Mathematics Educators' Affective Views/Beliefs of Social Justice in Informal Professional Development

• In Event: AERA Graduate Student Research in Progress Roundtable Session Three
  In Roundtable Session: Achievement, Identity, and Social Justice in Mathematics Education (Table 1)

Abstract

Recently mathematics has been positioned as a tool to support students' understanding of social (in)justice and the call for action. Since teachers are the foundational component of any educational system, focus must be on the appropriate and practical training of these teachers. Ideally, professional development for educators as adult learners offers collaborative support and training to collectively conquer challenges facing them in and outside the classroom. The purpose of this study was to investigate mathematics educators' views of social justice as they interacted with social justice mathematics (SJM) tasks in professional development. SJM tasks, modified by the researcher, were designed to complement the social justice issues addressed by the United Nations Agenda for attaining the 17 global Sustainable Development Goals (SGDs) for a better world by 2030. Data were collected through recorded meeting discussions over Zoom and individual reflections administered bi-weekly to capture the educators' perceptions about social justice in the mathematics tasks used in the discussion activities. The qualitative study adopted qualitative content analysis to analyze data. Three categories of educators' affective views emerged, report a personal connection, convey negative feelings associated with social justice issues, and report no development of emotions. I argue that educators' understanding of affective goals is essential because the knowledge of their students' affective characteristics leads to more targeted instruction and successful learning experiences.
Keywords: Affective views, social justice, professional development, reflections

Author

• Rose Mbewe, Purdue University
  Presenting Author