One topic that is widely debated today is education and how well children are being taught. Education is a difficult thing to improve because every child learns differently. So how do we create a system to fit everyone's needs? A man named Paulo Freire studied the educational system and points out the systems flaws in his essay,”The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education” in which he explains how children are being taught and proposes a better method. Mike Rose, in his essay,”I Just Wanna Be Average” explains in detail his experiences and the problems he sees in the school system. Both passages look closely at the educational system whether it be through research studies or personal experiences.
In his essay “The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education” Freire
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describes the faults in our current educational system and the method he believes should replace it. He shows how the banking concept of education creates an environment where students just receive and store information, but never question why they are doing it.Then goes on to explain how in the banking concept teachers act as if they’re superior to the students by referring to teachers as oppressors and students as oppressed. In his essay, Freire also gives a solution to the problems he describes in the banking concept. It’s called the problem posing method and it is an interactive way of learning where our minds are more engaged. This is a liberating educational experience where teachers and students are equal and the teacher learns from students too and encourage them. He then describes how these two different methods affect the children and their cognition and that children in the problem-posing method become creative and are good at problem solving. This is because they are engaged when learning while kids in the banking concept are just having information told to them to memorize, giving them a warped sense of reality. Rose describes his time in the same type of educational system except at his school its called the vocational track. He explained that it,”Aimed at increasing the economic opportunities of students who do not do well in our schools” but it’s actually just,”A place for those who are just not making it, a dumping ground for the disaffected.” The school tested students to see where they should be placed and the ones who didn’t do well were put on the vocational track. However, instead of putting the struggling kids somewhere they could improve, they passed them off to teachers who were incompetent and didn’t know how to teach them. Rose explains that,“Once a teacher took some time with you, and you learned how to carry out these operations. Simple versions, anyway. But that was a year or two or more in the past, and these are more complex versions, and now you’re not sure.” Their teachers couldn’t teach them enough to build a strong foundation so as problems become more complex students become confused and doubt themselves even more. One key topic in Freier’s essay is how education affects the cognition of students. Freire says,”The more completely they accept the passive role imposed on them, the more they tend to adapt to the world as it is and to the fragmented view of reality deposited in them.” In the banking concept children are not required to use cognitive thinking and little brain power is needed for they are just storing information. Due to this, many students end up adapting to their surroundings instead of making the situation better for themselves. In school they are taught to only do what is asked of them so when they enter the real world they can only take orders and don’t think for themselves. In his essay Rose writes about how this happened to students in his class. He says,”What Ken and so many other kids do is protect themselves from such suffocating madness by taking on with a vengeance the identity implied in the vocational track. Reject the confusion and frustration by openly defining yourself as the Common Joe.” In Rose’s experience kids were constantly being told they wouldn’t live up to anything. They were told by their environment, their teachers, and even themselves that they would never do more with their lives. Their education allowed them only to see what was right in front, never teaching them to use their imagination and this resulted in children not living up to their potential. A way in which he differs from Freire however, is that Rose believes students embrace the idea of being average, while Freire thinks it is thrust upon students by teachers. Both Freire and Rose agree on the problems of the educational system, but they have their own opinions of how students feel about education. Freire also believes that,”In the banking concept, knowledge is a gift bestowed by those who consider themselves knowledgeable upon those whom they consider to know nothing.” In fact one of the key points in Freire's essay is that he refers to teachers as oppressors because he believes teachers look down upon their students for not knowing as much as them.In his description of the Banking concept he states,”The teacher knows everything and the students know nothing.” The teachers see themselves as superior because they think they know more than the students.
It’s a system where teachers don’t give children the opportunity to advance because they don’t believe the student will need the information in the future. They are only preparing them for simple future jobs. They believe that the kids they teach won’t amount to anything in the future so why teach them more than they …show more content…
need. In his essay Rose explains a circumstance where his classmates are oppressed by a teacher. He says,”When his class drifted away from him, which was often, his voice would rise in paranoid accusations, and occasionally he would lose control and shake or smack us.” His teacher abused his authority over his students and treated them as if they were lesser. It’s like Freire states,”The teacher confuses the authority of knowledge with his or her own authority, which she and he sets in opposition to the freedom of the student.” For example, Rose’s English teacher made them read aloud for 20 weeks. He even lacked the authority of knowledge and he still demonstrated control over his students. The teachers believed that they don’t have control just over a student’s education but control over them as a person. Despite all the flaws of the educational system they pointed out in “The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education” these two authors didn’t just focus on the negative aspects of school. They also pointed out how things could get better. Freire does this by describing the problem-posing method.He describes it as,”Responding to the essence of consciousness-intentionality-rejects communiques and embodies communications.” It is an education system where the students are given more liberties and the teachers are not just teaching but learning with the student. This allows students to access more of their brain power to solve problems and come to their own conclusions.It also gives them the freedom to do more hands on activities and focus more on their interests. Teachers also have to be willing to learn from the students as well. In order for the problem-posing method to work, the teacher must accept that they don’t know everything. Rose explains how having just one teacher who worked with and believed in him turned his whole educational experience around.
