When I thought about college life, the first two things I really thought of were the parties, and the new people I�d get to meet. But along with that, I thought about the career that I was interested in and where would be the best place to go to learn the most I could about it. This was going to be a big part of my future, and I wanted to get the best education that I could.
After getting into college, and deciding what it was that I wanted to do, I also thought about what it is that I really wanted to learn. I think that going for a college education is very important in a person�s life. It should not be taken lightly and when deciding, everything should be taken into account. The college that you would be going to was going to be your life for the next four years or more.
Another thing to think about what the classes that I would take. They way that I thought a class would go in college would be class discussions, and a place where the teacher wouldn�t be talking all of them. But then again, I knew that there would also be the class where all the teacher did was talk, or lecture. The discussions with the teacher and the other students, would be where you�d come up with new ideas and the teacher would be learning with the class as well.
I think that when I saw a college class in my minds eye, I was people at tables, watching a peer give an idea to the class and then someone else asking about the idea. Almost like in high school, only here the students would be giving each other respect and they would be truly interested in what was going on. And the teacher would be there to help guide the students to keep them on task, but at the same time be there to listen and cause new ideas in their students.
With a college education, it�d cause you to think beyond what you know and it�d keep things interesting and keep the attention of everyone involved. What is being taught and not that it be a schedule or a strict guideline. The term that comes to my mind is the �Banking education� that Paolo Freire described.
One way that Freire described banking education is as:
�Narration (with the teacher as narrator) leads the students to memorize mechanically the narrated account. Worse yet, it turns them into "containers," into "receptacles" to be "filled" by the teachers. The more completely she fills the receptacles, the better a teachers she is. The more meekly the receptacles permit themselves to be filled, the better students they are.� (Paulo Freire: chapter 2 of pedagogy of the oppressed Paragraph 4)
This is what I feel that college education should not be. I agree with Freire that the banking education system is flawed and that an education should cause or rather pose questions. Hence the �problem posing� education concept that he also discusses.
Although problem posing is a good idea of education, I still think, that in a way, a touch of banking is needed. Especially if that is what a person was raised on, especially in college. Seeing as how this is a new experience to most students my age, and some older than I as well, and we would still need that direction but not the mindless memorizing.
In the classroom the student would be opening themselves up to these new ideas, but also they would be taking them with them. College is not all about sitting in class and �learning�, it is about living, and putting the new ideas into work, love and life! College should be the place to encourage the knowledge into everyday life and experiences. What is learned in class would be something that the student could take into their lives and live it.
I feel that in college, all of these things should be applied to everyday thinking that a person should open up to new ideas and new ways of looking at things. Along with all of the thoughts a single person might come up with, they would also be hearing from their peers as well, and from them, create new ideas together. It would be a new base as which to live by.