Category: 9:30 AM Class

Blog post #3 Pedagogy and power

To Friere, the banking model of education is the standard format of a classroom where a teacher, the knowledge holder, shares their knowledge with the students, the knowledge receivers, without any input from the receivers themselves.  This empowers the teachers because they are exalted beyond the receivers and their power is unchecked.  The students are disempowered because the power that they have is only the power that the teachers have given them.  If the teacher doesn’t feel the need to listen to their students, they don’t have to, because of the power they hold.  I’ve been in many classes that were modeled in this fashion and I’ve never had any enthusiasm for them.  The banking model has led me to study more independently and not rely on my teachers.  It has also made me someone who cares less about retaining the knowledge learned in class and applying it to my life, and more about simply passing the class with a good grade.  The banking model makes students robotic and not prepared for the real world.  They may lose independence because they are trained not to think for themselves.  One positive of the banking model, however, is that it can teach discipline and independent study, which are things that will be necessary in certain situations later in life.

Blog Post #3: The Banking Model

The banking model is a concept that was created by Paulo Freire, who was a brazilian educator and philosopher. Freire was an advocate of critical pedagogy. Critical Pedagogy is a social movement that recognizes the negative impact that a bad education system has on an already opressed impoverished community. Out of this concept, Freire created The Banking Model.

The Banking Model is basically the belief that educators aren’t teaching effectively. One of the errors that they make, is the way they approach their students. Freire points out that teachers come into a classroom and automatically make it known that they are superior to their students. They send a message that clearly states “We are not equal.” This creates a divide between the relationship of a student and a teacher. A student subconciously gets into this mindset where they believe that their ignorance can be cured with the knowledge that this teacher can give them. This results in the student being 100% reliant on the teacher to come up with every decision in the classroom. This inhibits a students ability to think for themselves, to be independent, and to be a critical thinker. Instead of having divergent qualities, students become machine-like. They end up lacking depth which can affect them negatively in their lives.

I believe that The Banking Model obviously empowers teachers and disempowers students. Teachers dont realize that they carry such an important thing in their hands, which is knowledge. They also don’t realize that their is a right and wrong way to execute their knowledge and carrying it out the wrong way can be disastrous to the student. Most children spend twelve years of their life in a classroom and if they are all being taught and raised to be these dull adults then they are just being set up for failure. They eventually will start to believe that life has the same enviorment as a classroom. Most teachers have this huge ego because they believe that the only ones who are ignorant are the students. A degree makes them feel as though they have nothing left to learn when facing young adults. When in reality, teachers can learn just as much from them.

Although I have had my share of teachers who teach with the obvious belief that I was inferior to them, I have been very fortunate to have had some educators in my life, specifically english teachers, who have influenced me enough to have the ability to be a critical thinker and to be divergent. There is a huge dichotomy between the teachers who believed me to be inferior and the teachers who have treated me to be their equal. I would always be excited to be in the classroom with those english teachers who included me in their teaching and leave that class feeling good about what I just did for forty-five minutes.  When dealing with teachers who treated me the exact opposite way, I would leave that class feeling drained and just not excited to go back the next day. These english teachers have had enough impact on me to make me want to become an amazing educator just like them. Imagine the type of change there could be if all educators were like my english teachers.

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tHe BAnKing MOdel and the Education System

Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire describes and evaluates the educational system and explores the teacher, student relationship, and societal relationship. Through his “Banking Model Proposal,” he criticizes the education system by explaining that students are essentially sponges who “deposit” information into their minds through rote memorization and through other impractical ways. Freire explains how knowledge is a “gift” that is bestowed upon students and that students should be taught effective ways on how to analyze and comprehend information rather than memorizing random strings of information. Also, Freire explains how destructive it is for students to passively rely on their teachers to feed them information as it will destroy their sense of reality as they become adults.

In all honestly, I have not experienced this lack of ownership in the educational setting. My high school teachers focused heavily on the concept of analysis. My English teachers would assign a novel every month and the homework assignments were analytical papers that focused on specific themes. Although I am a really bad writer and I dislike essays, I am grateful for my teachers’ efforts. If there is one class that heavily relied on memorization, it would be my high school Immunology class. Every lesson required rote memorization and the success of memorization reflected upon the tests and quizzes. I remember for one test, I had to memorize more than 30 different types of immune cells and their special properties and functions! The worst part was that their names were devastatingly long. Aside from my personal anecdote, I agree with Freire and his critiques on the education system. Hopefully, more teachers will understand the value and efficacy of analytical-styled teaching.

