How to Learn Math – Jo Boaler Course Begins

Boaler – Session 01 – 1.1 – Math Perception Concept Map – DEABREU

I’ve just been able to start the Jo Boaler course – getting married this summer is exciting and means I’m not going to be able to give this course the attention I would like. On the other hand, I’m getting married this summer to a truly wonderful woman who I can’t be thankful enough for. 🙂

The course has started out great. Lots of data has been shared already about perceptions of mathematics and the journey people have taken with the subject. And it’s just beginning.

In session 1.1, Boaler asks students to make a concept map of the comments made by people interviewed about their experiences with mathematics. Here is that concept map.

 

Math as a Human Activity

Wool bag woven by hand by Vivian Campbell. Photo by Robert DeAbreu

Considering some of the readings about the role of context in the mathematics classroom, I’ve been feeling skeptical lately that ethnomathematics would work with all students. Jo Boaler (1993) states that choosing contexts for mathematics that replicate the complexity of the real world as much as possible benefits students’ learning. I wondered if Langdon’s suggestion was correct: “students acquire a better understanding of mathematics by discovering that it is already a part of their environment than by studying local cultural examples” (in Boaler, 1993, p. 16). Therefore, while an ethnomathematical approach to the classroom can cause a valuable shift in students’ worldview (Eglash, 2009), are we hindering their mathematical understanding by introducing concepts in a cultural context so radically different from their own?  As Nel Noddings says, “slaving away at someone else’s real-life problem can be as deadly as doing a set of routine exercises and a lot more difficult” (Noddings, 1994, p. 97).

Our Mathematics, Community and Culture class visited the Musqueam Community Centre to learn the mathematics embedded in mat weaving and other cultural practices. My experience there essentially summed up the benefits that various readings expounded. According to Mukhopadhyay et. al. (2009), “ethnomathematics draws attention to mathematics as a human activity” (p. 68). Rather than distancing me from mathematics, Vivian Campbell’s weaving presentation drew me in to learn more about Musqueam cultural practices and the mathematics behind them. Even more striking was that, upon my return home, the experience catalyzed an investigation of photos and video I had taken of cultural practices in different countries during my travels. I sought to see “mathematics as a human activity” in weaving, fishing and canoe making in Myanmar; weaving, rice paper making and rice harvesting in Vietnam; and weaving, wood carving, and drum making in Ghana. By “incorporating the mathematics of the cultural moment, contextualized, into mathematics education,” (D’Ambrosio, 2001), I was inspired to learn more about the culture (Musqueam) being presented, and prompted to further investigate cultures that I had experienced, bringing me a much richer understanding and appreciation of culture and mathematics.

In other words, it didn’t matter that Musqueam culture is so drastically different from my own; learning about it was interesting and caused me to look for mathematics in other things that I had seen. Generally, I’m a curious guy, but this was a cool experience. I would love to explore some of this stuff with students (when i finally have a class of my own again!) as I am intrigued by the benefits that can be reaped by widening the cultural paradigm in the mathematics classroom.

References

Eglash, R. (2009). Native-American analogues to the Cartesian coordinate system. In B. Greer, S. Mukhopadhyay, A. Powell, & S. Nelson-Barber (Eds.). Culturally responsive mathematics education (pp. 281-294). New York: Routledge.

D’Ambrosio, U. (2001). Ethnomathematics: Link between traditions and modernity. The Netherlands: Sense. (Chapter 2).

Boaler, J. (1993) The role of contexts in the mathematics classroom: Do they make mathematics more ‘real’? For the learning of Mathematics, 13(2), 12-­‐17.

Noddings, N. (1994). Does Everybody Count? Reflections on Reforms in School Mathematics. Journal Of Mathematical Behavior, 13(1), 89-­‐104.

Mukhopadhyay, S. Powell, A. & Frankenstein, M. (2009). An ethnomathematical perspective on culturally responsive mathematics education. In B. Greer, S. Mukhopadhyay, A. Powell, & S. Nelson-Barber (Eds.). Culturally responsive mathematics education (pp. 65-84). New York: Routledge.