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Case: Math and Social Justice! No No! Recently, I read a report in a national magazine on income levels of different groups of people in the US. The report especially featured income differences between males, females and different ethnic groups. Some of the statistics were very disturbing. For example, women holding the same job as men with same number of years in the job made considerably less money in most of the states. Differences between ethnic groups were even more disturbing. I decided to use these data in my math class with my 5th graders in a lesson on graphing. The purpose was for the students to be able to interpret graphs and create graphs using the information provided. Students enjoyed the lesson and learned some social justice lessons. Apparently a lot of my students talked to their parents about what they had learned in class when they went home. I received notes from about 10 parents the next day simply indicating that what I taught in my math class would lead to hatred among my students and that I should not be wasting their children's valuable time. Rather, they suggested, I should teach math with no controversial materials. I completely disagree with them and I plan to use similar materials in my other courses as well. However, my principals asked me to send an explanation to those parents. I know my explanation will not stop the complaints. How should I go about this potentially long battle? Or should I take the short cut simply remove such content from my lessons? Solution: (Rates are posted for this solution!) I do not believe you should remove this content from your classroom because it is relevant to math and social inequalities that students need to be aware of. If the principal asked to send home an explanation then the principal seems to be on your side of this discussion. If they wanted you to stop teaching that specific lesson then they would have told you. I would try to explain to the parents that the statistics were featured in a specific study, and that you wanted to integrate other subjects into the math content. You wanted the students to understand that math is relevant in the world outside of the school walls. I would also explain that it was not done as a race issue, but it led to good discussions about the inequalities. |
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