The Impact of Identity in K-8 Mathematics: Rethinking Equity-Based Practices

Each teacher and student brings many identities to the classroom. What is their impact on the student s learning and the teacher s teaching of mathematics?

This book invites K8 teachers to reflect on their own and their students multiple identities. Rich possibilities for learning result when teachers draw on these identities to offer high-quality, equity-based teaching to all students. Reflecting on identity and re-envisioning learning and teaching through this lens especially benefits students who have been marginalized by race, class, ethnicity, or gender. The authors encourage teachers to reframe instruction by using five equity-based mathematics teaching practices:

Going deep with mathematics
Leveraging multiple mathematical competencies
Affirming mathematics learners identities
Challenging spaces of marginality
Drawing on multiple resources of knowledge

Special features of the book: Classroom vignettes, lessons, and assessments showing equity-based practices
Tools for teachers self-reflection and professional development, including a mathematics learning autobiography and teacher identity activity at nctm.org/more4u
Suggestions for partnering with parents and community organizations
End-of-chapter discussion questions.

About the Authors:
Julia Maria Aguirre is assistant professor of education at the University of Washington Tacoma. Her work focuses on mathematics teaching and learning, teacher education, and culturally responsive mathematics pedagogy, with a primary goal of strengthening access and advancement in mathematics education for historically marginalized youth. The National Science Foundation, Carnegie Foundation, and Spencer Foundation have funded her work.

Karen Mayfield-Ingram is associate director for the EQUALS programs at the Lawrence Hall of Science at the University of California, Berkeley. Her work focuses on mathematics and equity professional development, teacher leadership, and parent involvement. She is the author of The Journey--Through Middle School Math (EQUALS, 2005) and co-editor of the EQUALS Middle School Investigations series.

Danny Bernard Martin is professor of education and mathematics at the University of Illinois at Chicago. His research focuses on understanding the salience of race and identity in black children s mathematical experiences. He is the author of Mathematics Success and Failure among African Youth (Erlbaum, 2000), editor of Mathematics Teaching, Learning, and Liberation in the Lives of Black Children (Routledge, 2009), and co-editor of The Brilliance of Black Children in Mathematics: Beyond the Numbers and Toward New Discourse (Information Age, 2013).