Babies Overboard! Incorporating Culturally Relevant Teaching into

Mathematics Instruction

Lou Edward Matthews, Ph.D.University of South Carolina Spartanburg

Paper presented at the University of North Carolina at Chapel, Chapel Hill, NC

March 1, 2003

Rationale: Babies Overboard

• Mathematics reform is an inescapable and essential reality.

• Teachers can empowered to implement mathematics reform perspectives in ways that are meaningful and relevant – culturally relevant.

• Educators will have to think differently about mathematics teaching, in new ways—maybe even as radical as throwing babies overboard.

Reform in Bermuda: Opportunity and

Achievement• Education in Bermuda (like

other countries) has always been intricately tied to our best efforts to accomplish two aims.

– Achievement• Our standing in the world.

Insurance and business economy.– Opportunity

• Slipping through the cracks• “guarantee opportunity

Culturally Relevant Teaching

Academic Excellence

Cultural Competence

Critical Consciousnes

s*Culturally relevant teaching is teaching that seeks to promote academic success, while affirming student cultural and community identities and empowering students critically for the transformation of society (Ladson-Billings, 1994; 1995b).

Research Question

• How does mathematics teaching become more culturally relevant?– How do teachers attempt

to foster connections between mathematics reform perspectives and perspectives of culturally relevant teaching

The Research: “Babies Overboard!”

• Fall 2003• A collective case study

explored four teachers’ efforts in incorporating culturally relevant teaching into mathematics instruction.

• 48 observations; 12 interviews; 3 group meetings.

• Facets, Synthesis and Illumination

Connections between Mathematics Reform and

Culturally Relevant Teaching

Critical mathematical

thinking

Critical Consciousness

Informal knowledge

Cultural knowledge

Incorporating empowerment orientations toward Bermudian culture

Understanding Culturally Relevant teaching

• Culturally relevant teaching as making connections between schooling and the experiences of their students, Bermudian society, and the world.

• Culturally relevant teaching as separate, disjoint to teaching mathematics –an add-on to teaching mathematics. Comprised of doing activities.

• One teacher viewed culturally relevant teaching as being more than doing.

Complexities of Culturally Relevant Teaching

• Efforts to foster empowering, intimate relationships while teaching mathematics.

• Efforts to build on informal and cultural knowledge and foster critical thinking about society.

• Efforts to foster less robust notions of critical thinking about society -- just talking about important stuff. Reluctant to challenge.

• Teachers build to informal knowledge through teacher/text-transmitted cultural/critical infusions.

Conclusions

• Robust notions of culturally relevant teaching are essential to incorporating culturally relevant teaching of mathematics.

• Promoting the culturally relevant teaching of mathematics is complementary to promoting mathematics reform perspectives.

• Efforts must also focus on empowering teachers to modify Mathematics tasks and activities which promote culturally relevant teaching

Reconceptualized Critical Theory

1. a broadened view of critical factors that shape human endeavor

2. an examination of forces that inhibit individual and collective empowerment,

3. reconceptualization of power and its relationships with culture.

Analysis

• Facets (Complexities)• Synthesis• Illumination

– Memo writing