Week 9: November 4th

Reference:

Bear, L. L. (2000). Jagged worldviews colliding. In M. Batiste (Ed.), Reclaiming Indigenous voice and vision (pp. 77-85). UBC Press.

Poirier, L. (2007). Teaching mathematics and the Inuit community, Canadian Journal of Science, Mathematics and Technology Education, 7(1), p. 53-67.

Watch this TED Talk (Mathematics is the sense you never knew you had)

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At the beginning of the reading, Leroy Little Bear (2000) states that colonialism "tries to maintain a singular social order by means of force and law, suppressing the diversity of human worldviews. ... Typically, this proposition creates oppression and discrimination" (p. 77). Think back on your experiences of the teaching and learning of mathematics -- were there aspects of it that were oppressive and/or discriminating for you or other students?

My experience with math in the beginning was not bad, when I was young my parents would spend time solving math problems with me and they’re very strict when it comes to finishing up homework but I didn’t mind because that meant spending time with them and we could play as much as we want after. As I grew up I start to struggle more, especially moving to a different country, I couldn’t make sense of the questions and most were European based as well, I didn’t have the same connection with the subject anymore and grew to hate it. It also did not help that growing up, I would always here the stereotypes that "oh you're asian, you must be really good at math" but that was not the case for me; I do well in other subject areas, however I always fall behind in Mathematics and it made me insecure about my ability to learn. The article Jagged worldviews colliding talks about how European values a system where they are " linear and singular, static and objective",  it shows how they are only focused on the product by giving everyone the same task and assessed the same way and gives very little room for students to think freely or give them different options.

After reading Poirier’s article: Teaching mathematics and the Inuit Community, identify at least three ways in which Inuit mathematics challenge Eurocentric ideas about the purposes mathematics and the way we learn it.

The article mentioned how our world views mathematics as a universal language but they do not see it as part of our everyday life. The Inuit community on the other hand use mathematics for everything they do, they see mathematics as a language. One of the ways that I think Inuit mathematics challenge Eurocentric ways is the way they recognize it as a “cultural product” and could be interpreted in many different ways. Second is that Mathematics is embedded in their language, it relates back to our lecture that children are born with the ability to do mathematics without even realizing it. Lastly, students are given the freedom to create their own understanding in solving the problem and not just subjected to doing what everybody else is doing. It is also very important to keep in mind that there is no such thing as the “Math genes”, it solely based on how to understand the language and how we teach it to our students.