“Pedagogy of the Oppressed” Chapter 2

In the second chapter of Pedagogy of the Oppressed there were some points made that I found informative and helpful, and then there were some points that I found confusing or challenging (not a bad thing).

Overall, I thought the chapter did a good job of clearly outlining its contention with the modern education system (the “banking concept of education”), but I think it struggled to articulate a proposed solution with the same degree of clarity. It must certainly be taken into account that this is but one chapter out of the book and it’s possible that the narrative goes on to further detail the proposed solution (“liberating education”). Even if it does not however, this would be congruent with the point being made in chapter 2; Freire is taking on the very role that he is proposing for other teachers by simply “problem-posing” instead of oppressing true thought by dictating solutions.

By way of example:

The lack of a clearly articulated solution within the chapter led me, as a student of this chapter, to begin thinking up my own solutions, along with further questions. If my role as an educator is not to provide my students with knowledge, then what is it? What is the real difference between the role of the teacher and the role of the student in the classroom? How can I, as a future instructor, shift my role in education from the arbiter of knowledge to that of the co-seeker of knowledge? How can I promote true thought instead of providing insights and answers? Even if a teacher can move successfully into the role of the problem-poser, is it not simply another way of imposing one’s own authority over the students by selecting which problems will be posed and how to pose them? As I asked these and other questions, I realized that Freire’s point was most forcefully made in my response to the chapter: in the lack of a given answer to a problem, a student will respond to the challenge with critical thinking and questioning.

I still don’t feel like I’ve come up with a clear solution to the banking-education problem that Freire has posed in this chapter, but his point has been made and it does make me interested to see what the rest of the book has to say.