Building Critical Consciousness in Math: A Journey to Building Positive Racial Identity Development in Students

In what ways, can students’ access and build a positive math identity? How might racialized students engage in Mathematics if framed from an equity-based stance? What might a math classroom look, and sound like through the tenets of Culturally Relevant and Responsive Pedagogy (CRRP)?

This session explores how math practitioners can utilize their sphere of influence to disrupt current notions of mathematics – Numbers are Neutral, Let’s Get Back to the Basics for Success in Math. This session will interrogate Belief VS Practice, as it will explore how one’s belief system impacts one’s practice in Math. Mathematic practitioners will also be provided with practical strategies in addressing how to build positive math identity for students.

What Do We Owe Our Students?

Equity is about ensuring that every student has access to high-level instruction from a teacher who has done the work to deeply consider what it means to teach the curriculum as intended, whether teaching math is comfortable for that teacher or not. So the question becomes: What should parents/children/ the system expect of teachers in terms of offering high level math instruction? There are varying viewpoints on what it means to deliver the curriculum, so we will explore alternative positions on that issue. We will get “into the weeds”, looking at a variety of curriculum expectations at different grades levels from K – 10 as models, and specifically discuss what a teacher’s obligations are to ensure instruction on those specific outcomes are top-notch.

Access and inclusion open the doors to joy and creativity!

I believe that when we design and create learning communities where all voices are heard and seen; where stories have a chance to be found and told, we are creating a strong community for our students.

Call to action: Having accessible resources in trauma-informed classrooms opens a world of creative opportunities in supporting students as they cope with the challenges in their lives. As educators, how have we designed learning environments to be both accessible and inclusive for all learners?

Mathematical Modelling: An opportunity for all students to engage in rich and meaningful mathematics

This session will focus on the new initiative on mathematical modelling in the elementary mathematics curriculum in Ontario. The presentation will highlight how to engage students of all grades in mathematical modelling in ways that make mathematics meaningful to them and address their interests. Several examples from different grades will be used to help participants see what mathematical modelling might look like from early elementary through secondary school.

Engaging all students in mathematics through data and data science

Too often students see mathematics as unrelated to their world. Real data can motivate students to explore, conjecture and investigate mathematical relationships involved in contexts such as herd immunity, median incomes for men and women, changing levels of CO2 in the atmosphere or even rating professional football players. With technology and some simple coding commands, every student can be engaged in reasoning and sense making, using mathematics to model the world in which they live.

Building Math Residue with Lessons that Stick

Many times, throughout the course of a year, we teach a lesson and the understanding goes out with the trash because student retention is minimal. What only makes things worse is that all the misconceptions we thought we addressed resurface towards the end of a unit. Let’s explore how task selection can play a pivotal role in building math residue. Mathematical residue helps understanding stick and it can reduce the number of times that misconceptions rear their ugly head.

Moving Achievement Together Holistically (MATH)

In this session, Lisa will share understandings developed from long-term collaborative work done in Mi’kmaw communities of Atlantic Canada. The session will explore ways to teach mathematics from an Indigenous perspective, looking beyond ethno-mathematical investigations to explore the ways in which Mi’kmaw epistemology or L’nui’ta’simk, can be used to root pedagogical approaches in Indigenous knowledge systems and what this might mean for other contexts. Lisa will share examples from an on-going research project called Moving Achievement Together Holistically (MATH) as a way of demonstrating what it looks like to teach from this decolonizing approach that focuses on repairing student relationships with mathematics. Sample activities will be shared and we will discuss how these ideas are good for all students but essential for some.

A Math Walk At The CNE

Imagine if students went out for a math walk on a regular basis to make measurements; to collect data; to observe how things change; to study designs, logos, architecture and public art; to notice the little things that are often missed and to ask and answer mathematical and non-mathematical questions about what they encounter during their walk. Imagine how much time students are spending on screens, especially when learning online, and consider how a math walk can take the learning of mathematics beyond the walls of a classroom and off the surface of a screen. Imagine how much exercise students can get from this exercise. Finally, imagine a world where students do not wonder why they are studying mathematics - they know because they have seen where mathematics lives and how it connected to the world around us. Join Ron Lancaster and let's go beyond imagining to developing an action plan to take our students outside!

Panel Q and A

Join Kyle Pearce and Jon Orr, of the podcast Making Math Moments that Matter, as they host a panel of prominent Ontario education leaders, many of whom are presenters in this conference. The members of the panel will answer questions submitted by OAME 2021 delegates, and explore relevant issues in math education today.