Keynote speech

In 2013, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) published their first report on the complexity of skills needed for the 21st century, measured by an international assessment of adult competencies. Their report confirmed that numeracy skills are critical for success in the workplace, higher education, and community engagement. Unfortunately, in adult ESL programs, where family sustaining wages are a significant goal and many seek higher education, numeracy often receives less attention than literacy (Ciancone, 1996; Kantner, 2008). Building numeracy into an ESL curriculum requires buy-in from teachers and school leadership. In addition, many ESL teachers feel unprepared and uncomfortable with addressing mathematics (Elston, 2005). 

 

Heather will discuss the steps her team took to gain enthusiasm for math, including reframing the conversation from math to numeracy, elevating where numeracy already lived in the school’s curriculum, and creating school-wide numeracy challenges. In addition, she will explore what her school community learned about teaching math to adult ELLs including instructional techniques such as: connecting to prior knowledge in how we do math in everyday life, starting with pictorial representations before abstraction, prioritizing whole/part understanding, and honoring cultural differences and the many ways to arrive at the same solution (Bow Valley College, 2011; Ginsburg et al, 2011; Pierce & Walton, 2012; Maxwell, 2013). More than anything, knowing that the teacher can let go of the “right way” or the “right answer” can be liberating (Tout, 2016), because the journey is often more important than the destination! On that note, the journey of this endeavor has enriched the Carlos Rosario School institution and broadened thinking. Join Heather in an exploration of Making the Case for Math.