Commentary 3: Critical Dialogues to Promote Transformative Learning: A Commentary on Aguirre’s Case

The case study “Addressing Deficit Language in Math Methods: Providing Critical Feedback to Preservice Teachers” is an opportunity for math educators to examine the possibilities to promote transformative learning within their courses. The dilemma addresses how to support teachers in recognizing deficit discourses and alter their characterizations to a more strength-based resource orientation through critical feedback.

I can relate to this case study because I have taught elementary mathematics methods for 6 years in a large public state university. I have been the instructor of this course in the undergraduate elementary program and in a 2-year graduate program in which interns serve as instructional assistants in an elementary school. In the last revision of this course I included as a major assignment a modification of the Mathematics Learning Case Study (MLC) developed by the National Science Foundation-funded TEACH MATH (Teachers Empowered to Advance Change in Mathematics) project1, as the author in the case study did. As an uncomfortable admission, I must say I have held and continue to identify deficit discourses and practices in me as an individual and mathematics educator. I sometimes experience fear of the other, cultural ignorance, ambivalence, or a preference for those who I initially perceive are “like me.” It is this awareness that guides my equity framework as well as my responses to the students in my course and to this case study.