This article contributes a deeper understanding of teachers’ experiences with and beliefs about teaching mathematics for social justice in urban schools. In-depth, phenomenological interviews were conducted with a national sample of 15 secondary mathematics teachers from eight cities across the United States. Findings identify five overarching commitments of social justice mathematics teachers, the barriers they face, and what they envision for the future of urban mathematics education. Drawing on critical pedagogical theory, this study uncovers how social justice mathematics teachers have on-the-ground experiences and perspectives that can help us build upon Freire’s notion of education for liberation.
In this article, the author contributes to the growing body of scholarship on critical mathematics pedagogy. In particular, the author advances this scholarship by outlining how critical pedagogy in the mathematics classroom can support students to engage in transformational resistance. Using a critical practitioner research approach, the author retells (some of) her experiences as a high school mathematics teacher of ninth-grade Latin@ students in an Algebra I classroom. Beginning the course with activities to build a beloved community and connecting mathematics with social justice issues, the author strived to facilitate a learning space that supported transformational resistance. Through a culminating youth participatory action research project, students developed a critique of societal oppression, a motivation for social justice, and critical mathematical literacy.
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