Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Teacher group: Math is ‘the domain of old, white men’
EAG ^ | 9/12/2014

Posted on 09/16/2014 5:02:58 PM PDT by Altura Ct.

According to a Teach for America website, culturally responsive teaching in math is important because “math has traditionally been seen as the domain of old, White men.”

white privilege and prejudiceAs reported earlier this week, Teach for America groups across the country are committing themselves to “culturally responsive teaching,” a radical pedagogy used by communist Bill Ayers and other blatant anti-American indoctrinators.

The site, Culturally Responsive Teaching, Teach for America, says that because math is seen as a domain for old, white men, many students cannot identify with it. Therefore, educators should find ways to relate math to the lives of their students.

Judging from the math curriculum recommended, this TFA group, like all other social justice educators, wants minorities to believe that what relates most to their lives in America is racism and oppression.

For example, the site recommends “Critically Conscious Mathematics” and “Radical Math.”

Radical Math was created by educator Jonathan Osler several years ago while teaching at El Puenta Academy in New Jersey. Osler taught Radical Math along-side Cathy Wilkerson, a former member of the Weather Underground Organization (with Bill Ayers) who once participated in a plot to detonate a nail bomb at a dance for military personnel at Fort Dix.

Radical Math provides hundreds of social justice math lessons obviously meant to indoctrinate. For example, lesson titles include “Sweatshop Accounting,” “Racism and Stop and Frisk,” “When Equal Isn’t Fair,” “The Square Root of a Fair Share” and “Home Buying While Brown or Black.”

Today, Osler is director of the San Francisco Teacher Residency, a teacher training and job placement program created by the San Francisco Unified School District and Common Core assessment creator and validation committee member, Linda Darling-Hammond.

Astonishingly, in proudly promoting ‘cultural competence’ and ‘critical consciousness’ in education, the TFA website’s home page links to a Wikipedia definition of critical consciousness that describes it as a concept developed by Paulo Freire and grounded in post-Marxist critical theory.

As recently reported, the site also contains letters from 5th grade students asking text publisher Houghton Mifflin why they did not include in their textbook the fact that Christopher Columbus ‘burned, slayed and hanged’ Native Americans who would not find gold for him.

In keeping with their racism-of-evil-white-men theme, the site uses a story, involving racism against African Americans, of course, to suggest that the idea that math is neutral, rational, and logical is a myth and the premise that 2 + 2 = 4 is “naive.”

Here’s the story:

… a European explorer (presumably Francis Galton, the man who invented eugenics) agrees to trade an African shepherd two sticks of tobacco in exchange for one sheep. When he offers four sticks of tobacco in exchange for two sheep, however, the shepherd declines; the explorer later tells this story as evidence of the shepherd’s inability to comprehend simple mathematical reasoning and as “proof” of intellectual inferiority on the African subcontinent. But, if sheep are not standardized units, as there is no reason to believe them to be, then doesn’t it make sense that the second sheep might be worth far more than the first? And then doesn’t our premise of 2 + 2 = 4 look awfully naive?

If Teach for America, as a whole, does not agree with the content of this particular website that bears its name, now would be a good time to say so. Although TFA’s reputation has not been stellar as of late, the ideals and methods expressed in this particular website are beyond fringe, not to mention senseless.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society
KEYWORDS: arth
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 41-6061-8081-100 ... 141-156 next last
To: Red in Blue PA

Al Gore? I’m confused.


61 posted on 09/16/2014 5:38:52 PM PDT by Eddie01 (Liberals lie about everything all the time.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 15 | View Replies]

To: bray

not just public schools either, private schools, stay at home moms who think they know how to teach can be just as bad.


62 posted on 09/16/2014 5:39:21 PM PDT by manc (Marriage =1 man + 1 woman,when they say marriage equality then they should support polygamy)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: Altura Ct.; 2Jedismom; 6amgelsmama; AAABEST; aberaussie; AccountantMom; Aggie Mama; agrace; ...

ANOTHER REASON TO HOMESCHOOL

This ping list is for the “other” articles of interest to homeschoolers about education and public school. This can occasionally be a fairly high volume list. Articles pinged to the Another Reason to Homeschool List will be given the keyword of ARTH. (If I remember. If I forget, please feel free to add it yourself)

The main Homeschool Ping List handles the homeschool-specific articles. I hold both the Homeschool Ping List and the Another Reason to Homeschool Ping list. Please freepmail me to let me know if you would like to be added to or removed from either list, or both.

63 posted on 09/16/2014 5:39:50 PM PDT by metmom (...fixing our eyes on Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of our faith...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: RightGeek

The bigger the hoop, the bigger the _ _.


