In Chapter Two, Freire describes two opposing models of education. He criticizes the traditional banking method, in which students memorize content deposited in them by the teacher, and contrasts it with problem-posing education, where teacher and students work together on an equal footing to investigate reality and acquire understanding.

Freire methodically analyzes both types of education. He demonstrates the hierarchical and dehumanizing character of banking education, which supports oppression. Conversely, in problem-posing education, student and teacher dialogue with each other to stimulate consciousness-raising and the fuller expression of their humanity. Freire’s account of these two educational styles draws upon the existential and phenomenological philosophies of Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, and Edmund Husserl. The concepts of banking and problem-posing educational styles are arguably the most influential and well-known ideas in Pedagogy of the Oppressed.

In traditional education, the teacher-student relationship is strictly hierarchical. The teacher assumes a position of authority, possessing knowledge that he imparts to the student. The student is a passive and empty receptacle for this knowledge, patiently receiving and memorizing it. Education has a narrative character, with a narrating Subject (the teacher) and listening objects (the students), who are filled by the content of the teacher’s narration.