Week Seven

While reading Pedagogy of the Oppressed, I was forced to recognize that this book is designed for a very specific sort of education: education with the express purpose of liberation from oppression. Freire often speaks of equality between teachers and students (problem-posing method) and of the leaders and followers. I believe that this method is excellent for adults, but I was left wondering if this sort of pedagogy would really work in grade school. If anything is going to change in education on a large scale, it has to involve all levels of education.

I guess my first question would have to be:

  Where did we get our current system of education?
--It is clear that our education system is majorly flawed. Teachers, Students, Parents, Government Officials, and more all agree with this statement. Some want to change everything, some want to tweak a few things, and others look to the good old days to see how it looked when "everything was right." What I want to figure out is where we went wrong as well as where we went right.

While our education has been in the process of reform from the moment it began until now, Horace Mann was the first significant player in shaping our education system. He advocated for public education for all people in the face of the rush of immigrants flooding into the country. He was not perfect, and came no where near perfecting education in America, but he got the ball rolling on public education for all. His idea was that public education would be a way to give all of the diverse cultures and peoples flooding into America a common ground.

Many other reformers came after Mann, but I believe that the wrench that was thrown in the system came from reformer Ellwood Cubberly. Cubberly took the power out of the hands of reformers and created the industry-based administration that is still around today for education. I believe this is where education reform went wrong, and no one that followed him truly went back to fix it. John Dewey came close, but he focused too much on the classroom and the teachers without regarding the administration to fix the problem. I am not saying that Dewey did not come up with incredible ideas, but rather that he came up with ideas for the classroom that would be eventually hindered by the administration to the point where they would fail. And, since no one advocating for public education really came after him, traditional public schools have received progressively worse reputations. This is especially true of late in the public vs. charter school debates. One can easily get wrapped up in a "who did what wrong/right" blaming session, but this doesn't really help.

Banking Method: Pouring exactly what oppressor's want
 oppressed to know into their heads without any room
 for contradiction.

What Freire would say is that the education system was flawed from the beginning when it was formed around the banking method of education. Instead of the students coming together to demand more education, one man (Horace Mann, to be specific) thought that everyone needed a standardized education. So, he formed an educational system based upon the what he, a successful member of the "oppressor" group, thought that everyone needed to know in order to succeed. This could never work as a method for liberation for the poor, incoming immigrants because the system was designed so that everyone coming into the country had to conform completely to a society which had no room for them other than menial jobs that kept them in poverty and oppression. Freire supports this analysis when he says:

The truth is, however, that the oppressed are not "marginal," are not men living "outside" society. They have always been "inside" - inside the structure which made them "beings for others." The soluciton is not to "integrate" them into the structure of oppression, but to transform that structure so that they can become "beings for themselves." (61)

My second question:
Where can we go from here? What are some different options?
--With game shows such as "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?" it is no wonder that the American Education System is under such scrutiny. I do not think this show is highlighting that education has gotten better, but rather the common phenomena of children memorizing for tests instead of truly learning material. Students are not taught in such a way that they interact with the new information, thereby making it a part of their knowledge base. But instead, they are taught the skills of memorization and regurgitation along with a few test taking skills. I do not know a single person who calls this way of teaching educational or informative.


It may not be as hard as it seems to find effective ways to educate, though. Nor is it as difficult to find schools in America that educate in this fashion. One of the growing trends in education is self-directed learning. This form of education reflects a lot of the same values as Freire's problem-posing educational approach. One major example of a self-directed learning model is the Montessori Method. The Montessori Method works on the assumption that children are intrinsically motivated to learn already and need a teacher to support their interests and exploration instead of feeding them facts.

 

After viewing this video, I did a bing search to try and find weaknesses with this method of teaching. I was very surprised to find that there wasn't a single link on the first page of results that wasn't completely positive and relavent. Maybe this is a viable template for revamping America's Education System. Some schools in New York are picking up on this method by introducing Student-led Parent-Teacher conferences. They feel that when the students are involved that they take more pride and responsibility for they education.

This method is not confined to grade school and college education, though. The video that follows speaks to how businesses can use the concept of problem-posing education to allow greater productivity in their workforce. Not only is this a great model of education, but it is also a great business model. People do not change so much when the graduate from school to working, and a successful business's goal should always be to have their employees consistently bettering themselves and learning the latest innovations. The world does not stay stagnant, but rather is constantly changing and advancing. It is everyone's duty to work together to make the world a better and more enjoyable place.