Joseph Fulciniti Teaching Philosophy

Throughout my career as a student I have seen and experienced a wide spectrum of teachers and teaching philosophies. Ranging from hardly learning anything at all to being at the frustration level and having my head crammed with information. In regards to personality I have seen cold an impersonal to friendly and open. However, for the most part it seems as though many of my teachers have been on either side of the extremes, many times impersonal and even more so not allowing the students to have a full understanding of the information presented to them. Teaching from my perspective as a student, seems to be those different set of extremes, which makes it lifeless and impersonal; things I hope to avoid when I become a teacher. I believe that how you present the information to your students is extremely important. One teacher that did not deliver the information was my Advanced Placement United States History teacher, lets call him Mr.F. Even though he was very personable and easy to get along with, he never presented the information in such a manner that was conducive to learning or understanding he just simply gave us the notes and expected us to remember them. The information was shoved into our heads without any concern for weather or not we understood the information. Freire calls this the banking method. The concept behind the banking method is that the teacher is absolute in the knowledge of his subject and that the student is an empty container to be filled by the teacher. Education becomes an act of depositing in which the students are the depositors. Freire. In this method it is the primary goal of the teacher to change the thought process of the student to fit better into what is normal in society. They change the student to fit

better in the world, by having the world enter the student. By doing this they mold a person to fit into the world that is shaped by the world. This makes the banking method cold and impersonal, and it does not help students grow or think critically. As Freire says no one can be authentically human while he prevents others from being so. On the other end of the spectrum you have what Freire calls problem posing education which is based on an entirely different set of ideas. The entire method behind problem posing is to have students think critically and not to integrate them into the structure of oppression, but to transform that structure so that they can become beings for themselves. Freire What Freire means by that is that students should not in any way be changed to seem normal, but should transform what normal is to fit around them. Unlike the banking method the educator prepares the student to enter the world, not regulate how the world enters the student. The first step is realizing that, as a teacher you cant learn or think for your students. The only way to facilitate learning and thought is through communication. Communication, beyond simply relaying information, between the student and the teacher is vital for the learning process. Beyond that is the relationship between the student and teacher which is very different than in the banking method. Problem posing education states that education must begin with the solution of the teacher student contradiction, by reconciling the poles of the contradiction so that both are simultaneously teachers and students. To do this the teacher must help create something abstract and powerful, thought. A good teacher reflects on the things that they teach. They go beyond the face value of what they present and discuss with the students. Liberating education consists in acts of cognition, not transferals of information. Freire This is where communication comes more into play.

Through dialogue, the teacher of the students and the students of the teacher cease to exist and a new term emerges: teacher-student with students-teachers. The teacher is no longer merely the one who teacher, but one who is himself taught in dialogue with the students, who in turn while being taught also teach. Freire What he is saying is that both the student and the teacher need to learn from each other. That to me is incredibly important because it not only pushes the student to think critically, but it pushes the teacher think critically about how they teach. The exchange of information in that manner is vital for a positive problem posing education. Another idea I find fascinating is the idea that critical thinkers view themselves as incomplete. It is the teachers job to help them get to that point, by having them think critically and learn the information not just the facts. By doing so it feeds our inherent human desire to know more, to understand more. I believe if a teacher has helped a student crave more knowledge and given him the skills to understand it, then he has succeeded as an educator. Tying into that, John Dewey believes that students come into the classroom wanting to learn; but they dont necessarily have the initiative or the drive to learn, and thats where teachers come in. Once again; the idea of independent thought is placed on a pedestal as the goal for the teacher. However; Dewey uses an interesting idea to reach that goal. He proposes that the teacher acts as a navigator or a guide. This is important because he believes that the teacher should act as a facilitator of knowledge and that the student does all of the learning and thinking. However; on top of presenting information in a manner that promotes critical thinking and understanding, he also suggest that we can and should ethically guide our students. The key word of course again being guide.

Another point that dewy brings up that I whole heartedly agree with is that thinking is an art. He says thinking is preeminently an art; knowledge and propositions which are the product of thinking are works of art as much as statuary and symphonies. Dewey. I believe that taking this view is a huge asset for a teacher. You can leave it up to your own interpretation, but I think its important because it helps us realize that as an educator we are shaping and molding a mind, something that is infinitely more complex than any symphony or other art. Its a daunting and exciting thought. To wrap things up, I believe that educators need to focus on just a few goals to be successful. The most important of these are to have students think critically, to help yourself and your students be able to go out and learn outside of the classroom, and to get to know your students more than just as a number in a grade book.

Bibliography:

Simpson, Douglas J., Michael J. B. Jackson, and Judy C. Aycock. John Dewey and the art of teaching: toward reflective and imaginative practice. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage Publications, 2005. Print.

Freire, Paulo. Pedagogy of the oppressed. 30th anniversary ed. New York: Continuum, 2000. Print.