Monday, September 9, 2013
What is praxis?
In our last class we were discussing what is praxis. Paulo Freire (1986) defines praxis in Pedagogy of the Oppressed as "reflection and action upon the world in order to transform it." Through praxis, oppressed people can acquire a critical awareness of their own condition, and, with their allies, struggle for liberation. What do you understand praxis to be? How will this affect your future practice as teachers? Be sure to watch the included video before posting. Prof. Lopez
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Being aware of my condition,in a classroom, in a critical manner is extremely challenging. Just by watching the video I feel overwhelmed because they are so many issues that need to be addressed in the school system. It is clear to me that the most effective and important skill that needs to be develop in order to have success, success being defined as being productive, in our society is lifelong learning. It is constantly highlighted in the video, the three speakers may have differing points of view but each and everyone of them acknowledge the importance of being a lifelong learner in today's society. In order to become an effective problem solver there has to be critical thinking involved and I feel that it comes with being constantly growing. Education needs to go beyond the school years and into life in general. If intelligence can be defined by applying skills into problem solving then why is the school system not moving towards creating an intelligent society?; why are teachers so passive about it?
ReplyDeleteI had a professor who would always say "If I didn't learn anything today, I have wasted an entire day of my life." This should be something that everyone should believe. There are always new things to be learned to help you grow as a person.
DeleteI agree with you on why the teachers are so passive. I believe it is because they are so used to it being this way, they just gave up. We are the future teachers. Let it be our job to change things and make a lasting difference.
DeleteLife long learning is an ability that will make anyone successful because it opens the door to constant transformation.
DeleteTeachers can be passive about the importance education has in there students. Many teacher simple do not care if there student abstain the accurate knowledge possible. Inclusive, many teachers do not care if their students become a better person in society. The three speakers did acknowledge the importance of being life-long learners. However, what is your interpretation of praxis? Will praxis motivate you in your teaching? There are many issues in our school system as in many others, as evident in the video. As a future teacher we must address these issues in our classroom. As a future teacher, how will you address this?
DeleteEducation is the key for acquiring the knowledge necessary for transforming the world. Through praxis, teacher can show their students to be more productive. Once our student are more productive, they will have the necessary knowledge needed to solve social and life problems; they will also have the needed values and have the necessary skills to assist children. These issues are topics that today are not being emphasized nor at the schools or homes. "Education should care more about what really matter." We, as teacher need to transform this world for the better! Even if the government wants to force us to teach in certain ways and of certain topics, we cannot teaching what is justice and righteousness to our students.
DeleteI agree that teachers have an immense responsibility when it comes to education. It is important for teachers to emphasize more on developing critical thinking and social skills on their students. However, I think that it is not entirely the teachers fault if they cannot fulfill these tasks properly. I believe that the problems and situations that individuals encounter in their society are depriving the citizens from acquiring a good education emphasizing on values, critical thinking, and creating responsible citizens.
DeleteAinimer, I view praxis as a way of going beyond the cognitive aspect of teaching. Praxis is incorporating knowledge in every single aspect of life into everyday situations. It is all about not only coping, but to successfully live life in the more meaningful way possible. I am certainly going to take it in account, when my time comes to teach.
DeleteTotally agree with that the video is overwhelming but I hope all of us can contribute to change those situations in a positive way.
DeletePraxis is not the act of teaching basic cognitive knowledge. It is the act of impacting others life so that they may make a change in the world. The point of being an educator should not only be for your students to achieve academically, but to be a better citizen who are lawful and have moral values that will help society as a whole. It is about changing, transforming our students to be better humans socially in all areas. As educators, we must motivate our students to become better human beings. Therefore, we must base our teaching on what is proper and necessary to help our students be better, successful humans.
ReplyDelete“Education is not a bearer, but an enabler. It must be flexible for one to learn” said Yidan Wang, Senior Education Specialist at the World Bank in the presentation "Praxis Discussion Series: Education in a Changing World." It is important to be educated for one to improve their way of living, thus improving their society. Bernie Lovegrove, Executive Director of ASPBAE Australia, stated that “Knowledge is power.” By being educated, one acquires the knowledge needed to achieve academically, gains science of human rights, and life skills to solve everyday life situations. For this reason he stated “Education and life are much bigger than work.” The task at hand a human being should have is to become a better person taking into regard that the greatest payment is not money but knowledge.