This teacher used methods similar to problem posing by engaging more with the kids and creating activities to make the subject fun. As Rose describes his teacher, Mr.MacFarland, he says things like, “He asked questions often” and “He analyzed poems with us.” His teacher was interactive with the students and explained things to them. He didn’t just throw information at them to memorize. He took his time and made sure they understood. One of the most important things his teacher said to him was,”Listen, you can write.” He believed in him and encouraged him to work harder. That is what Freire is trying to say we need more of in education. He explains that,”Authority must be on the side of freedom, not against it.” That if teachers would just listen instead of lecturing, giving the student the freedom to speak their mind, things would be so much better. This is also a point where Rose and Freire differ because while Rose mostly focuses on the idea that teachers need to treat students better. Freire's goal is to inspire the children in school so that they can be better citizens in our society and help to change the
world. Freire thinks that the banking concept is making children believe that they are nothing and that we need to start using the problem posing method while Rose’s descriptions of his time on the vocational track and the teacher that pushed him to do better show how true Freire's ideas really are. These two authors really show how flawed our educational system is through their descriptions of teacher’s behaviors and how they think of students. However, they do show some bright spots and ways to improve. They shed light on the problems and also gave solutions to show that we can make a difference and make the educational system better.
Education is one of the most widely debated issues of our country in this current day and age. Many people feel as though schooling is biased and unfair to certain students; meanwhile, others feel as though the schooling systems are not serious enough in order to properly educate students to prepare them for their futures. The three texts that will be discussed, are all well written controversial essays that use a great deal of rhetorical appeals which help readers relate to the topics being discussed. In the essay “School,” Mori manages to specify her views on how different modern education is in America as to Japan; meanwhile, in “A Talk to Teachers,” Baldwin presents his argument as to how all children, no matter
As American’s we place a high level of importance on attending school and receiving a certain level of education. Across the world, the recommendations for attending school vastly differ based on the culture of the society. In America, we require our children to attend school until they are almost of legal age, push high school graduates to attend college and we constantly emphasize structured learning. Many children in today’s world lack many skills that would allow them to “teach” themselves outside of school leading to an increased interest in televisions, computers, and phones. Technology has taken away society’s attention away from independent learning such as reading, writing, and outside experiences. John Taylor Gatto’s emotional voice in his writing “Against School” has allowed me reveal my psychological voice regarding the educational system.
Education has become stagnant. Intelligent individuals are still being molded, but the methods of education are creating individuals who lack free will. Through deep analytical understandings of education, both Walker Percy’s essay, “The Loss of the Creature,” and Paulo Freire’s essay, “The Banking Concept of Education,” have been able to unravel the issues and consequences of modern-day education. Despite creating clever people, Percy and Freire believe that the current form of education is inefficient because it strips away all sovereignty from the students and replaces it with placid respect for authorities, creating ever more complacent human beings in the long run.
Labaree discusses how the United State’s education is in a school syndrome, as people in America want schools to teach society’s ideals as well as let people express their individuality. These two demands are polar opposites that cannot be achieved. As the focus goes towards balancing these in hopes of improving society as a whole, the bettering of actual student learning is put on pause. Labaree talks about the beginning of education reform, in the 19th century, being the most successful in developing society; however, as education reform continued throughout time, its effectiveness wore off. He then addresses how the desire for education reform is more about improving society than it is about learning. He finishes his argument by providing possible solutions to fixing this problem, but states that fixing this problem will never happen because no one is willing to give up both demands. Overall, Labaree goes in wonderful detail explaining the problems of education reform. What made me choose this article was that he addressed the desire that people have on school systems in promoting both society normality and individuality. This correlates well with my topic in whether public school systems promote conformist ideals or individuality.
Many Americans do not question the credibility of the education system within the country because they believe it forms good citizens and creates a stepping-stone to success. John Taylor Gatto is an American teacher who has experience in the classroom for thirty years and has now devoted his life to critiquing American schools exploiting his own experiences. In his essay “Against School”, he argues that the 12-year system of school may not be necessary, due to its curriculum, and that it may be a tactic of manipulation from the government to promote obedience. I agree with his argument because there are many paths to individual success outside of public education, such as homeschooling or vocational school.
This article points out the flaws in our modern education systems. Students should enjoy school and feel as though they are learning important things in the subjects offered. The classes can be altered to tend to the interests of children, so they can properly express themselves. School should be preparing children to be mature, how to handle hard situations, and ultimately prepare them for their future lives. Overall, Gatto’s article has its flaws, but it can be used to help improve the education system for upcoming
The greatest country in the world still has problems evenly distributing education to its youth. The articles I have read for this unit have a common theme regarding our education system. The authors illustrate to the reader about the struggles in America concerning how we obtain and education. Oppression, politics, racism, and socioeconomic status are a few examples of what is wrong with our country and its means of delivering a fair education to all Americans.
