Math Blog #1: Math Identity




    Why is your math identity important? How can a teacher's math identity impact their students? In class after reading the article, "Productive Math Struggle: A 6-Point Action Plan for Fostering Perseverance" by John Sangiovanni, Susie Katt, and Kevin Dykema, I've learned how essential it is for teachers to understand their own math identity in order to help students foster a positive math identity. "By understanding our early experiences as math students and how they shaped our definitions of what it means to do math, we can learn important lessons about the instructional choices we make" (Sangiovanni, Katt, Dykema, pg. 32). 

    Before reading this article, I had never heard of math identity. Math has always come easy to me, so this article really opened my eyes. Even though I have always loved math, that doesn't mean my students will. It will be important for me to consistently reflect on my instructional strategies and think about my students' identities. For this to happen, I will have to uncover my students' math identities. For older students, I think having them write a math autobiography would be a great activity. This would help me learn about their past experiences, in order to better teach them. For younger students, a couple fun activities would be to have them make bumper stickers (which shows their perseverance in math or a personal strength), and to have them draw an emoji which represents how they feel about math. A found another article, "How Do I Learn About My Students' Math Identities?", which talks about teachers' math identities and seven activities to uncover their students' math identities. 

    After uncovering your students' math identities, it's important to foster a more positive math identity moving forward. Students may have had bad experiences with math in the past, but that can change in the future. Students can learn how to have fun in math, and actually enjoy it. "Guiding Students to a Healthy Math Identity" by Deborah Peart is a great article to help teachers with their students and empowering their math identity. 

I can't wait to have my own classroom one day, and I will surely use these three articles and activities to help me understand my students and their needs. 

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