The theme of identity in the article by Cobbs and Hodge really struck a chord with me and made me think about how I identify myself. I agree with the view of culture as “a network of locally instantiated practices that are dynamic and improvisational” (pg 161). The “culture” that was passed down from my parents is much different than the school culture I grew up in, and those are much different than the social and work culture I find myself I now. There are so many different forms of culture that an individual can be part of, and each of these shapes their identity. I know that the way that I behave changes when I am around different people or put into different situations. When I was younger, I saw this as a result of not really knowing who I was. But “who you are” is a complicated idea. A person’s identity is much more than it seems from the outside - how we see someone is only part of their identity. And identity is always changing in response to new experiences.
The article by Boaler also gave me a new perspective meaning of gender. I understand sex as the physical features you are born with and gender as something you develop as you grow up, but I never really thought about how much gender is influenced by our environment and how, just like culture, it is always changing. Gender is a spectrum, not a neat little box you can check off, no matter how many boxes you’re given.
It does worry me that “the greatest differences in mathematics achievement and participation are found at the most advanced levels (Boaler, 28). Thinking back to my own university education, this does not surprise me. There were definitely more male students in my classes than female students, and of the female students, many of them planned to go on to teaching mathematics instead of perusing higher mathematics. However, when I look at my students, I don’t see the same difference. I don’t see the same difference in participation or achievement. This made me wonder if perhaps I was just looking all that closely, so I went back and looked at my students and their marks. Of the312 student to whom I’ve taught first semester math over the past two years, 167 were female and 145 were male. And when I compare their marks, the women have an average that is 4% higher than the men. I teach math to students in a science program, not a math program. They haven’t chosen to take math, they are required to do so. But the conclusion that I draw from these numbers is that, though girls may not choose to pursue math in higher education, they are just as capable of doing math. If the gender difference in higher education is cause by society sending the message that math is for boys, we as educators need to do something to change that.
Rohini
Hello Rohini,
ReplyDeleteDuring my undergrad experience, I too noticed a substantial difference in the number of male and female students in math courses (skewed towards the males). Interestingly enough, I too observed higher participation and achievement among females than males in elementary/junior math classes. So what exactly turned a large portion of females away from math/applied sciences? If indeed society is spreading a message that "math is for boys", then we definitely do need to investigate further.
I also think there are more complexities. There are many markers of oppression within society and to study just the topic of gender inequality/inequity would not do complete justice. As part of our so-called mandate for social justice, we need to explore the intersectionality of these systems of exclusion and oppression. Who is being excluded from math education? Which types of girls? how? why?
As much as math can be used as a tool for analyzing the world around us, I also think as educators, we need to demonstrate to our students that math needs them just as much as they need math.
I also noticed that there were more men than women in my upper level math courses during my undergrad. From Boaler's piece, I would guess that a large contributing factor is the way that boys and girls seemed to approach math in secondary school. While both boys and girls wanted to gain a deep understanding of the material, rather than just memorize a set of rules to follow, the boys "turned mathematics into a game" when this wasn't possible, and the girls "continued to strive toward depth of understanding" (30). I interpret that to mean that boys had better strategies for sticking it out through the more superficial stage of math so they eventually got to the deeper stuff.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if the fact that boys turned boring math homework into a game has to do with the kinds of activities that girls and boys are expected or encouraged to participate in from a young age. I would guess that participating in team sports would get someone used to following rules as part of a game. What I found interesting (and sort of validating for my beliefs about math education) was that there was no difference in what boys and girls were able to do or wanted to do. The difference was only in how they approached it. I'm convinced that gender differences are a result of socialization more than anything else, and Boaler's findings reaffirmed that understanding.
I appreciate the way you articulated how complex culture is, Rohini, and I think we need to apply the same understanding to gender. And as Praboda pointed out, we need to think about intersectionality. But in order to avoid essentializing, we need to go beyond intersectionality.
ReplyDeleteSo if we consider intersections, we might consider race, class, gender, sexuality, and more, as all part of what makes up a person. But as Rohini articulated above, the practices people participate in are the direct influences on who people are and what they learn. These variables like race, class, etc, matter because they give us access to different forms of participation, rather than somehow transferring something essential that makes people different from each other.