CRITICAL PEDAGOGY: THE BUILDING BLOCKS AND THE CRUMBLING BLOCKS

Critical Pedagogy (CP) is an approach in teaching methodology that basically derivates from critical theory. This approach of teaching aims at empowering the students with abilities to think critically about their educational situation and allows them to recognize connections between their individual problems and experiences and the social contexts in which they are embedded. In this paper, the main building blocks and the opposing crumbling blocks of CP including the basic concepts of schooling vs. education, control vs. democracy, authoritarianism vs. authority, individualism vs. individuality, deskilling vs. reskilling, and traditional literacy vs. critical literacy are discussed. The aim of this paper is providing an in-depth analysis of CP tenets and clarifying its rubrics as means of consciousness raising among English as a foreign language (EFL) practitioners and students.