Read on Twitter
Here’s a thread on 2+2=4 (in which I probably don’t make a lot of friends).
This tweet sparked some controversy in math education Twitter over the last few days and I’m going to share some of my thoughts. #mtbos #takebackmath
This tweet sparked some controversy in math education Twitter over the last few days and I’m going to share some of my thoughts. #mtbos #takebackmath
First, some things I think are true...
2+2=4
2+2=4
The above fact exists outside of culture. (Take your language, numbers in other bases, or modular arithmetic arguments somewhere else. Those arguments miss the point.)
Mathematics in general is true outside of culture, language, hierarchy, etc.
Math has been used for bad.
Math has been used for good.
Math has been used for good.
Understanding mathematics and mathematical thinking in general is a powerful toolkit for understanding the world that benefits anyone that grasps it.
Math can be taught in a way that results in many students not leaving with that toolkit. That’s an injustice.
Math can be taught in a way that results in many students leaving with the toolkit. This is the primary goal of most math educators.
There are decisions that have to be made about what goes into math curriculum and those decisions are a part of what progressive educators mean when they say that math teaching is “political”.
Conservatives claim that leftist ideology is spreading in education, including math education (antiracism, diversity, equity, inclusion, white fragility, etc.).
They’re right.
They’re right.
Evidence of this can be seen in the many Twitter conversations around the 2+2 topic.
They’re not trying to hide it. Many replies to this comic literally demonstrate the point made in the comic. Of course, no one was actually called a Nazi, but the comic isn’t literal. https://twitter.com/Laurie_Rubel/status/1280735619203960833
They’re not trying to hide it. Many replies to this comic literally demonstrate the point made in the comic. Of course, no one was actually called a Nazi, but the comic isn’t literal. https://twitter.com/Laurie_Rubel/status/1280735619203960833
I suspect this is a relatively small but growing group of educators, but they rarely face resistance among other educators. Those that disagree scroll on by.
If an educator pushes back then many in the group will defend the progressive idea (not just in this case, but progressive ideas in general) as evidenced by the #takebackmath hashtag.
For most people, dissententing and the prospect of defending oneself against the group isn’t worth it.
The best case scenario is you spend a bunch of time and energy trying to defend yourself. Even then you’ll likely end up labeled a racist as you didn’t toe the line.
The best case scenario is you spend a bunch of time and energy trying to defend yourself. Even then you’ll likely end up labeled a racist as you didn’t toe the line.
And maybe that’s fine. After all, progressive educators think they’re right, as they’re doing “the Work”. But every educator that falls in this group should be aware that many people think the ideas are bad, they’re just not saying anything.
The result is that progressive educators view their primary ideological foes as “right-wing trolls” who are obviously racists and white supremacists and not to be taken seriously.
So the ideas percolate without much resistance (or maybe without public resistance).
So the ideas percolate without much resistance (or maybe without public resistance).
But what about 2+2?
Math is the language of nature. It’s Truth and beauty is discoverable by any person in any culture. Humans are wired for finding patterns - mathematics in the raw.
Math is the language of nature. It’s Truth and beauty is discoverable by any person in any culture. Humans are wired for finding patterns - mathematics in the raw.
Many progressive educators are promoting an ideology that’s inherently divisive. But math can be a place where we can transcend our differences and explore what’s fundamentally true about our universe. It can be a uniting force.
We can acknowledge that while also acknowledging the ways in which math has caused harm to individuals and to groups. We don’t need to go straight to “decolonizing” everything.
It doesn’t do the perception of the math educator community any good to play footsie with radical subjectivity and to pretend that “2+2 equaling 4 is cultural” is a logical place to stand.
It provides the right with cannon fodder, makes people in the center skeptical of math educators, frustrates people in the center-left and isn’t true in any meaningful sense.
As an aside, this whole 2+2 thing, including this tweet, has echoes of a passage from 1984. https://twitter.com/esmathteacher/status/1281510244800008195
Here’s the passage. It doesn’t map perfectly, but seriously making the claim that 2 and 2 equaling 4 is cultural seems very close to tacitly denying external reality.
And this case isn’t the only example of bad ideas in education coming out of the far left. In this video a panel explains what they mean by “decolonize science”.
More on the term “decolonize” here: https://newdiscourses.com/tftw-decolonize-decoloniality/
More on the term “decolonize” here: https://newdiscourses.com/tftw-decolonize-decoloniality/
The person that created this comic has “decolonize all the things” in his Twitter bio.
I also want to point out that a right wing mob did go after Brittany, as Infowars picked up her tweet.
Everyone should have the right to express their ideas without getting mobbed. https://mathedcollective.wordpress.com/2020/07/09/attack-on-brittany-marshall/
Everyone should have the right to express their ideas without getting mobbed. https://mathedcollective.wordpress.com/2020/07/09/attack-on-brittany-marshall/