It’s no surprise that there are faults within our schools in today’s society. As both authors’ point out if our educational system is
In John Gatto’s essay “Against Schools” he states from experience as a school teacher that are current educational system is at fault (148). He claims that classrooms are often filled with boredom manufactured by repetitive class work and unenthusiastic teachings. Students are not actively engaged and challenged by their work and more often than not they have either already covered the concepts taught in class or they just do not understand what is being taught to them. The children contained in classrooms have come to believe that their teachers are not all that knowledgeable about the subjects that they are teaching and this advances their apathy towards education. The teachers also feel disadvantaged while fulfilling their roles as teachers because the students often bring rude and careless attitudes to class. Teachers often wish to change the curriculums that are set for students in order to create a more effective lesson plan, but they are restricted by strict regulations and consequences that bind them to their compulsory teachings (148-149). An active illustration of John Gatto’s perspective on our educational system can be found in Mike Rose’s essay “I Just Wanna Be Average” (157). Throughout this piece of literature the author Mike Rose describes the kind of education he received while undergoing teachings in the vocational track. During Mike’s vocational experiences he was taught by teachers that were inexperienced and poorly trained in the subjects they taught. As a result, their lesson plan and the assignments they prepared for class were not designed to proficiently teach students anything practical. For example, the curriculum of Mike Rose’s English class for the entire semester consisted of the repeated reading of ...
We live in a society where we are surrounded by people telling us that school/education and being educated is the only way to succeed. However, the school system is not up to the standards we want it to uphold. There are three issues we discuss the most which are the government, the student, and the teacher. In John Taylor Gatto 's essay “Against School”, we see the inside perspective of the educational system from the view of a teacher. In “I Just Wanna Be Average”, an essay written by Mike Rose, we hear a student 's experience of being in a vocational class in the lower level class in the educational system when he was supposed to be in the higher class. Both Gatto and Rose give their opinions on how the educational system is falling apart. Today the government is only trying to get students to pass, making it hard for teachers to teach what they want. Students are affected everyday by the school system. They sit there - bored - and do not think that the teachers care, making the
Education is a topic that can be explored in many ways. Education is looked at in depth by both Richard Rodriguez in his essay, “The Achievement of Desire”, and by Paulo Freire in his essay, “The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education.” After reading both essays, one can make some assumptions about different methods of education and exactly by which method Rodriguez was taught. The types of relationships Rodriguez had with his teachers, family and in life were affected by specific styles of education.
Through Freire’s “ The Banking Concept of Education,'; we see the effects this concept has on it’s students and also we see the effects that the alternate concept, problem-posing has. The ‘banking’ concept allows the students to become vessels of knowledge, not being able to learn at a creative pace. By using communism, seeing through how education is taught in the classroom, it is parallel to Freire’s ‘banking’ concept. We can see that both ideas are similar and both were harmful to the human mind. While ‘banking’ poses the threat of creative growth and power, Marxism, which applies Marx’s ideas to learning in a communistic way, it creates the threat of never being able to learn.
The Quality of a child’s education often either limits or opens up a world of opportunities. Those who study the purpose of public education and the way it is distributed throughout society can often identify clear correlations between social class and the type of education a student receives. It is generally known by society that wealthy families obtain the best opportunities money can buy. Education is a tool of intellectual and economical empowerment and since the quality of education is strongly influenced by social class, a smaller portion of the American population obtains the opportunities acquired from a top notch education. Many people believe that educational inequalities are perpetuated from the interests of specific classes, but some researchers like John Gatto believe that there are even stronger social forces in play. In the essay “Against Schools” the author John Gatto presents three arguments: (1) that are educational system is flawed, (2) that the American educational system is purposely designed to create a massive working class that is easy to manipulate, and (3) alternative teaching methods should be applied to teach children to think for themselves. In this essay I will be summarizing and relating each of these arguments to other educational essays. Also, I will be discussing the strengths and weaknesses of the author’s argument.
Personal experience does not dictate the type of human each person is; however, it is a major fact that separates each human from one another. Along with this, the “banking” concept does not “dehumanize” or make a person less knowledgable when compared to another. In fact, if both personal experience and memorization were mixed a whole new world of education would be created. There is no black and white when it comes to the education of the sciences, it is a rather grey area, a homogenous mixture to ensure the student receives the best education possible.
Education is a vital part of society. It serves the beneficial purpose of educating our children and getting them ready to be productive adults in today's society. But, the social institution of education is not without its problems. Continual efforts to modify and improve the system need to be made, if we are to reap the highest benefits that education has to offer to our children and our society as a whole.