Despite Paulo Freire being idolized in Brazil by a certain ideology, my wish is that his teaching method goes to the limbo of educational history, and I will explain why.
I did not study my whole life in a private school, and this was due to my parents’ dissatisfaction with my learning. As children, we cannot distinguish between right and wrong, we are not in a position to question in the classroom, but to absorb knowledge, and it was then that during one of those games at home of writing the names of “things,” I made such grotesque and basic mistakes that their immediate decision was to withdraw their daughters from public education.
I would say today, as was routine in homes in the 90s, “the damage was already done,” and so the learning difficulties and mental blocks dragged me into journalism college with a dull mind to reality, not to mention the ideological collision that generated discussions between teachers and students throughout the study period: those who opposed lived in hell in the daily life of college.
The saddest part of this deficient story in basic education was not the difficulty in perceiving the ideology preached in classrooms and recognizing throughout my childhood and youth the neglect by a good part of Brazilian educators in addressing doubts, but the greater burden was condemning the generations of the 80s and 90s, the so-called ‘children of Paulo Freire’ to functional illiteracy.
Only after my 25 years, with higher education completed and inserted into the job market, did I recognize the importance of daily reading, from the Bible to thematically and morally enriching books, because when it comes time to hire and be hired, the Portuguese language, one of the most beautiful on this planet, “the last flower of Lácio, uncultured and beautiful,” as defined by Olavo Bilac in his famous sonnet of love for our language, is a treacherous lover for those who do not master it.
However, when you need it most, it does not assist you, and thus I conclude desolately: Brazilians need to learn their mother tongue, which is essential for communication between people, and the foundation for critical and logical reasoning.
I bring here alarming data, according to official statistics: “Illiteracy fell in 2019, but there are still 11 million unable to read and write,” but I go further, the magazine Exame published that “40.8% of Brazilian children were not literate,” and to understand the geo-socio-cultural-economic issue of our “Brazils,” the South and Southeast regions account for 96.7% literacy in their populations, becoming the richest economic center of the country. In contrast, the Northeast region appears with the lowest literacy rate, where 45% of Brazilians live in poverty – (living below the poverty line) – about 23.2 million Brazilians, leaving the Northeast as the region that holds half of all poverty in Brazil.
The economic and social development of the nation will only be realized when education is a total priority without ideological misunderstandings.
We all have this sacred mission ahead.
ARYANE GARCIA
Journalist
aryanegarcia@hotmail.com