Globally, young people are asking questions about social responsibility. California addresses this in the second draft of its updated mathematics framework, still unreleased as this article goes to press. It defines these questions as authentic, suggesting that classrooms "include, at times . . . contexts students can engage with as a way to…

As people with power in schools, teachers and administrators make instructional decisions that shape opportunities in classrooms for students to learn. Educators' words and actions, especially related to the treatment of students and their ideas, are foundational for creating equitable learning communities in our classrooms and schools. David…

This qualitative study examined the building of a beloved community in a seventh grade life science classroom while teaching and learning in a constricting institutional context (U.S. public school). Guided by a Critical Race Praxis for Educational Research lens (CRP-Ed), the findings demonstrated how building a beloved community while situated…

Traditional science instruction typically follows an initiation- response-evaluation format and privileges curriculum reflective of Western, male, white, middle-class values, and knowledge which sometimes tends to exclude Black and Latinx students. This qualitative instrumental case study explored how a White male seventh-grade science teacher in…

This article examines and critiques gap-based education policies that are based on statistical and reductive conceptualisations of success for First Nations students in Australia. The policy desire to achieve social justice underpinned by parity of outcomes across a range of life indicators (including standardised English literacy) between First…

Purpose: This paper aims to examine two teachers' beliefs and practices on teaching writing at an urban, high-performing middle school to determine: What discourses of writing are being taught in an urban, high-performing US public middle school? What factors prevent or enable particular discourses? Design/methodology/approach: Drawing on case…

This paper reports on initial findings from the Visible Maths Pedagogy research project, a collaboration between an academic researcher and two teacher researchers (the paper's authors). The aim of the project was to explore the effects of making pedagogy more visible on students' success in school mathematics. We adopted a Participatory Action…

This paper draws on Bakhtin's (1981) notions of discourse and ideological becoming to investigate how adolescents' experiences with young adult literature and other texts might inform their thinking around issues of social justice. We engaged in a number of activities with the young adolescent participants: thought maps, illustrations of poignant…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to challenge pre-service teachers' (PSTs) assumptions about youth readers, the researcher in this study invited a group of three seventh-grade students to attend a multicultural young adult (YA) literature class designed for PSTs at a large mid-western university. Design/methodology/approach: Using…

Gifted students have unique social-emotional needs that are amplified through their heightened sensitivities or overexcitabilities. Common traits that gifted students exhibit in addition to their social-emotional needs are similar to those needed for the optimal level of citizenship, the justice-oriented citizen. This qualitative study asked a…

This article sheds light on the elusive presence of race, racism, and Whiteness in Norwegian primary schools. Empirical examples from observations at six schools exemplify how race and racism appear as taboo concepts, but nonetheless play central roles in structuring conversations in the classroom. I argue that applying an affective theoretical…

While a clear rationale for the need to decolonise school geography curricula has been proposed, there are few examples of what this looks like in practice. Drawing on our professional practice in both a secondary school and a university setting, we outline two case studies of decolonising the curriculum that centre on promoting student agency.…

Human rights are necessary and compulsory for all people irrespective of language, religion, race, gender or sect. Learning about these rights begins within family and continues in school formally. Human rights education is necessary for values of human rights to pass from theory to practice. The rights given to people or groups with certain…

This article provides a practical illustration of how culturally sustaining pedagogy (CSP) and evidence-based practices (EBPs) can be integrated into a mathematics curriculum to address social justice issues. A vignette is provided to illustrate how a secondary teacher infused social justice education in a seventh-grade mathematics lesson through…

Several mathematicians, social scientists, and psychologists have written about the role that mathematics has played in disenfranchising traditionally marginalized groups. Mathematics educators who are concerned with equity and inclusion have been calling for mathematics curricula that place social justice at the center of mathematics teaching and…