The banking model to Friere is a term he used for the traditional educational approach. He stated that students were like containers that teacher put knowledge in. A main criticism was that this technique often was a form of oppression towards the student. In other words while the teacher was active, the students were in fact passive. A simpler way to explain this approach is that often in this tradition teachers educate with monologues completely ignoring the student’s needs.  The banking model empowers the teacher at the expense of the student, because the student regardless of prior knowledge in the subject is completely ignored. The assumption is made that all students are the same, therefore the individual person is non-existent in this model. Often this system involves the sole use of memorization and no other processes.

I think it would be safe to say that almost everybody has seen this approach used to teach. The banking model was especially popular during my elementary school years. I had many teachers that to gain authority rarely allowed student interaction. This was especially popular with the old school military style teacher. In college this is rarely seen, the few times I did encounter this style it was used in lecture halls with over 100 students (but I think that is expected).