Allegory Of The Cave

Education is the root by which each type of mindset grows. Across the modern globe, children are taught in a variety different styles. Some live within a singular uniform from the day they are born while others explore and connect all corners of the world in their lessons. Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed and Plato’s “The Allegory of the Cave” discuss the influence that some of these various teaching methods have on an individual. Freire’s work names and describes two specific approaches which are referred to as the banking method and the problem-posing method. Similarly, though in a vastly more abstract way, Plato outlines two other ways of learning about the world through metaphoric prisoners within a cave. Though my own educational
journey cannot be fully described by their concepts, there are many parallels that I experienced. Growing up I went through a private school, a charter school, and two public schools. Due to this, I was given the opportunity to personally undergo two immensely different forms of teaching. Education should not be force-fed opinions, but rather an intake of ideas and discussions which a person can utilize to form their own unique thoughts and to further develop their mind. From first to sixth grade, I attended a private, Christian school. The school was small; my classes were ten to twenty people and the total number of students from kindergarten to twelfth grade was only three hundred. The school was structured around the Bible. We would have chapel every Thursday morning, they held church services three times a week, and the backbone of the classes was also the religious text. From history to math we were taught via the Bible. The limitations of this way of teaching never crossed my mind until I left the school. From the moment we entered the front door, we were taught the laws of the Bible as fact. That was the final line, there was no gray area, nor was there room to think for oneself. I never knew religions other than Christianity were still practiced, let alone religions with more than one god. The thought that I lived in and believed in this closed atmosphere for so long is still mind-boggling, but as Plato stated, “how could [we] see anything but the shadows if [we] were never allowed to move [our] heads” (Plato 1)? As a student, we were all standing in a position similar to the prisoners of the cave. The only truths that we knew were the ones told to us, despite what existed outside of the school’s fence. The private school’s method of teaching students was very similar to a method detailed by Freire.
Freire’s work described “banking” as a lesser, oppressive form of education (Freire 58). In this an instructor feeds the information to the students and expects them “to memorize mechanically the narrated content,” which leaves little room for independent thought and constructive learning (Freir 58). Being in a private, Christian school the lessons often felt exactly like Freire describes, most noticeably in Bible class. We would read verses of the bible together, be told what they meant by the teacher, and then asked to take our teacher’s interpretation and turn it into something demonstrative like a comic strip. A week or so later, this information would be regurgitated in a test. The test’s answers to the dense scripture we read were always as the teacher believed them to be. In my years at this school I was immersed in an immensely closed, “banking”-like
system. Much like the prisoner in Plato’s allegory, I was given the chance to leave the cave of my private school and experience a remarkably different world within public school. Through this, though I had a few teachers which employed the “banking” method, I was met with some of the best mentors of my life. I was enrolled in the International-Baccalaureate system, which meant I had to take a philosophy and writing class my freshman year. In stark contrast to all schooling that I had been a part of, the class was based entirely around discussions and took into consideration the way that I personally felt about the topics. We would be faced with challenging questions and ideas from around the world, and then given the task to form opinions and talk with our classmates about them. The grade was never based on a right or wrong answer, but instead on whether or not we put effort and genuine thought into our responses. This way of learning encouraged me to think and view the world in a new light, comparable to the “problem-posing” method presented by Freire (Freire 66). The beneficial learning environment I found within philosophy was not unique to that course, it was how the majority of the classes I took in public school were ran. The students around me were not replicas of each other, but individuals with a variety of different opinions. Throughout that experience, I learned the importance of education regarding “dialogue as indispensable to the act of cognition” and recognized the need for development of creativity (Freire 71). I was now encouraged to question, to grow, and to form a unique view of the world around me as opposed to molding myself in the image of my teacher. Though this change in learning technique was greatly beneficial, as Plato described, it came with complications as well.
As I furthered my scope of the world and discovered more truths about society, my family still within the world of the private, Christian school remained stagnant. When I presented them with my newfound knowledge and ability to question, they fought against me. Instead of listening and desiring to understand my thoughts, they kept to their memorized interpretations and aged truths, especially when the conversations covered politics or religion. These encounters caused me to doubt my actions. Similar to Plato’s prisoner as the light of day hurt their eyes, I wondered if “the shadows [I] formerly saw [were] truer than the objects which” I had now begun to see (Plato 2). I wondered if I had made a mistake by leaving the closed world of my private school and family behind. Nevertheless, I continued to learn, grow, and develop the strength I needed to stand my ground. I was able to not only build my knowledge, but also my capability to withstand future oppressive teachers and
thinkers. Through my experiences and the works of Plato and Freire, it can be seen that teaching students to go through the motions and robotically repeat information is far less effective than encouraging critical thinking and independence. If I were to have continued as a product of the private school which enforced the “banking” method, I would have been unable to fully encounter and analyze the opportunities within the world around me. My boundaries were bent, stretched, and broken through “problem-posing” education in a way which allowed me to flourish. To be shown how to use one’s mind is an invaluable tool for the entirety of one’s existence.