Characterizing our conceptions of being a mathematics teacher

Report of experiences situated in critical mathematics and ethnomathematics education

Abstract

In this document we want to propose a characterization of our experience as teachers who have located our investigative practices from Critical Mathematics Education and Ethnomathematics in which converges an idea of political subject that transforms the conceptions of being a mathematics teacher. We coincided some years ago in an international academic conference in which discussed research proposals and pedagogical practices situated in perspectives far from cognitive approaches and closer to social, political and cultural dimensions. There, we shared our academic papers and years later we met again at the II Meeting of the Network of Critical Mathematics Educators, noting that, although our interests had not changed, we were interested in recognizing the subject’s voice when recounting their investigative experiences located from social, political and cultural approaches to mathematics education. For this we use oral and written narratives to study and reflect on our own experiences as mathematics teachers. To achieve it, theoretically we base on the ideas of the social, political and cultural approach, especially in Critical Mathematics Education and Ethnomathematics, characterization both the idea of political subject and sociopolitical context. In connection with the methodology, we return to the idea of Jorge Larrosa's experience and the characteristics of biographical-narrative research, using particularly the autobiographical writings produced by the authors of this document. We seek to give life to subject’s voice by narrating their own experiences as teachers and researchers as flesh and blood who try to privilege in the classroom discussion spaces on social, political and cultural issues that are part of the daily contexts of Colombian schools. In addition, we recognize the importance of using mathematics as a tool that allows us to read, interpret and transform the world and the conditions of our current society, recognizing ourselves as political agents of change.