The Method

The Freire method, it must be remembered, does not aim solely or even chiefly at adult literacy. The major concern is to awaken consciousness: in the Portuguese "conscientizacao". This means making the illiterates aware of their potential and dignity, and enabling them to perceive more realistically the world in which they live, the causes and consequences of events in their lives.

The method stems from three sources. Firstly, the language, culture and problems of the illiterates themselves are taken into account. Before any teaching is undertaken with any particular population it is informally and closely observed, its attitudes, aspirations and peculiarities noted. A list of words most charged with meaning for the community is drawn up. Secondly, to balance this subjective study of the illiterates, the method draws on studies and analyses of underdevelopment and poverty. Thirdly, philosophies of knowledge, human nature, culture and history provide a more complete picture of man his needs and potential. This component gives direction to the method.

The list of words is reduced to between 16 and 20 by two further criteria: (i) how useful are they in learning the range of vowels and consonants and as keys to a larger, more complex vocabulary; (ii) their capacity to confront social realities and mean something important to the illiterates. For example, the word for "work" in Spanish, "trabajo", covers a number of sounds and as well as meaning "occupation" connotes of the nature of human existence, economic functions, co-operation and unemployment.

A set of cards with pictures relating to the chosen words is constructed with a view to impressing an image of the word on the pupil and stimulating thinking about the situation the word implies. For example the first card of set produced for a Chilean rural group depicted a peasant carrying an axe to cut down a tree. From this simple illustration, with a minimum of assistance (mostly in the form of questions and invitations from the "co-ordinator" to the less vocal members of the circle) it was hoped that the following point would emerge from the group...there is a world of nature and a world of culture, through work man alters the natural environment and creatively forms culture.

The second picture is of a folk-dance. Through it the group can learn man employs culture for aesthetic reasons, not just to survive. The third picture shows a humble Chilean home inhabited by a working class family. It is at this stage that the literacy training begins for this particular group. The class learns that one can symbolise a lived experience by drawing, writing or reading it.

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The literacy training involves a number of audio-visual techniques familiar enough to New Zealand teachers but placed in a context quite unusual to us. At the same time as the group are repeating and memorising words, breaking them into Component syllables, learning to write letters, learning to write words and constructing new words from the components, the co-ordinator of the group guides them in reflection and discussion. For example, from the meaning of the word "house" such themes as the need for comfortable housing for family life, the problems of housing in the nation and the problems of housing associated with urbanisation are developed. Provocative questions such as "where and why do Chileans lack housing?" help to generate critical attitudes in place of apathy.

The circles, as they are called, need to be assisted by someone trained in the method. The co-ordinator must not force his viewpoint on the group but rather help the illiterates to form their own opinions through dialogue. Dialogue is brought about by the co-ordinator asking provocative questions and drawing less vocal members of the circle-into the discussion.

Thomas G. Sanders says of those brought out of the culture of silence by this method "My own most memorable impression from having visited these classes is of the capacity of people of limited education for thoughtful analysis and logical articulation of issues when those issues are linked to their everyday life."

You can understand the threat felt by the Brazilian oligarchy when you realise that "conscientizacao" takes less than three months to complete (and this after a days work in the fields). At the rate the method was catching on in 1964, it was possible for Brazil to eliminate illiteracy, (estimated at 40,000,000 or half the population) within a few years Significantly, illiterates do not have the right to vote in Brazil.