My purpose will be to teach my students the necessary moral attributes and values so that they may cope with everyday problems in a just manner. The knowledge acquired by praxis is for life and will be the most used knowledge students can obtain.
I will start off by quoting a fragment of your comment: "The point of being an educator should not only be for your students to achieve academically, but to be a better citizen who are lawful and have moral values that will help society as a whole."
DeleteTeaching shouldn't just be "dumping" information into student's minds and watch them move along grade levels. Teachers are the ones students spend the most time with, and it is our job to be able to guide them in any way we can. This is why we currently have "Attitudinal Objectives" and the "Six Pillars of Character" in our daily lesson plans. With this, we are obligated to include in our lessons something that has a moral side to it.
Power to you! Teaching students moral attributes and values is exactly what needs to be done now-a-days. Unfortunately, if it is not practiced at home you will have your work cut out to you. Perseverance is key. Students are not bad by nature and will learn easily.
DeleteI completely agree, education needs to be a tool of transformation in order to create a better society.
DeleteI agree with your perspective. Our goal as teachers should be to trigger changes not only in the cognitive aspect, but in the person as a whole. Praxis is all about having the ability to solve everyday problems. I believe as well that we should teach for life in general.
DeleteI see praxis as a way of living. Society keeps developing but there are many people who still left behind. Praxis as a way of see the world and using it to help other people to be productive and to make ourselves more productive is a solution that should be practice by all teachers and society. There are so many situations and problems that we as future teachers cannot solve but what happen with the rest of society, what about values, what about caring for each other, what about think in a better society, what about our children and what about us. Education should care more about what really matters and we as future teachers should reflect our teaching constantly to see if we are part of that world transformation. I would like to feel the confidence that each person in the world knows the same, or at least almost the same, and that each person is capable to decide if something is appropriate for them or not. It is a shame because as we discussed in class, the government has a lot to do with these boundaries. Like they say in the video they should develop people that use critical thinking and that knows about problem solving and this should be through education.
ReplyDeleteI agree. As you said, "there are many situations that teachers cannot solve." Teaching has become more demanding. The government expects higher task from teachers to accomplish, without providing them the resources to do such tasks. How can we as teachers help develop such skills and values in our classroom having into consideration that the government does not provide us the resources needed and that not all teachers have the same objective as others? I know it is not impossible, still I think that it might be a quite challenging task to fulfill. Just maybe, if every teacher and the government have the same focus towards education, the world itself may improve.
DeletePraxis, from what I interpreted, is like the next step to active research. It's taking what you've done to improve yourself and improve your student's learning process and turning it into something you can use to change society. It's a form of analyzing what you can do to help the world be a better place. The "Praxis Discussion Series: Education in a Changing World" video is a perfect example of this. The people presented here use the knowledge they have of Education to look for ways that they could apply it to help the community, and at the same time reaching more people out there, who could also help find solutions, by sharing their opinions through the internet. This way, they are not only helping their community, but other places that might be having the same problems they face as well.
ReplyDeleteI found amazing just to imagine that we are going to contribute to world changes and who knows we are going to be right next to those people.
DeletePraxis is an incredibly difficult term to define. It does not only include how we teach but why we do so, what areas we can help restore, remake and change in the school system. After watching the video provided in class, I had a hard time getting the story of June out of my head. It is a real eye opener at how schools can be so unfair. Not only is knowledge important, but so is the motivation to do more, to want more. Just because a person doesn't have enough money or other superficial excuse doesn't mean the person is not deserving of an education other than primary. This is an area that needs repair in the school system. I believe that schools concentrate too much on a set curriculum that has been run down from the past. How about schools help students understand the “Real World”? I agree that school needs to prepare students for the working environment, but I disagree that it should be the only focus. What impacted me more about the video was the fact that these great people were not only talking about the problem areas, but they were also looking for solutions. They took time, sat down, and talked about it. I wish the people “on top” in the education system would watch this and realize that complaining will get us nowhere is we don’t band together and analyze possible solutions. Teaching should not be “to get them to pass the class” but “get them to always love to learn”.
