Paulo Freire The Banking Concept Of Education

In The Banking Concept of Education, Paulo Freire introduces two terms to define the educational system. The First term is banking education, which basically means memorizing and learning the facts without learning what they really mean. The Second term is problem-posing education which makes students question the world around them and challenges them to learn and think critically. There are many controversies about education some people believe children should be taught by the "banking" concept of education, and some think children should be taught by "problem posing." In fact, both concepts of education should be required in teaching students. Combining "banking" and "problem-posing" will bring out students’ potential. The combination will
make students think critically and obtain conceptual knowledge. In my digital art class, my teacher used both of Freire's concepts of education to teach us. This system lead us to challenge ourselves to think critically and to come up with an original piece of art. By building a foundation with “banking” information, teachers can then implement the “problem-posing” style to allow students to innovate and create original ideas.
In tenth grade, my digital art class included both "problem posing" and "banking" education. On my first day of the digital art class, I was anxious about learning new things and about how the teacher was going to instruct us. I and my classmates were waiting for the teacher to get up from his seat and introduce himself and explain what we were going to be doing in that class. Then the final moment came when the teacher got up and explained that we would be using Photoshop to edit celebrity photos, but he did not explain how. I was frightened, and I had no idea how I was supposed to do this project without even having learned anything. I asked my classmate about the project, and they knew nothing as well. So, I started the Photoshop program that we were supposed to use for the project, and I just started experimenting. The teacher challenged us to problem-solve and learn new tools in Photoshop by ourselves. I had no idea what different tools could do except for paint, brush, and eraser. Then the bell rang, and the class was over. All my classmates were talking about what was going on in that class, and I even considered dropping that class. However, the next day surprisingly the teacher showed us an example of how to do the project and gave us a tutorial using Photoshop, and he explained what all the different tools were and what they did in Photoshop. By giving us the tutorial on Photoshop, after letting us go through a struggle, it helped me more because it was easier for me to understand what I needed to learn.
It was fun imagining and creating digital art in Photoshop. One of the projects that I am most proud of was morphing three animals together. It was very challenging to blend the animals together. For my project, I used a frog and a turtle shell to put on frog’s back as well as an alligator’s tail on the frog. It was the best piece I had ever created in that class. I could not have achieved what I wanted without my teacher’s use of the banking and problem posing educational methods together. From there I came to believe that both education systems are equally important. In the Banking Concept Of Education, Freire says, “Banking education (for obvious reasons) attempts, by mythicizing reality, to conceal certain facts that explain the way human beings exist in the world; problem-posing education regards dialogue as indispensable to the act of cognition that unveils reality.”(268) This quote explains that banking educations gives some facts that are important for humans, to understand certain things the way they are. The problem-posing education asks questions about those facts and goes beyond what banking education teaches. Therefore, I came to believe that first students should be taught through the banking concept and then problem-posing education. So students will first learn the new material, and then they will challenge themselves to come up with something new. In my digital art class, our teacher gave us tutorials on Photoshop, but he never taught us any definition of the term being used in Photoshop. At the end of the year, however, when we had an exam he gave us a lot of Photoshop terms to define. In our class, everyone was able to define those terms and passed the exam easily because through problem-posing education, we had to struggle and use those words over and over again by ourselves to understand the meaning.
Furthermore, after experimenting with Photoshop for one or two weeks, I was being challenged to produce an art piece that I had imagined.
It was very hard for me to create something eye-catching, and when I asked my teacher for help, he just told me to put on the paper what I had imagined in my mind. He used “problem-posing” education to make us challenge ourselves. He only helped us by telling us what tools to use and how to improve the project. When we finished the project after four weeks, he gave us a paper with some questions on it. On the paper, he asked us what was the most successful work and what we would do differently the next time. Then he told us to give suggestions to other students about how to improve the project. After finishing the final project, he took all the art pieces then presented them to the entire class for critique. The teacher asked all of us about what we liked in each piece of art and why we liked it. Critiquing is a good part of problem-posing education because by critiquing, students learn and come to a conclusion as to whether a certain student achieved what he wanted. Also, students gets suggestions from other students to make that piece of art better and to learn what mistakes to avoid next time. Paulo Freire says problem-posing education makes children critical thinkers." Our teacher did the same thing in teaching us. He challenged us to think and come up with our own original ideas for assignments in his class. For me as an individual, I
enjoyed coming up with cool ideas for the art projects by myself. It was a good learning experience for me. Even though this was an art class, the art skills could be used throughout job fields. Many people can use these skills to make advertisements or to create interfaces. This skill will help people to illustrate their ideas effectively for their peers. I think this skill of learning on your own through struggling is necessary because people like Bill Gates are successful because they do not fear failure. They might have sometimes failed in their lifetime, but now those people are some of the most successful in the world. In the art class, I failed many times to achieve what I wanted in projects, but our teacher guided us about how to fix these mistakes and how to succeed the next time. In our class, there was no grade until the final project was completed, so students tried their best in that class because they wanted to learn more and be challenged. Our teacher taught us that we needed to fail to succeed, and students were able to experiment in a safe environment. Therefore, students were not afraid of making mistakes.
As a society, it is crucial to learn from mistakes, because without our mistakes we would not have all the things that we have today. Today we live in a society where everyone has equal rights, and there is no slavery. In our former society there were slaves and people were not equal and did not have the same rights. People learned from their mistakes and made a better society for future generations. In The Banking Concept Of Education, Freire says, “In problem-posing education, people develop their power to perceive critically the way they exist in the world with which and in which they find themselves; they come to see the world not as a static reality, but as a reality in process, in transformation.” ( 267) This quote explains, that through problem-posing education, people start to question reality, and they start to perceive what is going on around them or in society. When people learn what is wrong in society, they challenge themselves to fix those problems for next generations, just like Martin Luther King Jr, did. In my Digital Art Class, teacher used both banking and problem-posing education to help students become successful in real life as well as to give them knowledge and skills.
Students actually liked to come to that class and tried not to miss it. It was a safe environment for students, and students were always prepared for that class. In our society today, many students do not want to go to school because they do not like the way their teachers teach. To fix this problem, teachers need to use both Freire's problem-posing and banking educational methods to instruct students. Students will then want learn and will challenge themselves to be prepared for life’s important
tasks.