Making Math for All: The Equal Sign, Equality, and Remaking the Math Learner

• In Event: 58.083 - Roundtable Session 26
  In Roundtable Session: 58.083-9 - Curriculum as Cultural Production

Abstract

Situating the equal sign as more than a symbol of mathematical logic, the study explores how political and cultural theories of equality are embedded in the rules that organize curriculum and conceptions of the child. Examining how the psychologies of schooling intersect with the equal sign to shape how children are to think, see, and act in school, I attend to how the cultural expectations for inclusion are historically produced and reclassify who is considered a math learner. This logic about who children are and should be as ‘equal’ participants in schooling and society is highlighted by making explicit the historical rules and standards that organize cultural norms of equity, equality, and inclusion within reforms aimed at math for all.

Author

• Jennifer Diaz, Augsburg College