Paulo Freire's 'Pedagogy Of The Oppressed'

In the article, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Paulo Freire disagrees with the way education is being conducted because students are not given the opportunity to think for themselves. Teachers do all the thinking, and students are expected to store all the information. Freire describes the education system as the banking system, an act of depositing. Freire says the banking system is the wrong method because it hinders intellectual growth. He then proposes a new method of “problem posing” education which he believes is more effective and fair. With this method, students are responsible for understanding the materials they are being taught instead of adapting the teacher’s style.

Freire illustrates his claim by using the relationship between a student(object) and a teacher(subject) as his prime example. The banking system is set up in a way where teachers are there to feed students information they were once fed by their oppressors. The students are then forced retain that information. Students often don’t get the opportunity to the filter what they believe is right, wrong, or even important. The facts forced upon students are often detached from reality. These facts give students no form of knowledge about what is going on in their society.

Education needs to become an inquiry process between teachers and students. Doing so will decrease all the teacher-student contradiction. Students will then discover that they have the power to educate teachers. Rather than fitting into the world as it is, students will become knowledgeable about their society and shape it to what it could be. Students who are well informed about their world will develop into participatory citizens who are eager take action of responsibility and work toward improving their society and the world since they are aware it. Freire supports this system as the only concept