Date of Award
8-2026
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
College/School
College for Education and Engaged Learning
Department/Program
Teacher Education and Teacher Development
Thesis Sponsor/Dissertation Chair/Project Chair
Mayida Zaal
Committee Member
Douglas Larkin
Committee Member
Jeremy Price
Committee Member
Robert Q. Berry, III
Abstract
Persistent racialized inequities in mathematics education continue to marginalize Black and Brown students while also obscuring Black women teacher’s pedagogical knowledge, as reform efforts emphasize standards, accountability, and measurable achievement. This critical narrative study examined how five Black women K ̶ 6 public school mathematics teachers describe the ways their lived experiences influence classroom practices. Using a historicized ecological systems theory to frame a Black feminist thought methodology, this study employed life-history interviews with five Black women mathematics educators. Through a critical narrative approach, the Black women’s ecological system framework emerged as an integrated analytic lens to trace how history, power, and institutional constraints intersect with pedagogical agency across time. The findings revealed three themes: a) resisting and navigating oppressive educational systems; b) relational pedagogies of care, grace and empowerment; and c) culturally affirming pedagogies and counter-narratives. The participants described pedagogy as sociopolitical labor enacted within intertwined ecosystems to create access to mathematical meaning-making. Additionally, these five Black women teachers positioned instructional disruption, relational commitment, and cultural affirmation as deliberate responses to institutional conditions that often restrict Black and Brown students’ intellectual dignity. As such, this study offers an integrated theoretical framework that situates Black women teachers as knowledge producers and advances an ecological analysis of pedagogy. Implications call for teacher criticality within daily instruction, and structural reform in teacher preparation and accountability systems to sustain humanizing mathematics instruction and equitable educational conditions.
File Format
Recommended Citation
Tidwell, Stephenie J., "If You Know Our (Her)Story, You Might Understand Our Math Pedagogy: Understanding the Lived Experiences of Black Women Math Teachers" (2026). Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects. 1735.
https://digitalcommons.montclair.edu/etd/1735