Critical Thinking, Metacognition, & Analysis
Organized in chronological order.
The Banking Model of Education and Dehumanization
My First Essay in Hutchins
Fall 2021 - LIBS 302
For my section on critical thinking, I wanted to include my first essay from LIBS 302 on the “banking model” of education, from Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed, and how it dehumanizes students. I was introduced to Pedagogy of the Oppressed through reading our first assigned book, Education for an Engaged Citizenry. Being exposed to our first book and Freire’s allowed me to start shifting my negative and self-blaming attitudes about my previous educational experiences into a more critical view of the institution of education as a whole. Through this essay, I connect my experiences of feeling dehumanized in school with the more extensive system at work and its implications on students collectively.
Upon rereading this essay, I think I accomplished the given direction for the assignment. This essay embodies critical thinking in my mind because the main topic is how the “banking concept” of education I experienced, which actively discourages critical thinking, impacted me, along with my analysis of the harm it does and why it is used. However, I would make many edits to this essay now if given a chance, even outside of formatting/citing issues and a few careless mistakes. For example, I would separate paragraph 4 into two, starting the second one with the sentence, “This model is not education nor is it truly learning.” I would separate paragraph 5 into two as well by splitting it after “But this doesn’t happen in the ‘banking’ model.”
Regardless of these changes, I connected the text Education for an Engaged Citizenry with my own life experience and Freire’s “banking concept.” I also can tell that I was being very intentional about my topic sentences, which I think paid off in making my essay feel more organized. Overall, I am proud of this essay, and I’m glad my first essay in the Hutchins program turned out the way it did. Being introduced to Freire impacted me and how I view education greatly, so I’m glad that moment is immortalized in this essay.
Meritocracy Myth Reading Response
Fall 2021 - LIBS 312
This reading response on The Meritocracy Myth from LIBS 312 is significant because it was the first time I expressed a critical opinion on something we read in Hutchins. Overall, I liked this book and enjoyed reading it. However, I was left with a glaring critique of the last chapter. Some things the author said erased their entire argument that the whole book was about! I went back and forth on including my criticism in my response because I was scared I was "wrong." However, I ultimately decided to include it.
Looking back on this response a year later, I still agree with my critique of the book. While everything in the middle of the book destroys the concept of "meritocracy," the last page completely ruins his argument. It's funny to think about how nervous I was to express a critical opinion, since I usually have one critique minimum for everything I read in class now. This reading response proved that Hutchins was a safe place to express my views, and that our teachers didn't want us to uncritically receive what they assigned us to read as containing some universal truth.
Humanity and Control Final Paper
Fall 2021 - ENGL 314
In my first English class at SSU, we read and watched many sci-fi and fantasy texts that I enjoyed. At the end of the class, the professor gave us a few choices for our final, and I chose to write an essay exploring the themes that connected at least four texts from class. I chose this because an underlying theme I noticed throughout our texts was control and the consequences of imposing your will onto others and the world. That was an interesting theme for me to write about. I decided to connect this theme with the texts The Lathe of Heaven, 100 Years of Solitude, Princess Mononoke, and Jurassic Park (the movie).
As I was perusing all my schoolwork to build my portfolio, I realized that I had forgotten about this essay completely. I suddenly remembered what my experience was like writing this. While I was motivated to write this essay because I was interested in exploring the theme of control, I remember that I felt embarrassed turning this paper in. When I was done with it, I thought it was terrible and incoherent. I hated waiting for the dreadful moment when I got the submission notification that the professor had graded it or made a comment. When that moment came, I had gotten a perfect score, but the teacher had not given me any feedback or comments (which rarely happens in my other classes). I immediately felt deflated and thought I was given a good grade out of pity or that I
had gotten an A because the professor had simply run out of time to grade. So, I just forgot about it.
Upon remembering this, I decided to give it a read. I can't believe that I thought this essay was terrible! This is one of my favorite things I have written. I did a good job describing each text, discussing their other themes, and connecting the content to the theme of control. I believe this essay was organized well, fulfilled what was required, and that it was clear I looked critically into the texts I used to make good arguments about control being a theme that connects them all.