64 posted on 09/16/2014 5:40:00 PM PDT by Eddie01 (Liberals lie about everything all the time.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: Dallas59

“As I said before...time to give them some land and no cash..let them live in the jungle by jungle law.”

We already tried that after the civil war, the country was called Liberia


65 posted on 09/16/2014 5:40:05 PM PDT by dsrtsage (One half of all people have below average IQ. In the US the number is 54%i)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 23 | View Replies]

To: Darksheare

And He is as old as it gets.


66 posted on 09/16/2014 5:40:31 PM PDT by all the best
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 29 | View Replies]

To: sagar

Not exactly. There’s a reason the Arabs referred to the numerals as Hindu numerals. And they probably did not come up with Algebra
http://gatesofvienna.net/2013/08/how-muslims-did-not-invent-algebra/
And Bhramagupta as well as the Olmecs would question the Islamic origins of zero as well.
http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/about/zero.jsp


67 posted on 09/16/2014 5:41:45 PM PDT by freefdny
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 34 | View Replies]

To: martin_fierro

F’n wow!
I’m all about gated communities. Conservatives only. Well armed.


68 posted on 09/16/2014 5:42:03 PM PDT by Eddie01 (Liberals lie about everything all the time.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 54 | View Replies]

To: Darksheare
Donald in Mathmagic Land
69 posted on 09/16/2014 5:42:14 PM PDT by OneWingedShark (Q: Why am I here? A: To do Justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with my God.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 45 | View Replies]

To: Altura Ct.

If 2Mil is holding 20 rocks of crack, how many ho’s does he need to pimp so that he can smoke all 20?


70 posted on 09/16/2014 5:44:10 PM PDT by Ouderkirk (To the left, everything must evidence that this or that strand of leftist theory is true)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Ouderkirk

“If 2Mil is holding 20 rocks of crack, how many ho’s does he need to pimp so that he can smoke all 20?”

Yella Boy?


71 posted on 09/16/2014 5:47:26 PM PDT by Eddie01 (Liberals lie about everything all the time.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 70 | View Replies]

To: Eddie01

Exactly, , before 610 AD, nobody anywhere did math. Not Pythagorus, not Euclid, no Romans, and certainly nobody in China.


72 posted on 09/16/2014 5:47:53 PM PDT by DesertRhino (I was standing with a rifle, waiting for soviet paratroopers, but communists just ran for office.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: luckystarmom

They had to do creative writing in public school?
One would think that there’d be fewer/less-obnoxious IM/texts then.


73 posted on 09/16/2014 5:47:54 PM PDT by OneWingedShark (Q: Why am I here? A: To do Justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with my God.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 60 | View Replies]

To: Altura Ct.
“Anyone who cannot cope with mathematics is not fully human. At best, he is a tolerable subhuman who has learned to wear his shoes, bathe, and not make messes in the house.” ― Robert A. Heinlein
74 posted on 09/16/2014 5:50:53 PM PDT by DuncanWaring (The Lord uses the good ones; the bad ones use the Lord.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Altura Ct.

Pathetic morons relying on pathetic morons, to teach kids to be pathetic morons, and to continue down the path of pathetic moronaty(?).
Because math just 1 of those things that have a right and wrong answer, therefore: RACIST!


75 posted on 09/16/2014 5:51:21 PM PDT by vpintheak (Keep calm and Fire for Effect!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Altura Ct.

Lot of contradictions here. Were higher mathematics invented by old, white Arabs? Or is this just another reason to be stoopit?


76 posted on 09/16/2014 5:51:56 PM PDT by ozzymandus
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Caipirabob

Hey! Homer Simpson works a nuclear power plant.


77 posted on 09/16/2014 5:52:03 PM PDT by Scrambler Bob (/s /s /s /s /s, my replies are "liberally" sprinkled with them behind every word and letter.!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 42 | View Replies]

To: Red in Blue PA

Islam had a lot to do with preserving cultural knowledge during the Dark Ages. Some say they invented Algebra. Some of the mosaic windows etc from their era of greatness are incredible.


78 posted on 09/16/2014 5:52:17 PM PDT by grania
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 15 | View Replies]

To: Red in Blue PA
I think islam (small i) invented zero.

Some pretty convincing evidence says they got it from the Hindus, the same place they got "Arabic" numerals.

The six part, BBC documentary The Story of India addresses the origin of those mathematical concepts, among other things.

79 posted on 09/16/2014 5:52:19 PM PDT by Will88
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 15 | View Replies]

To: Altura Ct.

Math is notoriously racist and sexist.


80 posted on 09/16/2014 5:52:52 PM PDT by cdcdawg
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 41-6061-8081-100 ... 141-156 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson