Maggie's Farm

People don't want freedom, because all of their lives they have been conditioned to believe that they are not subjects; they are merely objects. I would like to refer to an essay written by Paulo Freire, one of the Fathers of modern education.

Freire said that the primarily failure of schools to create bright, happy, well-adjusted children lies in the fact that the kids are oppressed by the adult power structure. He calls this failure the "Banking Concept of Education." As the situation stands now, Freire explains that the role of the teacher is to "Fill" the students with the contents of his narration; and nothing more. This narration turns the children into little robots whose only job is to listen and repeat. Thus, they are merely receptacles to be filled by the teacher. In other words, objects.

There is also a much darker message, and I quote: "Implicit in the banking concept is the assumption of a dichotomy between man and the world. Man is merely "in" the world, but not with the world or with others. Man is a solitary spectator; not re-creator."

In this view, man is not a conscious being; he is only the possessor of a consciousness; an empty mind open to the reception of deposits. It is the educators role to regulate the way the world enters into the students. And since, in the banking system, men "receive the world as passive entities", education should make them more passive still. Translated into practice, the banking concept of education primarily serves the needs of the adult oppressors, who don't want students to question the world which they have created. So by the time kids graduate from school, they have been so conditioned to behave as objects, that they cannot even conceptualize the term "freedom." Let alone, act upon it.

Standing in sharp contrast to this brutal system is an altogether different arrangement. One where the freedom of the individual student is of paramount importance. The most famous of these systems is called "Montessori". Unlike the banking system of rote learning, Montessori places more emphasis on the actual experience rather than the outcome. At the center of the Montessori philosophy is the idea that children should be allowed to express their full personality in the classroom, in order that they may better internalize the lessons. While the banking system creates a barren and meaningless intellectual landscape, Montessori creates a much more engaging social atmosphere for the students; and gives them the freedom to explore the subjects which they find interesting.

Montessori may be thought of as one type of instruction within the field of "Inquiry Methods." In the book "Teaching As a Subversive Activity" authors Postman and Weingartner explain
how a complete break has occurred between teaching and learning. Modern teachers want to "deliver" information, without checking to see if the students have actually grasped the concepts, and can manipulate them. Above all, the modern teacher wants to provide the data in a linear, compartmentalized sequence which allows for absolute intellectual uniformity. This conditioning teaches children that they must never ask questions that are outside the box. Ever. Why? Because the adult world is full of moral corruption that wishes to remain hidden. For example: What if a student wanted to know about taxes? Or government salaries? Or how AIDS is transmitted. Or soil erosion? Or river water pollution?

"That is why all authorities get nervous when learning is conducted without a syllabus."

"The ability to learn can be seen as the ability to relinquish inappropriate perceptions, and to develop new and more workable ones." Maria Montessori said that the real punishment of man is the loss of the consciousness of that individual power and greatness which are the sources of his inner life." That's why people recoil from freedom. It's the sad transformation from a subject into an object.

So let's get rid of the horrible linear public schools; and send our kids instead to schools that will teach them how to be good subjects. People who are not afraid of freedom.