Month: November 2020

1. Think back on your experience of the teaching and learning of mathematics- were there aspects of it that were oppressive and/ or discriminating for you or other students?
2. Reading #2 identify at least three ways in which Inuit mathematics challenge Eurocentric ideas about the purpose of mathematics and the way we learn it.

In my experience learning mathematics was fun and I really enjoyed it. For me I always loved that there was a right or wrong answer. I liked that even if a teacher did not like me in high school, they could not be bias in marking my tests because there was a very clear answer. When I was in elementary school, I really struggled in school I started to fall behind, and every year school was just getting harder and harder because I kept of falling behind. I really fell between the cracks in elementary school because I ask a lot of questions and we had a very large class in my grade 2 year, so I did not get very much attention at all. So when it came to math I remember being so confused because I had no idea what was going on in class and the same reason why I love math now was the reason why I hated math when I was younger. Because there is only one right answer and the teachers only know one way of explaining why that answer is the answer. Why math I understand why so many people struggle with it because if it isn’t taught in the way that makes sense in your brain that you will be completely confused and your grades will be low. But I believe that if a teacher can explain it in a way that makes sense to you then most people would realize that math is not really that challenging.

In reading the reading the three things that stand out to me the most by challenging the Eurocentric ideas are mathematics and language, mathematics and culture, and teaching methods. With mathematics and language, the Inuit mathematics challenges Eurocentric ideas because math is not taught in the same language. Inuit’s learn mathematics in their own language until grade 3 and then they switch either into English or French. This is not ideal because the language transition is hard as well it is not the best to have to take a subject in a different language because it gives the impression that the Inuit language is not complete. The second idea that is challenged is mathematic and culture. With this, the Inuit culture used a base 20 system in their language as well as their everyday understanding of the world. Whereas we use a base 10 system. With this minor difference, there is a change in the mathematics that we learn. Inuit’s also do not find importance to mathematics in their culture. The purpose of mathematics in our culture is so that we can get a good university education. But Inuit’s do not find a purpose in their day-to-day lives because the Pythagorean theorem the way we are taught will not help them in their lives. In their lives, they have other talents that will not be reflected in their mathematics grade. By only judging a small portion of what mathematics is in the Eurocentric idea they are being graded on things that they do not understand and now being graded on things that they excel at like “Nine Men’s Morris”. The final, idea is challenged in the way that we are taught. In the Inuit culture, most of their knowledge is learned through conversations and listening to elders. So, to learn through writing and reading a textbook is not how they normally learn things. It is just like how some students need examples to learn, others need to just listen, and others need to see it. We are all different and yet the way math is taught is the same. I think that the challenges that the Inuit mathematics will make to the Eurocentric mathematics are a step towards a future of all students loving mathematics.

I am so sorry that you have to be in this situation where you feel push back against doing the right thing. It is so hard to share what is right when people of authority around you do not agree or think it is a joke. In my experience I think the best way you can handle it is by sitting down with your coop teacher and sharing with them why you think it is important and how you plan on teaching it in your classroom and if they have any suggestions that may help to focus the students in your lesson. Here are some things to consider sharing with them.

Treaty Ed is in our curriculum for so many reasons and it is important to understand them, otherwise it is easy to brush over it because it is difficult to teach. Just because it is difficult however does not mean that it is not important. Dwayne Donald shares in his lecture that it is important to teach the past because it is our past, Canadas past. We teach about FNMI people in Canada because they are the people that were here first. In other places in the world they learn about the importance of their ancestors so we should do the same her. As well, part of the importance of history is to learn from the mistakes of what happened in the past so that we do not repeat them. Learning about the treaties and the relationship between the Europeans and FNMI people is important so that we can acknowledge our mistakes. Claire Krueger shares that the teachers have a large impact on how students will perceive things. If teachers emphasize the importance of something, then students will follow. By avoiding teaching this we avoid talking with students about the importance of it. They will go on having these thought for the rest of their lives that Treaty Ed is not important because it was never talked about in school.

