classroom must be the already known” because a student must understand and process the knowledge already discovered before they can “achieve truly independent thought.” Rodriguez uses an anadiplosis to explain that the concepts and information in school, the “already known,” must be learned by students in school in order for the capability of discovering different things on their own

People begin their education from day one till the day they die. Therefore, every day, we always learn new things in different ways such as education, news, magazine, internet, etc. An ideologist, Paulo Freire, in his narrative essay, “The Banking Concept of Education,” present the modern concept of and approaches to education. Freire’s purpose is to compare the two educational systems, the “banking concept” and the “problem-posing concept”. Throughout his essay, he argues strongly to support his creative own and make his readers believe that problem-posing education is more efficient than the banking education.

In his essay, Rodriguez shows all four characteristics of expressive writing which are self-definition, emotional responses, the expression of values, and subjective language. Rodriguez defines himself as someone who struggles with the validity of reading and learning to read. He states books were “unquestioned”. Rodriguez asked, “What was the connection between reading and learning? (172)? “Did one learn something only by reading it .“(172) He was made to think he should value books as a friend when he found reading a “chore”. Still, he values the opinion of others and “basked in the praise” by reading for academic approval. His narration of learning to enjoy reading is an emotional roller coaster from the loneliness of reading to the pleasurable joy he learned through experience. Thus the title of the book makes sense,

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

Richard Rodriguez?s essay, Hunger of Memory, narrates the course of his educational career. Rodriguez tells of the unenthusiastic and disheartening factors that he had to endure along with his education such as isolation and lack of innovation. It becomes apparent that Rodriguez believes that only a select few go through the awful experiences that he underwent. But actually the contrary is true. The majority of students do go through the ?long, unglamorous, and demeaning process? of education, but for different reasons (Rodriguez, 68). Instead of pursuing education for the sake of learning, they pursue education for the sake of job placement.

In Paulo Freire’s essay “The Banking Concept of Education,” he discusses the flaws he has seen in the education system. Specifically he argues that in most education systems the students are just empty receptacles being filled by their teachers, there is no dialog between the teacher and students. Freire thinks that in education learning should not be a one way thing, there should be a dialog going on between the teacher and students. Another big point Freire emphasizes in his essay is active learning, so that everyone is learning and participating. In Freire’s essay he proposes a new way of learning/a new concept of learning called the “problem posing concept.” Another point Freire makes in his problem-posing concept is that education is

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.

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.

The idea that information is “deposited” from a teacher into a student fits the majority of Rodriguez’s educational experiences. As a young child, Rodriguez feels that “books were going to make [him] educated” (Rodriguez 578). He never questioned what he was told by his teachers or what he read in any book. He didn’t develop ideas of his own or any critical thinking skills. Rodriguez says that he was “a great mimic; a collector of thoughts, not a thinker; the very last person in class who ever feels obliged to have an opinion of his own” (Rodriguez 581). This type of education helps us to understand the relationships Rodriguez had with his “mentor” Richard Hoggart, as well as his school teachers and parents.

"…I came to idolize my grammar school teachers. I began by imitating their accents, using their diction, trusting their every direction. The very first facts they dispensed, I grasped with awe. Any book they told me to read, I read – then waited for them to tell me which books I enjoyed" (Rodriguez 625). Rodriguez allowed his teachers to tell him how to think; he became completely submissive to their every belief. As Freire stated the teacher’s task is, "to fill the students with the contents of his narration – contents which are detached from reality, disconnected from the totality that endangered them and could give them significance" (Freire 348). Instead of having his own opinion, Rodriguez permitted his instructors the privilege of reasoning for him.

The past educational experiences I've had that led me to UWB have been a dissatisfaction with the banking model of education. Freire is indeed correct that the banking model is demoralizing to both the teacher and the student, and does a tremendous disservice in the task of getting the student prepared to engage in the world. "The teacher talks about reality as if it were motionless, static, compartmentalized and predictable. Or else he expounds on a topic completely alien to the existential experience of the students. His task is to 'fill' the students with the content of his narration contents which are detached from reality, disconnected from the totality that engendered them and could give them significance. Words are emptied of their concreteness and become hollow, alienated, and alienating verbosity" (Freire, 71). This is precisely the type of experience that I had in the traditional educational arena which led me to both reject this model of teaching, and push me to find an institution that also rejects this model, like UWB. Earlier, in life my parents were in charge of my education and they generally selected schools for me which were considered "good" located in safe neighborhoods and with reasonably satisfactory test scores for the school at large. Schools like that generally mediocre and run of the mill thrive on the banking model of education and believe that the student's job is to "learn" facts via

Freire strongly disagrees with the “banking” concept of learning and he believes that it should not be used for education. Instead, he believes that the “problem posing” concept will let the students become a

In “The Banking Concept of Education”, written by Paulo Freire, the author analyzes the modern day education system by comparing students to “containers” or waste receptacles that are meant to be “filled” by the teacher, or the depositor. The idea that teachers are meant to teach and students are only to listen is the main problem is today’s society. The concept is that a teacher is deemed more reputable “the more she fills the receptacles” while students are better the more they “permit themselves to be filled” (Freire 1). In turn, the “banking” concept of education is born suggesting that education becomes only an act of depositing instead of communication between both students and teachers. When students are denied their creative freedom,

Factory workers are being produced today, although the age of factories has long passed. Students are dehumanized from their first graded assignment, their first report card, the first time they step into school until they graduate. At that point, they are completely stripped of critical thinking and creativity and see learning only as memorization for a test. There seems to be no meaning beyond the face value of what teachers say and possibly less. All that is needed is to memorize word for word what the teacher says. They don’t perceive “what four times four really means, or realizing the true significance of “capital” in the affirmation “the capital of Pará is Belem,” that is, what Belem means for Pará and what Pará means for Brazil” (240). Freire introduces the banking system as the cause of dehumanization, but it is not the system in general that causes it. It is the use of grading. They are used to measure the value and intelligence of students, so this is all students focus on. They only do what they need to receive the highest marks. However, this means the students don’t have time to truly understand their material or realize that they don’t have to spend that much time with the material. After all, the purpose of the banking system is to just fill students with information.