PHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION

Paulo Freire's Philosophy of Education

Paulo Freire's philosophy of education

Introduction

This paper is aimed at considering the philosophy of education presented by Paulo Freire in the realms of learning and teaching environment, comparing his philosophical ideas and their significance in the modern day education. Oftentimes, Paulo Freire has been marked amongst the most prominent thinkers on the area of education in duration of the late twentieth century. The educational philosophy by Freire starts with an immense humility and respect for the oppressed individuals and respect for their understanding of the world they live in. Freire was of the belief that the oppressed people may change the situations in life by critically thinking regarding the reality and then adopting measures. And, according to Freire, educating the subjugated and the indigenous people is very important for this. The mitigation of human suffering and oppression is possible by means of education only (Kirkendall, 2001, pp. 647-649). When the oppressed people are educated regarding their own heritage, religion, medicinal practices, history, and culture, they may pose a transformative impact on their livings and result in their own empowerment. Nevertheless, Freire was of the belief that education per se is going through narrative sickness and has served an essential role in keeping up with oppression and therefore it requires being removed for the order of ascertaining that circumstances changed for the oppressed individuals.

Analysis

The favorite metaphor of Freire for conventional education is “banking mehod” and it emphasizes on the critical, creative and stifling thoughts in mass education. He is of the belief that banking education facilitates the oppressors in maintaining the system of oppression. According to Freire, the students in this system are deprived of the prospect of questioning or critically evaluating the world wherein they reside and therefore they do not have any prospect for changing their lives for good (Arora, 2007, pp. 123-126). Freire believes that education may not be reduced to a mechanical instruction method. Learning is not a package of skills to be conveyed to the students or a magnitude of information to be memorized.

The social pedagogy of Freire describes education where society and individual is established, a social action that may either domesticate or empower students. Freire considered that education must be a program that would per se be an act of creation, such that results in the democratization of culture, capable of acknowledging other creative actions (Saleh, 2013, pp. 5-7). The liberating or empowering education, according to Freire, is not a novel doctrine or data bank conveyed to the students; rather it is a transformative and democratic association amongst the teachers and students, students and society, and students and learning.

It is argued by Freire that the entire education activity is political by nature. There exists politics in the student-teacher association, whether democratic or authoritarian (Bartlett, 2008, pp. 2-5). There exists politics in the subjects picked by the students for the syllabus and also in the ones left out. Politics also exists in the means of picking the course content, whether ...