Striving Toward Transformational Resistance: Youth Participatory Action Research in the Mathematics Classroom

Abstract

In this article, the author contributes to the growing body of scholarship on critical mathematics pedagogy. In particular, the author advances this scholarship by outlining how critical pedagogy in the mathematics classroom can support students to engage in transformational resistance. Using a critical practitioner research approach, the author retells (some of) her experiences as a high school mathematics teacher of ninth-grade Latin@ students in an Algebra I classroom. Beginning the course with activities to build a beloved community and connecting mathematics with social justice issues, the author strived to facilitate a learning space that supported transformational resistance. Through a culminating youth participatory action research project, students developed a critique of societal oppression, a motivation for social justice, and critical mathematical literacy.