How do I respond to the examples provided here -- as a teacher and a former student?
In reading this article and reflecting on my experience as a learner, a few things come to mind.
First of all, I trusted what the textbook said, depending on the language used. For example, considering the examples offered in the article about the length of a femur of a man or the image of the Vesuvius-like man and the equation/measurement offered, I would have taken that as true. Done. I may have even stashed that tidbit away for playing Jeopardy! later. What I cannot say that I did, even if I took the information as true, was put too much weight on it. I guess what I mean by that is that I didn't really evaluate the claims that the textbook made -- especially when it came to word problems or questions with a context. They were 'just' math problems. What I did do was think that the textbook's job was to help me learn math, so the numbers, situations, etc. were way more contrived so that I was forced to do practice a particular concept. So, in that regard, the textbook did not really strike me as a socially embedded educational artifact. I do recall looking at old textbooks from teachers' classrooms. I think we found it more amusing to look at how the kids in them dressed or the technology that was referenced.
Secondly, which is a mild consequence of the point above, maybe a lot of the textbook didn't strike me as odd because I did participate in the dominant culture. I identified with it. I might have even found it odd that someone in the text was named Jamal. I didn't know anyone by that name. I almost felt like the writers were trying 'too' hard to be inclusive by only changing the names of people. Nonetheless, that may be an issue for me and could indicate that I was situated where the textbook was situated.
As a teacher candidate, I recognise that these questions are written by people who are situated and may be part of the dominant voice, and that they may have inherited their views of textbook writing from what they themselves were exposed to as students/teachers. So, I take textbooks now as little more than someone writing a situation not for the sake of sharing information, but rather for the sake of doing math. The real world just happens to be there.
What are my thoughts about the reasons for using/not using textbooks, and the changing role of math textbooks in schools?
I have mixed feelings about using textbooks. In one respect, textbooks offer an all-in-one response to the curriculum. All of one's potential resources could be there. This might be a limited view, however. Teaching to the textbook has long been criticised by curriculum administrators (While I think it's true, I do not have a lot of support for that statement. That was always a potential criticism of math teachers by NSW authorities during registration/auditing time.) But that is also considering that resource as a common one can really be a benefit too. Often times textbook developers do have experience teaching and have tried to make sense of what they feel people should learn and what the local curriculum expects. It also means that teachers are not sourcing every single resource.
Restricting oneself to a textbook is just that: restricting. That is why I feel it's important to look outside of the text. Not just to other texts, but to anything where a person has to (or can!) use math to interpret something about the world. So, I feel that this is more the role of a textbook now: a support or starting place.
