Reacting to a Cognitive Shove

I define an opportunity to develop as a professional a success when my thinking, my stance as a teacher of mathematics and a preparer of teachers of mathematics, changes. By that measure my time at the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) Annual Meeting was a success. Whether it was hearing about Black Liberatory Mathematics during Danny Martin’s Friday morning talk or Karen Karp discussing appropriate strategies for working with students in need of additional help in mathematics, both provided me with a cognitive shove that makes me want to seek out more information. Information around appropriate actions to take to help me make sense of the change to my stance.

Anne Marie Marshall, Rebecca Nance, and I held a workshop during NCTM where we shared some of the work we have been doing around increasing awareness and agency around issues of equity and diversity. Our attempt to cognitively shove our audiences was to argue that there are no neutral math teachers. A math teacher is either an agent of change or an instrument of inequity when it comes to the teaching and learning of mathematics. But then what…what do we do to be an agent of change? Part of our work in the session was to provide some potential answers to that question and create a list of resources to help people teach mathematics with, about, and/or for social justice. The intent is to help those trying to love others through the teaching and learning of math.

Here is a link to the collaboratively created handout that we created during the session.
Here is a link to the slides presented at the talk

How are you an agent of change in the math classroom?

Amidon, J., Marshall, A.M., & Nance, R. (April, 2018). Becoming an Agent of Change! Learning to Teach Math with, for, and about Social Justice. Session at annual meeting of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. Washington D. C.