 

The Banking Model is Disadvantageous

Paulo Freire came up with the concept known as The Banking Model in his book known as “Pedagogy of the Oppressed.” The “Banking Model” touches upon the relationship of students and teachers, specifically how students learn and teachers teach in a classroom. The job of students in a classroom is to remember the information the instructor provides. The students don’t participate in another way, they just simply take in the information that’s given to them and memorize it for the test. The “Banking Model” within educational systems is common and it prevents students from developing certain skills that make them critical thinkers. It doesn’t give students a chance to voice their opinion or to bring out their creatibity, but to just absorb the information the teacher brings forth in a classroom. This leads to the disempowerment of students and empowerment of teachers, of course, at the expense of the students.

Personally, I experienced this “Banking Model” concept in high school. In my junior year of high school, my Psychology teacher had prepared slides and copy and pasted the information provided in the textbook onto these slides. She would just read through the slides each class and not explain it. The only positive thing my fellow classmates and I got out of this was that we were able to challenge ourselves by teaching everything on our own. The reason why it’s easier for the teacher to explain it because in certain classes particularly psychology, it’s easier to understand the concept using real-life examples to help us relate. Since much explanations for concepts in my Psychology class wasn’t provided it was hard to understand. Another negative was that it took a lot of extra effort and time. In the classroom, I was daydreaming and didn’t participate so much because I didn’t think there was a point to. If my teacher explained it as she went rather than just reading the slides, it would have saved time so that I can focus more on my other classes. I was always googling examples of the concepts that I learned to fully understand it instead of just memorizing it. It’s easier to memorize when you actually understand.

Pedagogy And Power

Pablo Freire was a Brazilian educator and philosopher who support the idea of Pedagogy. Pedagogy is the academic discipline with the theory and practice of teaching and how these influence student learning. He related to the term called “banking model”  which he explained the wrong method of how the students are learning. The banking model is describing as a negative way of students being educated every day.

The banking concept of education has received many criticisms. Freire describes this as when the teachers directly fill the minds of the students with information and the student themselves accept it without any questioning. The teacher informs, and the student listens in to return. The students are not allowed to challenge and ask any questions. Therefore, the students have no freedom in learning and do not gain any knowledge. Most students basically memorize all the information before taking an exam, but have not fully understood the concept of learning it.

For example, when the professor tells you read the textbooks and you will be able to find all the information you needed. This is the part when the students have no clue in learning something because the book does not always give a perfect explanation and may not also provide the right information.

The Banking Model of Education – Post #3

According to Friere, the “banking” concept of education is when the student only knows how to retrieve, file, and store away certain information given to them. Students only know how to memorize the information given to them, but don’t actually take the time to understand the material provided. Thus, by “banking”, Friere means to take and put away, just like you would do at a bank with your money. No further process needed. In the system of education, teachers assume the position of the all knowing, while considering others to know nothing. This highly disempowers the students by minimizing their “creative power” and taking their ability to solve problems on their own. With this, ignorance is projected onto others, causing the problem of oppression. These oppressors don’t want to see the world transformed with new ideas nor do they want to show the true nature of the world we live in. Friere states a list of rules in which the banking model incorporates. Some of these “rules” are that the teacher knows everything and the student knows nothing. Or the teacher chooses and enforces his choice, and the students comply. If this doesn’t scream oppression, then what does? Students are not being taught material needed for the real world, but rather useless information is stored into their brains that will be forgotten later. It is a means to an end.

Throughout my years of schooling, I had many teachers who were perfect examples of the banking model in modern education. There were teachers who had absolutely no interest in the topics of which they were teaching, and yet criticized the students for not doing well on assignments. How can students learn properly if the teachers themselves don’t want to be there? I have also had classes in which I had to learn the information given just for the sake of memorizing. It was a constant cycle of memorization without actual understanding. This was due to the need of passing examinations and getting good grades to please my parents. I barely even remember what I learned in my Pre-Calculus math class in high school, or my physics class. I even remember saying once, that after I took the exam, left the room, and then automatically forgot everything that I learned. When students are expected to know nothing in a subject, it becomes frusturating to only hear the words of the teacher and absolutely no input from the rest of the class. Ideas should be shared so that minds could be opened. However, an upside to the banking model would be that as we grow older, we start to question. As years go by, our ability to question the world around us arises, and we become more knowledgable than ever before. This allows new and innovative ideas to form along with new ways in solving different problens with different approaches. Also, the banking model allows for information provided to us that we didn’t even know existed or needed.

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The Banking Model/Concept

The Banking Model or Concept was created by Paulo Friere. The Banking Model/Concept is a education method that basically says that teachers teach and students listen. This empowers the teachers because it gives them a boost of confidence when they’re portraying their knowledge to the students. The banking concept unfortunately disempowers students tremendously. With this concept students are shown as people who don’t know anything and that the only way to know something is through the profound knowledge of the teachers. The banking model also degrades students in expressing their creative sides. This model was created as a way for teachers to feel as if they knew everything in the world and that students couldn’t teach them anything else.

