Pedagogy as Education to Active Thinking

Gianluigi Segalerba,Oleg Yurievich Latyshev-Maysky

doi:10.14195/1647-8614_54_2

Abstract

In our study, we analyse some reflections contained in the education thought of John Dewey, Paulo Freire and Peter McLaren. The three thinkers, with mutually different methods, have, in our opinion, as common point the intention to show that no education system is neutral in relation to the way in which societies are organised: all systems of education aim at the constitution of a particular kind of society through the formation of a corresponding mentality in the individuals. The ethical and political foundations of a society are mirrored in the education system: any reform of the society should, therefore, begin with the reform of the education system; furthermore, any reform of the society cannot be effective unless it is founded on the reform of education. As regards Dewey’s observations, we concentrate our attention on his criticism of any education system based on the passivity of pupils and on the massification of students: Dewey steadily pleads for a system of education aiming at the individualisation of pupils. As regards Freire’s meditation, we point out Freire’s uncovering of the oppression exercised against the subaltern classes through the traditional education systems: the constant relegation of pupils of the oppressed classes to a condition of total passivity, which is the aim of the system of education described by Freire as the banking concept of education, destroys any sense and aspiration to autonomy in the pupils themselves. Self-depreciation of pupils is the result of the traditional system of education. McLaren points out that a correct system of education should have as its own aim the self-transformation and the empowerment of the students: educators ought to uncover the relations holding between knowledge, which is always a social construct, and the interests of the dominant class.

Highlights

We shall analyse some ideas regarding the relationships between democracy, education to autonomy and refusal of authoritarianism: we shall base our investigation on some reflections of John Dewey, Paulo Freire and Peter McLaren
Through his refusal of a banking concept of education, Freire expresses, as Dewey does, his favour for an education promoting an active behaviour in scholars; Freire’s pedagogy is, a denunciation of the education system worked out by the dominant classes
Dewey’s general perspective is that, since society is becoming more and more democratic, school system ought to follow this transformation of the society

Summary

Introduction

We shall analyse some ideas regarding the relationships between democracy, education to autonomy and refusal of authoritarianism: we shall base our investigation on some reflections of John Dewey, Paulo Freire and Peter McLaren. Children attend school in order to take in contents, not in order to create something in independence and autonomy: they ought to exclusively repeat an already completely and definitively established doctrine They should listen and not be active. As the oppressed individuals have completely internalised the contents and the values of the dominant classes, they cannot recognise the values of the society in which they live as the values of a particular group of persons: they are mental prisoners of the indoctrination. Oppressed individuals do not know what freedom, autonomy and independence are, since they have been subjected to a process of assimilation through the education. For these individuals, education has been nothing else than assimilation to an external doctrine. Very interesting is what Freire says about the concept of self-depreciation of the oppressed:

The strategy of the oppressor is to close the spaces

Conclusions