Ashleen Tucker Intro DB

Paulo Friere's "The "Banking" Concept of Education" is pretentious, poorly supported, and generalizes. Friere takes no mind to audience; throwing out scientific and vaguely defined terms in an attempt to avoid the tone of a griping high school student. Terms like "conscientização", "critical faculties" and, "raison d’être" can only be deciphered with rereading. If his audience was a group of college deans perhaps Friere's diction would not be so painful but, his intended audience is students of this "banking education". He considers his audience poorly taught yet, expects them to be enticed in by his obscure vocabulary. Friere also shows a borderline obsession with repetition. The words "meekly", "oppression" and, "narration" pop up continually; by the last "oppressed" the word has lost some of its meaning.

Friere also leaves his essay without answering key questions. Teachers play the role of "oppressor" to justify their existence yet, many other roots for justifying existence are readily available and less demanding. The psychology teacher could chose to open a practice instead of teach but, some chose to teach. Friere believes "the majority adapt to the purposes which the dominant minority prescribe for them", as though somewhere someone is standing behind a curtain plotting nefariously to rule the world. What the minority "prescribe" and how that benefits the minority’s want remains undefined. The only clear gains made by the minority are unspecified amounts and types of control. Whether the gain is political, economic, or social cannot be determined. He fails to provide a concrete example of how teachers benefit from this "banking education".

Finally, the “banking education” ignores that most public education is based on a classical education. The first stage is the “Grammar Stage” where kindergarteners to fourth graders learn facts by rote. Friere’s “Banking Concept” and Aristotle’s “Grammar Stage” are one and the same. However, the second stage lasting from fifth to eighth is called the “Logic Stage” where students learn to question why and to actively seek answers. Here in most fifth grade curriculum comes the break away from straight memorization; the student learns how to find answers. The final stage, “Rhetoric Stage”, applies to ninth to twelfth graders who learn to state their own original conclusions elegantly. The Rhetoric Stage utilizes the logical drawing of conclusions in the “Logic Stage” that are based on the initial learn from the “Grammar Stage”. Thus, “Bank” learning is a necessary base to any education.

Friere presents an overstated idea with foggy vocabulary and no concrete examples.



By the end of this semester I would like to improve my critical thinking (especially under time constraints), write better, and read interesting essays.