Building Resilience in Students
Welcome! You've made it here!
On this page, I discuss one aspect of my research on building resilience in students. As I have claimed before, I believe that building resilience requires three stages:
1. having a good understanding of the self through reflections,
2. embracing the glory of the mathematical struggle, and
3. finding the empowerment and purpose within oneself to better the world.
On my Inquiry Project page, you will get to read much more about my literature synthesis, tools I used for my data collection, as well as some research findings that I have summarized for you. Here, I want to share one specific tool/project/idea/teacher move that I have implemented in each one of these three stages of building resilience, and show you some very cool artifacts from students!
Mathematical identity: "dispositions and deeply held beliefs that students develop about their ability to participate and perform effectively in mathematical contexts and to use mathematics in powerful ways across the contexts of their lives.” (Aguire and Mayfield-Ingram, 2013, p.14)
Portraits of Mathematicians
In the beginning of every semester, students are asked to produce "portraits of mathematicians". This is one of my all time favorite assignments, for the reason that these portraits would look exactly like the ones you would imagine. Even the highest-achieving/performing students created portraits that involved someone who:
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has crazy hair/appearance in general
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seems to not be having a good time
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is often white, and male (with the one exception below of Katherine Johnson)
The math that is often done in the portraits can be characterized as:
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head splitting (literally, in one example)
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chaotic, disorganized, so difficult that it looks like gibberish
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not very useful in real life, just a bunch of abstract equations floating in vacuum
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nightmare material that will haunt you in your dreams
All of the portraits are fascinating data and the perfect starting point for me to engage in conversations regarding mathematical identities -- dispositions and deeply held beliefs about learning math -- and challenge preexisting and internalized biases about who can be "good at math", who has power in the math-learning and math-doing space, and ultimately, what it means to be a mathematician.
A few weeks later, after engaging in countless conversations about mathematical identities and what it means to be a mathematician, students are asked to reflect on their thinking, and create a second portrait of mathematicians. This time around, a lot more students choose to talk about themselves, and how they have started seeing their own growth and change. My favorite example is on the right -- it provides such fascinating insights into the complex world inside a student's mind. Progress is being made.
"Dear Math" Letters
Every time I tell a stranger that I am a math teacher, they almost always say something along the lines of, "oh I am/was not good at math in school", or "good luck to you, I hate math". All of these are signs of previous mathematical trauma that has never been addressed. How can I help my students to become resilient mathematicians, without addressing their true feelings towards math?
Gadanidis (2012) argues that “mathematics will not change unless what counts as mathematics first changes — what counts as mathematics needs to include the stories of doing mathematics” (p.20).
In "Dear Math" letters, I try to remind students of the importance of authentic, vulnerable storytelling, especially in mathematics, which is often seen as a "valueless" discipline. These counter-stories, defined as “a method of telling the stories of those people whose experiences are not often told", is a tool to help students share out their past math-learning experiences in a space that has traditionally discouraged discussions of identities, feelings, and emotions. They are also a tool for exposing, analyzing, and challenging the majoritarian stories of racial privilege” under critical race pedagogy (Solózano&Yosso, 2002, p.32).
Below, you will read a selection of "Dear Math" letters from students. Click on the different envelopes to discover what the students have to say! You can also check out the podcast episode that I produced, which features particular voices of students and their "Dear Math" letters.
My Podcast Episode:
Groupworthy Tasks & Doing Mathematics for Social Justice
Groupworthy tasks not only help build classroom community and resilience in the classroom, they can also empower students to see themselves as mathematicians who have agency in the world to create changes. One of my all-time favorite lessons simply asks students: "What is a fair living wage?" Students would be divided into groups with very clear roles, and have two class periods worth of time to explore this very open-ended question, with minimal assistance from me. Click on the yellow crayon to see the entire lesson plan!
Many of these lessons come from this amazing resource that I cannot recommend enough: High School Mathematics Lessons to Explore, Understand, and Respond to Social Injustice.
