Critical pedagogy: what it is, characteristics and objectives

No one doubts that teaching is essential for societies to progress and train citizens adjusted to the demands that their social environment demands of them.

The problem is that on many occasions teaching remains anchored in simply transmitting knowledge, without promoting significant learning or being critical of what is learned.

This is just the opposite of what he defends critical pedagogy, with figures such as Paulo Freire and Peter McLaren, supporters that teaching is an act that should encourage criticism, even for what is explained in that teaching. Next we will take a closer look at this pedagogical branch.

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What is critical pedagogy?

critical pedagogy is an orientation of pedagogy that maintains that teaching is not a neutral or decontextualized process and, in fact, it shouldn't pretend to be either. This branch maintains that teaching should invite critical thinking, to question the lived reality and what is learned in class, since The knowledge imparted, after all, is selected by people who cannot escape their sociopolitical context, with its biases and its opinions.

In addition to this, critical pedagogy aims to go beyond the classroom context. through critical thinking students are invited to question the life they have had to live, and see to what extent they can change it through political and social intervention.

It is in this type of pedagogy a promotion of social change by making students part of the sociocultural movements of their time. The conceptualization of critical pedagogy aims to transform the traditional educational system in particular to encourage changes in society in general.

While it traces its origins to the Frankfurt School, the ideas within critical pedagogy were further developed by various American philosophers., being its maximum referents the Brazilian Paulo Freire, the Canadian Peter McLaren and the American Henry Giroux. These same ones were inspired by the philosophical proposals of Karl Marx, and share the importance of teaching students students to get involved in what happens around them, not to learn passively and not to apply it in their field social.

Always starting from an ethical and political position, critical pedagogy seeks to develop the art of questioning in students, making them ask why their environment is the way it is, see to what extent social structures are beneficial to them or, on the contrary, must be transformed or demolished.

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Objectives of critical pedagogy

Although we have already been introducing it, we can highlight as main objectives of critical pedagogy the following:

• Transform the traditional educational system.
• Encourage questioning of what is taught.
• Be applied ethically and politically.
• Encourage students to question themselves about their social actions.
• Promote teaching methods from an analytical position.
• Transform educational values ​​and practices.
• Promote social changes by questioning political and social processes.

The figure of Paulo Freire

The founder of critical pedagogy, at least as regards its conceptualization understood as more defined, is Brazilian philosopher and educator Paulo Freire. His idea of ​​critical pedagogy, also called liberating, is quite contrary to the idea of banking education, which according to him was the most appropriate term to refer to education traditional.

As we have commented, critical pedagogy rejects the idea that knowledge is politically neutral, arguing that teaching, itself, is a political act, regardless of whether the teacher is aware of it or not. The materials to be taught, the way in which they are made and the methods to penalize the error have been selected under an undoubtedly political perspective, both by teachers and by those who own the power.

In all countries there are socioeconomic differences in terms of the type of education received, which in itself has a purpose in terms of oppression. The lower classes go to school to acquire the right knowledge to be able to work in low-paying jobs, which hardly allows them to climb positions. On the other hand, it is usual that in the education of those who hold power or have been born into privileged classes, their education is focus on how to be able to exercise jobs in which they wield power and exploit the lower classes, more or less implied.

The educational curriculum in public schools in the most underprivileged countries is usually limited to being able to read and write, and at most reaching secondary education. In those same countries, the rich can easily reach higher education, in which either because of the way in which the education directed to these classes is made and because of family pressures end up studying economics, with clear goals of running a large company or a business that uses low-income people as production workers. training.

The goal of critical pedagogy is emancipation from oppression through critical consciousness.. This is an idea coined in the Portuguese term “conscientização”. When this goal is achieved, critical consciousness motivates individuals to bring about change in their society, through social criticism as theoretical action and political action as action practice.

Within being critical of society, both ethically and politically, is identifying authoritarian tendencies. To what extent does what we are taught at school allow us to reflect? Are we educated to be servants/dominators or are we really free? Regardless of the type of education, it is clear that what is taught is still politicized, and influences society, both by making reality accepted and by initiating change.

The practical aspect of critical pedagogy, both defended by Freire and McLaren and Giroux, is, first of all, define what power is like and acquire measures against oppression. It is this idea that is understood as liberating within the current. Social transformation will be the final product of a process that begins with questioning the state of things, apply changes, evaluate what has been achieved, reflect and, again, question the new reality to which it has been arrived.

Bibliographic references:

• Freire, P. (1967). Education as a practice of freedom. Rio de Janeiro: Peace and Earth.
• Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Rio de Janeiro: Peace and Earth.
• Freire, P. (1981). Education and moving. Rio de Janeiro: Peace and Earth.
• Freire, P. (1992). Pedagogy of Hope: a reencounter with the pedagogy of the oppressed. Rio de Janeiro: Peace and Earth.
• Freire, P. (1997). Pedagogy gives autonomy. Necessary knowledge for educational practice. Rio de Janeiro: Peace and Earth.
• Giroux, H (1997) Writing and critical thinking in social studies. Teachers as intellectuals. Towards a critical pedagogy of learning. Barcelona. Paidos.
• McLaren P. and Kincheloe, J. L.. (2008), Critical Pedagogy. What are we talking about, where are we, Barcelona: GRAO