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Re: math for reproduction and domination



Yes, Nancy!
And that sense of fairness and apprehension of equality and inequality of
materials gets preschoolers to model addition and subtraction long before
those operations become number-bound  -- that's Davydov, right?
Peg
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ares, Nancy" <nancy.ares@rochester.edu>
To: <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
Sent: Thursday, November 11, 2004 10:00 AM
Subject: RE: math for reproduction and domination


> Young children have often very well-developed senses of fairness (see
Vivian
> Paley's work), so I do think that the kind of thinking about privilege
that
> W-M Roth points to is not that far off for first graders. That it is
obvious
> that schooling in the US (and other places) is a very efficient sorting
> mechanism and is less efficient at fostering meaningful learning that can
be
> transformative doesn't relieve educators and researchers of a
responsibility
> to try to change schooling and learning. There are important efforts at
> addressing the kinds of issues Roth brings up in elementary grades by such
> groups as Rethinking Schools, where content learning (math, science,
> language arts, social studies) is grounded in problems facing marginalized
> groups and communities, as well as Moll and colleagues' work on funds of
> knowledge that recognize cultural practices of marginalized communities as
> important resources for learning.
>
> I'm not arguing that bb's analysis has to include the cultural historical
> analysis Roth wrote of, but I do appreciate the call to our discussion to
> consider it...
>
> Nancy Ares
> Assistant Professor
> Teaching & Curriculum
> The Warner Graduate School of Education
>     and Human Development
> University of Rochester
> P.O. Box 270425
> Rochester, NY 14627
> 585-273-5957
> fax 585-473-7598
>
> > ----------
> > From: Bill Barowy
> > Reply To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
> > Sent: Thursday, November 11, 2004 10:43 AM
> > To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
> > Subject: math for reproduction and domination
> >
> > On Thursday 11 November 2004 10:22 am, Wolff-Michael Roth wrote:
> >
> > > I was struck that in the entire discussion, there was no cultural
> > > historical analysis of the situation in which children do these
> > > mathematical things not because they are (considered) useful and its
> > > outcomes have any relevance to anything but to the reproduction of a
> > > society, where, as in the US, 15 to 20 percent of the population live
> > > in poverty, and where education is used to systematically exclude
parts
> > > of the population to share in the wealth that is collectively
produced.
> >
> > I don't think such an analysis is necessay, Michael.  I think it's
obvious
> > and
> > publications from such people as Bowles and Gintis hammer that point
home.
> >
> > In first grade, this kind of thinking is a long ways off.  I'm not even
> > sure
> > it's something one could do consistently in high school.  But if a
student
> >
> > takes a course in marxist economics at Umass Amherst, or any other
> > univeristy
> > for that matter, that point will be well addressed.
> >
> >
> > -- 
> > --------
> > bb
> >
> >
>
>