Mexico’s Indigenous teachers fight to preserve ancient cultures in math class
When Totonacú children in Mexico learn to count, they learn the numbers to count animals – one-two-three pigs, one-two-three chickens. Then they learn the numbers for counting wool. And earthen furrows. Those are different. And the numbers for grapes, and other things that grow in clusters? Different. And for round things? And long, straight things? Yep, different.
The Totonacú language has 71 different systems of counting, each for counting different things. Totonacú children have no trouble learning all 71, says Fanny Cruz Garcia, a Mixteco professor of culture and language at the Intercultural University of Puebla who is working with Indigenous teachers in Veracruz. But when those kids get to school, and they encounter the numbers in Spanish – uno, dos, tres, no matter what you’re counting – well, that seems alien. Then they start to learn math, with…
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