In the second chapter of Pedagogy of the Oppressed Paulo describes the negative aspects of banking education and how it is deterring the students’ learning process. In deterring the learning process this, in turn, deters how the student perceives the world and themselves. He then goes on to say, how, if schools continue the method of banking, the students’ education will continue to negatively impact their perception of the world and themselves as part of the world. There are many parts to the banking concept and many examples of these parts present in the current education process and are evident at most schools.
The first part of the bank of education concept is that the teachers are narrating life into this static, motionless story that is completely predictable, when in reality life is always transforming and hardly ever predictable. An example of this would be in a foreign language class. The teachers give you phrases to learn for pre thought planned situations. In reality no conversation is like this, and not everyone will greet you the same way, so in by learning this way Paulo explains that you aren’t experiencing life in different ways but instead thinking of it as always predictable and certain. The opposite of this is that the teacher will teach the students a concept that is completely unheard of to them and something that will never be used in actual life. The fact that both of these parts of bank of education are taking away from a quality educational experience.
Paulo then goes on to talk about how the student is perceived to be an uneducated object that takes in all the deposits of the teacher who is considered knowing everything. The student is not allowed to input their own opinions just take in those of teacher and a good student does not question what the teacher is teaching. This restriction of inquiry prohibits the students’ creativity and questioning. This aspect of banking is shown in most classes where the teacher will tell the students something like cells make up all living things. The teacher tells this to the student knowing this to be true and will make the student test it to prove what he/she has already said. But the teacher won’t let the student try to disprove this or question why this is they are just supposed to accept as a fact. This aspect is another negative point to banking education.
Another point of banking education that Paulo outlines is that the teacher is not the dominant authority in learning and knowledge but that is how he/she acts. The student is perceived to be the submissive listener of the paternal authority of the teacher. This not only increases the likelihood that the student will rebel, but it also means that student is not contributing their own knowledge to the classroom. There should be a mutually interdependent relationship between the student and the teacher. The student can’t learn and grow without the teacher but at the same time the teacher cannot expand their knowledge if they don’t pay attention to the students’ knowledge.
There are many other aspects to the banking education concept. But all of them feed off of each other on how they impact the student teacher relationship. All of them negatively affect education and how it is taught. To Paulo if everyone pitches in they can change and transform education, which will in turn change and transform them. But while banking education and all of its features are still present neither the student nor the teacher will be change or transform anything not themselves or the world.