Critical Pedagogy and the Urban...English Classroom.

The research project attempted in this chapter is very similar to much of the research I have seen concerning the attempt to make classrooms “multi-cultural” and “diverse”. I think it is interesting, however, that they used this paradigm in order to teach, in a lower income, minority school, the concept of critical thinking on issues of cultural diversity and the struggles inherent in a system that, even after all our efforts in the past 20-30 years, still fails to adapt a pedagogy that can be applied equitably to any cultural, financial or other diverse background.

                Most interesting to me in the article is the concept shared by the authors, but apparently coined by Freire and Macedo, that being the “dialectical relationship between reading the world and reading the word, where readings of the word informed readings of the world in a dialectic cycle.” This fascinates me because it expresses eloquently the way that I view reading of any kind. Reading anything, rather literary, informational or just for entertainment, should be used to help the reader better understand their world, and become a more integral part of it. Furthermore, having become a part of their world, the reader can use what they experience in it to better access any reading they may come across. Learning to bring this concept into the minds of students and help them understand that reading is not about words, it’s about ideas is why I have endeavored to become an educator. I want my students to see all the various thoughts expressed by so many authors of so many different backgrounds so that they may use those ideas as a springboard to become thinkers themselves. To look at everything they come across, rather in reading, or in the real world, with a critical eye and a desire to find the truth, or lack thereof at the center of any idea they come across.