Negotiating Discourses of Social Justice and of Mathematics

• In Event: 26.079 - Roundtable Session 7
  In Roundtable Session: 26.079-8 - Exploring Preservice Teachers' Conceptualizations of Social Justice, Ethics, and Sociopolitical Consciousness

Abstract

This study explores the experiences of preservice mathematics teachers as they attempt to negotiate the discourses of mathematics in order to teach for social justice. Critical Discourse Analysis is used to analyze a portion of a conversation that occurred in one of their teacher preparation class revolving around student needs and teacher authority. This is not a simple process because this authority is built into the discourses of mathematics education. This study is the considers the possibility that there is something about the ways in which math teachers understand mathematics that discourages them from engaging with issues of social justice and how a group of preservice teachers confronted these issues.

Author

• Trevor Warburton, Jordan School District