Teaching Mathematics

For Equity, Agency, and

Empowerment
Bowling Green Council of Teachers of Mathematics
(BGCTM)
Theodore Chao
The Ohio State University

#EquityMathEd @professorteds
 Turn and Talk
1. How do you feel about your own experiences learning mathematics
as a child?
2. How was mathematics taught to you in ways that connected to your
history or culture?
3. Think of a child you teach who is different than you (gender,
socioeconomic status, home language, etc.). How do they learn
mathematics? How might it be the same or different than the way
you learn mathematics?
4. Mathematics is Culture and Politics Free (T/F)

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 2
 About me
• Please, call me Teddy
• Former Brooklyn middle-school
teacher
• 4th-year assistant professor
• My work: Critical Math, Elem and
Teacher Education, Teacher
Identity, and Technology

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 3
 Math Teaching is Identity Work
• Math Ed is political (Martin, 2015)
• Math sorts students on racial/ethnic/gender/socioeconomic categories
(Boaler, 2008)
• Traditional math curriculum still focuses on mercantile, nautical uses of
mathematics: Capitalism and Colonialism (D’Ambrosio, 1985; Joseph, 1992)
• Math can be seen as a White, Middle-class, Eurocentric space (Gutiérrez,
2014)
• Decisions we make as educators of our students have lifetime
repercussions, particularly our “othered” students (Berry, 2008)

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 4
#EquityMathEd @professorteds
 Turn and Talk
•What does it mean
to “do math” as a
Black/Latinx/Asian/
Gay/Trans/Othered
child (Martin,
2009)?
•Put yourself in your
child’s shoes.

#EquityMathEd @professorteds
 Teaching Mathematics so our students
Recognize and Confront Injustice
• What does Black success in mathematics look
like (Berry, 2005; 2008)?
• How do we connect community/cultural math
to formal math (Aguirre, 2012)?

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 7
 Math Identity vs. Math Teacher Identity
• Mathematics identity: “the dispositions and deeply held beliefs that stu-
dents develop about their ability to participate and perform effectively in
mathematical contexts and to use mathematics in powerful ways across
the contexts of their lives.” (Aguirre, Mayfield-Ingram, & Martin, 2013,
p.14)
• Mathematics teacher identity: “knowledge and lived experiences,
interweaving to inform teaching views, dispositions, and practices to help
children learn mathematics.” (Aguirre, Mayfield-Ingram, & Martin, 2013, p.
27)

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 8
 Why Teach Math for Equity and Social Justice
to Young Children?
1. Young children are able to recognize injustice (Freire,
1972)
2. Adults often dismiss children’s voices
3. With math, adults have to listen to children’s logic, have
to engage in children’s claim (Chao, 2016)

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 9
ROSA PARKS ACTIVITY

Discuss With Your Neighbors

1. How many empty seats do you see?
2. How many people must stand up in the back of the bus?
3. Is this fair? Why?
 The Mathematics:
1. If it costs 10 cents to ride the bus, how much money did our bus
lose with the boycott?
2. If 40,000 of the daily Montgomery bus riders are Black, how much
money did the system lose every day?
3. The boycott lasted 381 days, how much did the system lose
during the whole boycott?
4. What other math-related questions would you ask? Try to focus
on: Numeracy and Operations, Algebraic Reasoning, Attention to
Precision, Logical Reasoning.

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 11
“It’s not fair. It’s dumb.”
vs.
“It’s not fair because eight children were
standing and twelve seats were empty.”

– 4-year old children in

DeAndrea’s Classroom
12
 Picture Book
Connections:
• If A Bus Could Talk by
Faith Ringgold (2009)
• Rosa by Nikki Giovanni
(2007)

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 13
 The Rosa Parks Activity
came from collaboration
with DeAndrea Jones,
Pre-K teacher at
Weinland Park
Elementary School.

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 14
#BLACKLIVESMATTER ACTIVITY
Welcome to Peace Park.
White people, please use the Spinner on the left. People of
Color, please spin use the Spinner on the right.
Spinning blue means entrance to Peace Park.

Discuss with your neighbors

1. How did you feel as the student approached the spinner? How did you feel after the child
spun?
2. What patterns do you notice about who got to enter Peace Park and who did not?
3. Is this fair? Why?
 The Three Billy Goats Gruff
“There was very little grass in the
valley and the Billy Goats were
hungry. They wanted to go up the
hillside to a find meadow full of grass
and daisies where they could eat and
eat and eat, and get fat.”
“Who’s that tripping over my bridge?”
roared the Troll

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 16
PEACE PARK 1. Welcome to Peace
• swings Park.
• water slides 2. White people, please
• free popsicles use the Spinner on
• basketball courts the left. People of
• bubble area Color, please spin use
• outdoor skating rink the Spinner on the
• live music right.
• swimming pool 3. Spinning blue means
entrance to Peace
Park. 17
“There’s only 5 people over there (in
Peace Park) and more of them over
here.”

– 6-year old girl who was denied entrance to

Peace Park in Maya’s Classroom

18
 The Mathematics:
1. In Ferguson county, Black citizens accounted for 86% of pull over stops and 92% of searches,
even though they are only 67% of Ferguson county. Based on your understanding of “fairness”,
is this fair? If not, what should the numbers look like to make this fair?
[Percentages based on racial profiling statistics from Ferguson, Missouri in 2013 (Madrigal, 2014)]

2. For every 1 White male that gets hurt by the troll, 21 of the Black males got hurt. In this
discussion, we could ask whether it is fair that 21 Black males would get hurt in proportion to
the 1 White male? What is a fair representation? What is an “equitable” representation?
[Young, Black males get shot to death by police officers at 21 times the rate of Young, White
males nationwide (Sagara, 2014)]

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 19
 Activity Origins
• Lesson adapted from “Driving while Black or Brown” activity
from Rethinking Mathematics (Gutstein & Peterson, 2013)
• Came from students in my Early Childhood/Elementary Math
Methods course who wanted to talk about Ferguson, the day
after police officer Darren Wilson was found non-guilty for the
murder of Mike Brown

#EquityMathEd @professorteds 20
 Connecting Peace park
and #BlackLivesMatter
activity came from
collaboration with Maya
Marlowe, a 1st-grade
teacher at Weinland Park
Elementary School.
#EquityMathEd @professorteds 21
 What I’ve learned:
• Children have sophisticated mathematical
thinking
• And ability to recognize injustice
• Math empowers children when connected to
community issues/sense of self
#EquityMathEd @professorteds 22
 So How do I do this in my classroom?
(Tips from Ms. Jones and Ms. Marlowe)
• Let children lead the activity, particularly the discussion.
• Keep activities fun and silly.
• Emphasize make believe, some situations get scary
• Invite older children to participate as role-play participants or
helpers.
• Focus on children’s conception of fairness (not yours).

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 Turn and Talk:
1. How can we create and make activities that
connect to children’s identities and communities in
our own teaching?
2. What ways can we connect mathematics teaching
with empowerment and agency?
3. What is one mathematics topic, lesson, or unit
coming up that I can use to create an equity-focus?

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 Thank You for you time.

Please tweet out any questions or comments

you have to me at @professorteds.

#EquityMathEd @professorteds