ReplyDeletePraxis focuses on changing and transforming our social world to being a better one; motivating people to be better citizens. As a future teacher I would like to add my little grain of sand in making my students the future citizens that want to make the world a better place for everyone. As they say, “just one spark starts a fire”, I want to have part of the responsibility for the (positive) change in our society.
ReplyDeleteYidan Wang said: “Education should enable people to maximize their skills, ability, and these will help people to make a contribution to society effectively.” We teachers are responsible for creating lifelong learners, even though we want them to learn academically in school, we also want to make sure we are helping them grow as a person to be good citizens in a way they can apply what they know in their everyday life situations.
As we discussed in class, the Department of Education tells teachers to teach a curriculum in an established way; I disagree with this because if teachers would do exactly what the Department told them to do I believe we would be teaching robots instead of students, we would not be able to develop their critical thinking skills. We are not there to teach a class as a lecture where the students absorb the information and that’s it. We want to make them critical thinkers (in order to cope with daily situations) and lifelong learners. LIFElong learners, emphasis on the life, where we should make sure that the students learn in a way they can apply it in the outside world. We should make like a chain reaction, where we want them to be motivated in making the world a better place, and they can help do the same by motivating others.
In Freire's, Pedagogy of the oppressed, he discusses how students are taught with passive methods that hinder their ability to think critically which essentially effects them and their roles in society. I strongly believe that the students in the class are a direct reflection of the teacher. Thus, if the students are being "oppressed", doesn't that mean that the teacher is in need of educational liberation? And how do we, as educators, free ourselves from this redundant cycle of teachers dumping information on the students? Praxis suggest that as teachers, we must continuously search for innovative teaching methods that help transform the students and thus transforming society. Critical thinking is essential in becoming active members of society that are able to solve any problem that might arise. It is also important that education reflects the needs of society and help develop the necessary skills needed for the labor market. In the video, Yidan Wang states that "Knowledge and Skills are key to the development of the economy". It is no secret that the economy is an important factor when it comes to the well being of the society. Students need to become aware of what is expected as the future job holders that will help stimulate the economy. The members of the forum also state the importance of implementing ethical ideas and values that are important within the society. In essence, education needs to stir up a transformation in the lives of the students, but that cannot be accomplished without innovative teaching methods and an educator who is constantly developing as a professional. As a future educator, my goal would be to cater to the needs of the society by motivating the students to be hungry for change that will better the world in which they live in. But first, I must be willing to transform myself as a professional, and prove myself to be an effective member of society.
ReplyDeleteI see praxis as a way of survival in the labor force. The reason that we study is to acquire knowledge and as well to be able to cope with the economic and social changes of the world. It is well known that if we do not educate ourselves and earn a college degree the possibility of obtaining an honorable job that will help us have a moderate life and a secure future may become very difficult. In the video "Praxis Discussion Series: Education in a Changing World" the interviewed professionals emphasized that it is basically on the educators hands to make their students contribute well in the society, and hence that as educators they should enable the learners to develop and enhance their critical thinking skills and abilities. I believe as well as this professionals, that education should be flexible and hence as educators their job is to improve people’s life and to serve their needs according to the society they are living in.
ReplyDeleteAs for education overall I believe that the government is the one that is oppressing the population by depriving them to obtain an effective education and from developing certain skills that will help them think critically, solve problems and help them become responsible citizens. I believe that the government is giving a huge responsibility to the teachers and that they are expecting too much from them. There are many situations that educators cannot solve. Even though I am a true believer that teachers should motivate students into modifying their behaviors, enhance their learning, and help them cope with the changing world, I also believe that educators and the government should come hand in hand when it comes to education. I think that the government should provide multiple activities, courses, and resources to the community that will prepare them to obtain a good job according to their skills and as well will help increase the population's knowledge. An example of this depravation it is seen throughout the education of PR. The education in the island has merely decreased overall the years. It is well known that the government and the education department have not provided an effective education to their citizens. They have only provided a basic education without going deeper into the context of what education really is. I think that if the government wants to create professional citizens, improve the economy, create a better society, and reduce the amount of dropouts in school and nonliteral persons in the island they should encourage students to do better in life by providing them courses that will help them grow as professionals.