The understanding of the curriculum that “we are all treaty people” is that we are all in this together, we share the land now, and that there are two sides. Understanding that we are all in this together helps to put the responsibility more on Europeans and less completely on FNMI people like it always has been. This will help us support them in recovery instead of just telling them what they need to do. It is part of taking some blame for what has happened to FNMI people onto ourselves. We cannot go back in time and change what happened. What is done is done and now we live together on the same land. However, it is our job to respect, acknowledge, and support the land that we took from them. They helped us and now we can help them.  Cynthia puts it beautifully when she said, “[i]t is an elegy to what remains to be lost if we refuse to listen to each other’s stories no matter how strange they may sound if we refuse to learn from each other’s stories, songs, and poems from each other’s knowledge about the world and how to make our way in it.” (Chambers). It is our job to learn from them, listen to them, and support them. Because although it is all in the past, we can take time now to learn about what happened to them. Being a treaty people means that both people matter so both should be heard. That is why it is so important to teach Treaty Education in our school systems.

Cultural relevant pedagogy in my future classroom will look like many different things. I have seen that in my education growing up that the curriculum was very whitewashed. Everything was taught through the lens of white people. From history, math, language arts, etc. All the subjects reflected what white people believe, and do, and think, and work. However, with the rise in immigrants to Canada, as well as the coming importance toward Indigenous curriculum, the focus of our curriculum should no longer be entirely Euro centric views. I hope that we can spend time learning about all the difference cultures that are represented in the class room and not just focus on white history. By doing this we can bring in parents of the students, elders, and even have students share their stories about the history of their culture, traditions, language differences, math difference, etc. By doing this we will make normal all of the cultures that are present in the class. As well, by sharing and learning about the differences they become normal and there for students will be less likely to have bias in the future because they were able to learn about the truths of so many cultures. It also gets rid of the idea that whites are better then other races and cultures because we will learn about them all equally.

As I said above I really want to have a rounded class that learns about all cultures and races. I think that by having this it will help students have a sense of place in the classroom. To explain, by having students learn and also teach other students about who they are, their culture, their traditions, how they do science and math in their language, we create in environment in the classroom that no ones ideas are better the anyone else they are just different. And being different is not bad it is good because that is what makes us unique. I think that by having this environment in my classroom student will feel free to dress how they want to dress, speak what language they want to speak, and really make them feel like they can be themselves at school. Which in the end will make them feel like Canada is home because for most of them it is but often times they do not feel that way.

Hip Hop can be used as a tool to promote social justice and youth activism in the classrooms by breaking so many barriers that have been placed in our school system. The first is the barrier in the relationship between the teachers and the students. For what seems like forever there is a bad relationship between the students and the teachers. Making it so that the teachers feel unapproachable to the students. This makes students believe that they have to lie, cheat, and hide things from the teacher instead of being honest, working hard, and sharing everything with the teachers. As it is said in the article “Hip Hop is the dominant language of youth culture, and those of us who work with young people need to speak their language” (De Leon, 2004, p. 1). It makes so much sense that if we are to be teaching the students then we do not make the come to us, but we go to them. We need to “speak their language”, do what works for them, and engage in their interests. There is also a barrier that has banded African American culture from the schools. Students are able to listen to rap, dressing most rugged, and hip hop are all deemed as belonging “in da streets” so they are not approved for the school. However, we could us hip hop “as a method for organizing African American youth around issues that are important to their survival” (p. 35). By breaking the barrier that tells African American students that what they do is wrong or bad we encourage them to participate in hip hop instead of other things that could lead to crime, drugs, and dropping out of school. Finally, we can use hip hop to bring student together and help them want to come to school. Schools can use “hip hop as a tool for illuminating problems of poverty, police brutality, patriarchy, misogyny, incarceration, racial discrimination, as well as love, hope, joy” (54).

The relationship between hip hop culture and the development of critical consciousness amongst students is their need to feel heard, that they can make a change and that what they say and do matters. In the article, it says that “students viewing schools as key mechanisms in the reproduction of inequality rather than places where education is seen as a practice of freedom, a place to build critical consciousness, and social mobility (Ginwright & Cammarota, 2002). When we do not engage with students and make them feel like an individual, we continue to push an idea that we are just trying to get them in and out of school. The reality is that school is a journey that can lead to critical consciousness. It can only be attained, however, when agendas are not applied to students, but agendas are made to help students learn and develop what they need to grow and learn.