Teaching mathematics for social justice: Reflecting on practice

In this section, I use extracts from a reflective discussion I held with practising teachers to explore how some of the theoretical ideas from Part 1 of this book can be translated into classroom practice. The online discussion was with Shaila Gosrani and Lauren Hennessy, two participants in an ‘innovations work group’ organised through (and funded by) one of the regional Maths Hubs in England. The work group ran from September 2019 to July 2020 and was focused on ‘teaching mathematics for social justice’ and ‘participatory action research’ (see Chapter 2). At the time, Shaila was in her 8th year of teaching and Lauren was in her 3rd year of teaching, in secondary schools in the Bristol area in England. Coincidentally, both were also studying on the same Masters’ Level university course in mathematics education. The reflective discussion was part of an evaluation of the work group carried out with ethical approval from University College London Institute of Education. We are grateful to Shaila and Lauren for giving consent for their data to be used in this section of the book.