Pedagogy of the Oppressed.

Despite the late hour I find myself once again reading Paulo Freire's revolutionary classic, 'pedagogy of the oppressed''(Freire & Macedo, 2005). Now this is not exactly an easy read, slightly dodgy translations, and "marxist jargon" (Freire & Macedo, 2005, p.20) to comprehend, but my attention is divided as my husband is on the phone by my side defending my writings: "its a blog not an academic assignment" I hear him say. Ok, time I temporarily put down the book and paid attention: having read my blog, my sister-in-law (the teacher) has feedback for me, eeek...........this is good, someone has read my blog!!!

So, seemingly I have a few (ok more than a few) typing errors. Now this does not sit easily with me, within my academic writing I am a perfectionist - proof reading to the last hour before deadline. So as you can imagine, my first thought was to edit and amend. However, upon reflection I have decided to resist the temptation and leave the human errors as they stand.  Here's why:  my disclaimer.  The purpose of my blog is for ease of entry, I want to use it as a working document, as evidence, analysis and reflection on, and where practical in, action (Schon, 1991). If I seek perfection I lose writing in the moment, so please forgive my imperfections, and keep reading..........

Back to the book.....
Up until a few weeks ago I had never heard of the author Paulo Freire; I chose the book on a bit of a whim as my tutor suggested it as one of many 'philosophical perspectives on learning' which may be of interest to me for use within my assignment, and this one seemed to jump off the shelf.  Having read the book its quite obvious why; Freire is writing about me, right?!

Up until now guess I never really understood my own motivations for wanting to teach; as I can not be an eternal student it just seemed the next logical step. I knew I was good at the academic stuff and often seem to be the oracle in my own classes, whom fellow students turn to for help with their work. Also I love the buzz that learning and new knowledge gives me, and I desperately want to better myself, be a positive role model, and provide a good standard of living for my children.
However, there  is so much to learn and take on-board as a new teacher that conformity to the norm occurs without realisation; terms such as inclusivity, differentiation and embedding learning lead the way (rather shallowly in my own case).
However, I can honestly say that reading pedagogy of the oppressed has transformed my thinking and provided me with new motivations; I now understand the type of teacher I want to be. Admittedly it took a while , and over the course of my reading I have been disturbed by the thoughts:

• Am I a "banking educator"? 
• Have I been programmed into conformity, or groomed to fit societies measure of the norm?
• Are my own children on the same course? 
• Am I on the verge of shifting from oppressed to oppressor? What can I do to prevent this?
• How can I ensure I don't stifle creativity and critical thinking, whilst teaching to a criteria which at times appears to students to be disconnected from reality?
• How can I employ dialogical methods of teaching and encourage dialogue in the classroom?

Admittedly, I can think of instances when in implementing the program of study and working to the assessment criteria, I have: 'taught' instead of 'facilitated', deposited information which is disconnected from reality,  and potentially hindered creativity and critical thinking. From here on in, I intend to reflect upon the aforementioned questions which have plagued my thoughts: in embedding numeracy, literacy and ICT, in differentiating learning so as meet the needs of the individual learner, in planning for and implementing inclusive practice. I hope to work within the current system and bridge the gap between the realities of practice which consists of seemingly arbitrary assessment criteria, and students motivations, perspectives, interests and realities. 

I make no claim of transformation, I am not naive in my thinking; society and education will remain of its present structure despite my efforts. Neither am I certain I would wish for transformation to the extent of Freire's ideal, after all the present system is one of familiarity; surely radical transformation would be to the detriment of generations?! Maybe, as Freire would argue, this means I am colonized, accepting of oppression as I do not recognise its nature, and fearful  of liberation. However, I would argue the opposite, maybe, and just maybe, I am happy!!

So I guess after all I sit on the fence a little, but definitely perched with my eyes wide open. 

Test Experiment - if I save and don't publish, can I use the blog as a means or recording reflective entries I do not want my students to view?

Feeling naughty hehe.

A world of opportunities.

So I laid in bed after publishing my first ever blog; three things occurred to me which I had not yet considered:

1. If my intention is to use this blog as a reflective journal for my teaching assignment, how am I going to interject enough academic fluff to met the module outcomes, into what is shaping up to be a rather informal approach?

2. This would be great to share with students and ask for their feedback on certain elements of my teaching practice,  but there may be things I do not want them to read, can I make these aspects private?

3. Can I can get blogger  on my phone? This would allow me to make the most of idol times I spend waiting - over lunch at university, in the school playground, at kids dentist/ orthodontist / opticians/ immunisation appointments; you get the drift right!

So my mission for today is to find out: watch this space, I will be an expert blogger come the stroke of midnight!!

A bloggers virgin voyage into the world of social media!!

Ok, so today I took my head out of the clouds and joined the 21st century!!

Twitter, Yammer, Blogger, Moodle; a world of social media with with I am trying to get to grips. I never realised I was such a social media virgin, what was I doing when the information revolution hit?! Having babies, playing pool, working hard.......eek I have some catching up to do.

Day 1 of the rest of my life.
I now have a twitter account which I intend to use for professional purposes, and have stolen some people to follow from fellow co-workers. Not sure I know what I am doing, but I don't think it looks too difficult. Maybe I will need to persist a little, at the minute although I can see the potential value, I haven't come across any 'tweets' of interest.
My yammer account is in full swing, and I have used it to access teaching resources, Once I am more confident in the use of Yammer, I am thinking I will create a space and use it with my own students. This will be a huge step for me, at present I am using email to communicate with and send resources. However, I understand the limitations of this system; email can be too random and disorganised with no capacity to search.
Blogger: lets see how this post goes!! I set up the account (with a little help from a friend), but am not sure I will ever find my blog again ha. I do hope I can; can't afford to lose an hour out of my crazy busy life. I think I will copy and paste into 'Word', just in case. I am wondering who is actually going to read this? but then does it really matter, this is my reflective journal right.

I am hoping my steep learning cure will allow me to enrich both my own learning experiences in the short term and those of my students in the long term. Although I expect this will take a little while, I hope to persevere so as to reap the rewards. At  the minute technology seems to slow me down rather than speed me up, would you believe I am only 32? I am reading this and thinking my lack of  knowledge in the field of social media makes me sound much older than my years!!