Paulo Priere-My grand old man

The brazilian educator Paulo Friere is one of the most influential educational thinkers of the late 20^th century. His most well known work is Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Throughout this and subsequent works, Paulo emphasizes on learning as an act of culture and freedom.

Before we go to have a peek at what is happening in Paulo Friere’s schools, let us try to understand briefly, his contributions to pedagogy.

Some significant aspects of Paulo’s work:

1.     Emphasis on dialogue. It is not surprising that informal education is dialogical rather than based on curriculum. However, through his discussions Paulo insisted that dialogue involves respect. It should not involve one person acting on another but rather people working with each other. Another important term mentioned is ‘BANKING concept of knowledge’. He argues that too much education involves banking where the educator makes deposits in the educatee. According to him this means that the scope of action as far as the student is concerned extends only to receive, fill and store the deposits.

2.     Praxix-(action/reflection) or action that is informed and linked to certain values. It is not enough for people to come together in dialogue in order to gain knowledge of their social reality. It is required that they act together upon their environment, critically in order to reflect upon their action and therefore transform it through further action. Conscientization. Is the process of developing a critical awareness of one’s social reality through reflection and action. Paulo says that we all acquire myths which have a dominant tendency, so learning is a critical process which depends upon uncovering real problems and actual needs.

3.     Paulo insisted on situating educational activity as a real life experience of participants.

Having discussed some of his ideas we now move on to a Paulo Friere school.

In Paulo Freire freedom school for example, they believe that real knowledge comes from experiences that are authentic and engaging, learning environments are created keeping in mind that young people learn better when learning is connected to the real world they live in.

The curriculum focuses on social justice and environmental sustainability, which is reality, based. Students not only learn about current issues and problems but are also encouraged to think about solutions.

At the school, it is believed that children grow academically, physically, emotionally, socially and spiritually all the same time.  The school is separated into developmentally appropriate learning environments each designed to support students unique developmental needs and capacities.