Weekly Questions: What is mathematics? What’s the relationship between equitable mathematics learning and why some students struggle in mathematics?

Essential Question: What does equitable, justice-oriented, and/or anti-racist mathematics learning look like?

Something I have learned during my time in college is that mathematics does not have a clear definition. It's this thing that we have created -- or maybe we haven't, maybe we discovered it -- that helps explain the world around us. We choose to represent it with these weird symbols like numbers and multiplication signs and sometimes it all makes sense but sometimes we can't prove why it works at all. A TikTok went viral recently of a teenage girl grappling with why math came to be and whether or not it is "real." The internet absolutely tore her apart, calling her stupid and dumb and all kinds of terrible things because she had the audacity to question this thing that she is being forced to learn -- questions that the foremost mathematics scholars ask themselves as well. This points to larger systemic issues of the way we treat and view young girls and asking questions, but, beyond that specificity, we also see the way that her mathematics educators have failed to humanize math for her. Gutiérrez points out in Rehumanizing Mathematics for Black, Indigenous, and Latinx Students that math is often perceived only through "windows" or in ways that show people who don't look like the students themselves learning and doing mathematics. The girl in this TikTok was questioning why people even took the time to come up with math and spent their time developing complex formulas and numbers in a time where plumbing didn't even exist. This suggested to her that perhaps math was therefore just completely made up and isn't actually very relevant to the world around us. Gutiérrez goes on to emphasize why this creates a need to rehumanize mathematics for our most marginalized students, particularly those who are Latinx, Black, and Indigenous, and I recognize that those students are in need of even more rehumanizing in their curriculum. But this trend even with young, white girls struggling to conceptualize how mathematics might apply to them points to a deeper problem within mathematics learning and teaching. Statistically, she is likely being taught from a white perspective, and yet this view is still failing her. The math is still only coming through a window. It isn't even a mirror for her.

So what do we do? Bettina Love talks about needing to know our students, to know their culture, in order to teach them wholly and equitably. That seems like a logical starting place, and I think it's valuable insight. Relating to students, creating mirrors for them in their learning, would be nearly impossible if you don't know who it is you're relating to, who it is you are trying to emulate in that mirror. But then this young girl from TikTok might be educated by a white woman. It is entirely possible that her teacher knows a lot about her and her cultural background and the ways she is experiencing school. Is that still not enough? Or is it just that the domination of commonly repeated mathematics history by white men means even female educators aren't creating those mirrors within their explanations of the origins of mathematics? Equitable mathematics teaching is a struggle to create when the only things those teachers have known have been windows. Maybe that's why the lack of equitable mathematics learning is leaving students struggling. Or maybe it's not. But it seems like a good place to push up the sleeves and start on some progressive work.