Essay 1
John Henry Newman and Paulo Freire both have many similar ideas about education. Newman makes his case that a liberal education holds superior value for learning. Freire believes that the relationship between teachers and students reflect on how well and efficient the students learn. Paulo Freire’s idea of education is about communication between teacher and student. If there is no communication or interaction with the students, they will not retain the information that was given to them. For example, imagine a classroom with twenty or thirty students. They are all sitting in rows facing a whiteboard. The teacher is just writing information down, and she frequently walks up and down the rows of students. The teacher speaks only from the textbook, and never makes any interaction with the students. If and when the teacher says something that is not from the textbook, the students are expected to memorize it for the test. Every week the students are expected to complete. Also, once a month the students take a test over all of the material she went over that month. The teacher does not hand out a study guide of any kind, the students are expected to memorize it. Rarely does the teacher stop to answer questions the students may have, but when she does the teacher will use the textbook to try to explain it better which only mimics her original explanation. When the teacher does that it still leaves the question unanswered. Also when the students were given assignments like reading, they were hard and difficult to follow or grasp. It took several times reading it over and over again to finally understand the meaning of the material This is called the “banking” concept of education according to Paulo Freire. He explains in his essay concerning ways to teaching. He says things on how students are never engaged in discussion with their teachers or amongst with the other students. The students are the “oppressed” and the teachers are the “oppressors”. It seems that more teachers approach their students with the “banking” concept rather than the “problem posing” method. Freire states in “The Banking Concept of Education” that “Teachers must surrender their absolute authority, and students must take active responsibility for determining how and what they are taught” (62). Freire is basically saying that you cannot expect your students to learn if you do not interact with them or let them interact or communicate with the students they will not learn it, they will only memorize it for a test and never have to think about that again. However, there are some things the students must be taught. There are always going to be things the students do not know and will rely on a teacher to teach them about those things, but the teacher needs to do it in a way they students will grasp the information. John Henry Newman makes his case that a liberal education holds superior value for learning. Newman shows that if a person knows only one subject, they need to know how it