In 1984 mathematics educator Martin Johnson reported a paucity of research focused on how to organize instruction to support African American students’ learning of mathematics (Johnson, 1984).  He called attention to the need for research programs that were more closely linked to practice.  Although there have been advances in this area of research, decades later the need still stands. This was reinforced in the context of a research project investigating the improvement of middle-grades mathematics instruction across large US urban districts when we repeatedly heard in interviews with teachers that they were aware of the need to better support African American students in learning mathematics, but struggled in identifying how to do so. Additionally, the teachers reported receiving little to no professional development to support them in their efforts. In response, we turned to the literature to identify what mathematics education research suggests in the wake of Standards-based reform. In this paper we report on our literature review that answers the following questions: a) What does research suggest regarding forms of teaching practice that support African American students’ participation in rigorous mathematics activity? and b)  What does research focused on African American students’ experiences suggest for the organization of teaching practice?

Theoretical Perspectives

Scholars have documented two ways of framing African American students’ learning of mathematics: one that focuses on African American students’ performance on standardized mathematics assessments in comparison to the performance of other groups of students through a lens of achievement (Gutiérrez, 2008; Stinson, 2006) and one that focuses on African American students’ learning of mathematics via a lens of opportunities to learn (Darling-Hammond, 2007; Flores, 2007).  This review focuses on studies of African American students’ opportunities to learn in K-12 mathematics classrooms.  Our definition of opportunities to learn is informed by recent research in mathematics teacher education, which suggests the importance of connecting principles of high-quality mathematics teaching to practice, or what teachers and students do in the classroom—how they interact with one another and with mathematics content (Ball & Cohen, 1999; Ball & Forzani, 2009; Ball, Sleep, Boerst, & Bass, 2009; Grossman, et al., 2009; Lampert, Beasley, Ghousseini, Kazemi, & Franke, 2010).  In addition, our review is informed by the work of Gloria Ladson-Billings (1997, 2000) and Danny Martin (Martin, 2007, 2009), in asking questions specific to African American students. There is an inherent complexity in researching and specifying educational supports for particular populations of students (Clarkson, Fawcett, Shannon-Smith, & Goldman, 2007).  One runs the risk of essentializing (Gutiérrez, R. 2002), in this case, youth who identify or are identified as African American. As with any identifiable or self-identifying group of people, there is diversity in terms of African Americans’ strengths, experiences, opportunities, preferences and so forth.  However, Ladson-Billings, Martin and others argue that given African Americans’ history of inequitable opportunities in the US, it is crucial that educational research is centered in the experiences of African American learners if educators are to support African American students.

Findings

We found that studies that suggest particular components of practice that specifically support African American learners (e.g., studies on culturally relevant teaching and African American students’ learning preferences) are useful in identifying and documenting orientations of teachers who have been shown to support African American students (e.g. Ladson-Billings, 1995; Lattimore, 2005; Malloy, 2009).  These studies also highlight learning preferences of African American students that teachers might build on in instruction in order to better support their students as mathematics learners (e.g. Boykin, 1986; Hurley, Boykin, & Allen, 2005; Rowser & Koontz, 1995).  However, these studies often suggest abstract characteristics or principles of teaching and do not include details of how teachers learn to develop effective orientations, how teachers negotiate relationships with African American students, and what specific forms of practice support African American students to participate in rigorous mathematical activity.  We also found that though studies of successful African American students provide an alternative to the deficit-oriented narrative regarding African American students (e.g. Berry III, 2008; Martin, 2000; Sheppard, 2006; Thompson & Lewis, 2005), it was not always clear how success was being defined and most studies did not closely examine the nature of the classroom interactions in which the successful students participated.

Significance

If the field of mathematics education is to contribute to significant improvements in African American students’ opportunities to learn mathematics, our analysis suggests two implications for research.  First we suggest that it is necessary for research to intentionally work to specify and decompose (Grossman, et al., 2009) forms of practice that are grounded in studies of African American students’ experiences of classroom instruction, are empirically shown to support African American students’ learning of mathematics, and support the development of positive mathematical identities.  Secondly we suggest that it is necessary for research to specify how contexts of teaching can be organized to support teachers’ development of the aforementioned practices.    

This year’s NCTM Annual Meeting has the theme Linking Research and Practice.  A central motivation in this paper is evaluating the extent to which the existing research base is able to suggest forms of practice.  We conclude that a stronger link still needs to be made between research in practice and recommend that the next step in helping practitioners facing the challenge of supporting African American students is getting at the how, which entails unpacking the relationship between the nature of mathematics instruction and learning outcomes in settings that serve African American students.

Timeline

There will be a 15-minute overview presentation of the paper to the entire audience then two 15-minute roundtable rotations with small groups of participants.  We will discuss findings outlined in the paper as well as ways the field of mathematics education can generate research that better specifies and decomposes forms of practice that could then form the basis of teacher education development projects for both pre- and in-service teachers (so this session has the potential to address the priority area of professional learning).

References

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