Please read these excerpts from David Stocker's Math that matters ("Beyond pizza party math") textbook. Here are some questions you might want to think about as you read this:
Is mathematics 'neutral', or is it connected with social/ environmental justice?
What are your ideas about the author's intentions in writing this textbook?
Can these ideas from middle school math inspire teaching ideas for your secondary math classes?
Are there topics in mathematics that are more or less possible to connect with social justice issues?
Mathematical knowledge itself is neutral, from my perspective, but the way we teach it can be related to social/environmental justice. However, it may be a problem that too much "relating" can be harmful to some students' interests of scoring high in exams. My understanding of this is to find a balance of different interests----neither too much relating nor too little relating is good to most students and myself.
The way mathematics is taught must be student-oriented. This ideology, if we explicitly explain its meaning through the perspective of student-oriented, means that mathematics only make sense if it is taught in a way that makes sense to students. In other word, the knowledge itself must be wrapped in a cover, through which students can relate the knowledge to their own realities, that bridges students from a comfort zone (a place in which mathematical knowledge is used implicitly, or maybe is seemingly unrelated to the reality) to a tough zone (a place in which knowledge is explicitly explained using mathematical language, which is strict and boring to some) and back.
It is absolutely possible that these ideas can be transplanted from a middle school setting to a secondary school setting, although I still want to point out that it is highly related to school environments. I was told that in some IB schools, math teachers are only given 90 hours (instead of 120 hours) an academic year to finish all the materials in HL mathematics. I like to try some strategies the book recommends, but it is risky to some extent to both me and my students.
And finally, about the social justice issues, I believe these topics can be used in math class. Minimum wage, tax policies, or any other issues are all more or less relavant to some mathematical knowledge.
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Actually I am not quite sure what "social justice" David Stocker means in his book. Here I just assume it is a real-life topic that can be related in mathematical concepts, and I do realize that my understanding ignores the word "justice" but I do not know what or how to relate it to the topic.
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