Problem Posing in Teacher Education: A Freirian Approach

Overview & Synopsis

What kinds of ideas and issues do teachers, students, and citizens in general need to think about at this time in the history of society? And how can we in higher education address these important matters? This article offers one means by which such issues might be approached, in and through teacher education. Drawing on the critical work of Paulo Freire, John Dewey, and others, I outline a problem-posing framework for teaching education. First, I outline the framework, commenting as needed on its philosophical underpinnings. Next, I provide a personal example related to the challenges of ensuring professional autonomy and quality instruction in today's highly regulated modernist milieu. I conclude by suggesting that problem-posing education is grounded in ancient philosophical notions of quality and trust in the pursuit of "paideia", a profound pedagogical quest involving education for excellence in the largest sense of the term. (Contains 5 notes.)