I cannot think of a time that when I was learning mathematics where I personally felt oppressed or discriminated against. Mathematics always came easily to me when I was in elementary and high school even though my math grades might not always reflect it but that was because of effort. All of the math concepts just seemed to click with me in my head either instantly or after a quick bit of extra teaching. However, I remember a time when I was in elementary school probably in grade 8 or so, some of the class would learn math with the regular classroom teacher, while a few members of the class would learn math with the learning resource teacher or a teaching assistant. I was mad that those students were able to learn the simpler math while I had to learn more difficult math. Thinking back on this situation now, I can see how this really could have made those students that were being taken to learn the other math feel singled out for ‘not being good at math or for not being able to do hard math’. Many of these students that were pulled out to do the more basic math were not the highest achieving students and would have felt out of place, but I think not pushing the students to learn or even attempt to learn the same mathematics as the rest of the grade and with the rest of the grade, and instead getting the simplified computational mathematics, was a disservice to them.
The question of how Inuit math differs from our Western or Eurocentric views on mathematics was asked. Inuit math uses base 20 and not base 10 which Eurocentric math uses because they use their ten fingers and 10 toes which make sense to me but at the same time is confusing . Secondly, the calendar days both groups have 12 months in a year but the days are more different on how they look at it, Eurocentric math says it is solar not lunar. Inuit is neither in fact, it is natural, independent recurring yearly events and base on the how long it takes that natural event to happen that is how long the month will be. Finally in Eurocentric mathematics, a ‘line’ is automatically thought of as a straight line, while in Inuit mathematics a ‘line’ is not automatically thought of as straight. I think this is important as it encourages creativity and imagination when talking about lines and shapes which are a big part of all mathematics classes.
2 Comments
Kianna Woodruff
3/17/2019 07:20:52 pm
Hi Paul!
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3/21/2019 11:32:31 am
Hi Paul,
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