Throughout all my years of schooling, I’ve had at least one teacher whose a prime example of the banking model/concept. These teachers knew what they were talking about but had little to no interest in what the other students had to say. I would look around the classroom and all of the other students were either buried in a book, on their phones, daydreaming, or sleeping. The pros about this was that I didn’t have to participate and that it made the lessons go faster. Unfortunately, this hindered the other students who actually had input on what the teacher was talking about. Due to the inactive participation of the students, it made me hate the sound of my teacher’s voice. Everything that I’ve learned so far in school was based on the knowledge of both students and teachers. Learning never stops no matter if you’re a teacher or a student. There are many things that we can learn from each other despite the fact that one is an educator and one isn’t.

Students, Teachers, and The Banking Model

 

Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire was a book that criticizes the conventional education system. The banking model Freire proposed is that students only receive, file, and deposit what the teacher provides. The only thing students are learning to do is memorizing information that the teacher “deposits” in the students’ brains. The job of teachers is not so the students can memorize as much information as possible but to teach and get the students to think and analyze the work that is given. Therefore, instead of strengthening the students’ knowledge they are only strengthening the oppression the teachers have on them. This causes the students to be disempowered while the teachers are highly empowered, at the students’ expense.

My encounter that was similar to the banking model happened in high school. In tenth grade, one of my teachers wanted us to read a book. To make sure we were reading it, she would give us quizzes. However, these were not ordinary quizzes. She would not ask what was the setting or main theme of the book. She would write a quote from the book and we would have to fill in missing words from the quote. This requires students to memorize the whole book, in case she would ask for a word from a specific page. Quizzes were a decent amount of our grade, so I started memorizing the book. The positive side of this was that I learned how to memorize a lot of pages in a short amount of time. The negative side of it was, I was not actually learning. I was memorizing because I wanted to do well in the class. We were not actually analyzing the book and learning the deeper meaning of it, so I gained nothing. The overall reason I was doing it was because she was my teacher and I had to do it. This is what the school system has turned to, students memorizing texts because the teacher asked them to.

Blog 4: Formal Analysis

Formal analysis, when discussing works of art, seems to represent the visual and physical aspects of the work of art, what the viewer explicitly “sees” when viewing a piece of art. The “answers” you are looking for in formal analysis come from the work of art itself, usually without referring to outside sources. It asks, what did the artist want to accomplish in visual terms with their art.

Specifically formal analysis looks into color, line, shape, mass, scale, and composition. What colors did the artist use, are they dark, light, saturated, unsaturated? How are the lines painted or drawn or sculpted, are they soft, infrequent lines that let the viewers eyes flow from section to section, or are they heavy handed lines that are meant to draw the viewers’ eyes into specific sections? Are the lines 2D or 3D, is it presented with a flatness or depth?

How does the artist manipulate the space of their work? Is it cluttered to show static motion or is it minimal to depict a quiet stillness to the work? What is the scale of the work? How are the images presented in comparison to one another, what is big, what is small, what is important or stressed?

For composition, how does the artist put all these elements together and how do they work in relation to each other? In formal analysis you will ask how line, shape, color, space, scale all contribute to overall composition and visual effect.

Blog Post 3: Pedagogy and Power

As described by Paolo Freire in “The Pedagogy of the Oppressed,” the “banking model” reflects the current system of education and the specific relationship that exists between the teachers, (subjects) and the students (listening objects in the education system. According to Freire the teacher fills the head of the student with ideas “detached” from reality, meaning ideas that are almost entirely foreign to the student, and in turn the student is then forced into memorizing the ideas mechanically without ever truly understanding why. Freire believes this turns students into receptacles or depositories while the teaches are the depositors, thus “the banking model” title. Freire states this is a misguided system of education, in which teachers become oppressors and the students become the oppressed. He also states that the interests of the oppressors lie in “changing the consciousness of the oppressed,” not [changing] the situation which oppresses them.” This model of education greatly empowers the teacher and disempowers the student. The solution to this misguided model of education does not lie in integrating the students onto the system, according to Freire, it lies in transforming the structure of education so that students can become “beings for themselves.”

I, and I feel like most students in our current system of education, have a greta deal of experience with this “banking model.” All throughout middle school, high school, and even college, most of the information is presented in this way. The teacher or professor presents facts/ information, depositing it into the students heads, then the student is responsible to retain that information for a test/paper/midterm/final and when the test is over, the studied/learned information almost seems to vanish. Instead of studying or learning for the sake of learning and personal betterment it becomes a cold system of memorization for the sake of memorization without that intimate relationship of having learned something just for the sake of learning.

 

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