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Teaching Math for Social Justice

Math education is never unbiased. The contexts of word problems in math classrooms present information from a certain perspective. For example, a question of a pizza box poses students as consumers who eat unhealthy food. Even if the question asked about a healthier food such as quinoa, or kale, there is a factor of a local/global impact - water usage and labour - from the consumption of these particular foods. Of course, information as such is left out of such a problem, and hence we unknowingly, we are teach our students to become ignorant consumers.

Stocker presents a smorgasbord of lessons that discuss many social justice topics and provides a way for any teacher to apply to their curriculum. He advises teachers to start with a topic that they would feel comfortable discussing, and to go from there. Although this may seem harmless, it may soon become tricky to navigate if the teacher has not been well-informed of how to facilitate these discussions. It could become a sticky situation if the teacher approaches topics such as racism or sexuality with students of color in the classroom or of differing sexual orientations and gender identities, and has not developed the sensitivity to create a safe environment for dialogue in the classroom.


Comments

  1. Susan Gerofsky27 November 2017 at 10:56

    True -- but don't all teachers have the responsibility of developing sensitivity around these important topics for our students? Why should math teachers be 'exempt'? I do understand what you're saying though... and social studies and literature teachers do make it their business to be informed about these things more often.

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    Replies
    1. afacheen27 November 2017 at 14:44

      I strongly agree, all teachers have the responsibility of developing sensitivity around these topics, and math teachers should certainly not be 'exempt'. I should have followed up my last comment; there should be more resources for teachers - or perhaps an implementation in teacher prep programs/prof dev. - for the importance of and skills in how to tackle social issues in the classroom.

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