ICEBERG Structure for Mathematics Learning Process I - Ethnomathematics Reflection

The Reflection of ICEBERG Approach of Learning Fractions in Junior High School: Teachers’ Reflection Prior Lesson Study Activities

 

Mathematics and language are two important elements in using of ethno mathematics.

The learning process never blames the students. Students’ learning problem always comes from the elder. The elder, in this case the teacher, should not blame students. The teacher has to make some innovations in learning process. If the teacher always blames the students, it means the teacher has no innovation in learning process. If the teacher still blames the students, it means the teacher forces students too much. If teacher forces students too much, then students will feel and believe every material the teacher gave is hard. They will see the materials or assignments as a burden. Every human being wants to be free. Then education must set every human free: free to think, free to give argumentations, free to get democracy, and free to live freely.

Hermeneutics of Life

What is Hermeneutics? Hermeneutics is a school of philosophy that can be defined as a theory of interpretation and the interpretation of a script by the experiment. The word is associated with the god Hermes, the god in Greek mythology who in charge of the news from the gods to man. This god is also the god of science, invention, eloquence, art of writing and the arts. Hermeneutics is generally used to interpret the Bible, especially in the critical study of the Bible.

The elements of Hermeneutics of Life are circle and line. Circle means that life will always sees the same thing over and over. Now is morning and we will see another morning in the next day. Circle represents something become ordinary or routine. Line means that life goes on straightly. We never feel again what it’s like March 13, 2013. We only have one day like that. August 17, 1945 was happened once in a lifetime.

  Human life is not divided into circle or straight line, but it is combination of both circle and straight line. This combination form new construction: a spiral, an endless spiral. The spiral starts when someone born, and it ends when someone die. The movement of spiral is the same movement of the Earth. The Earth revolutions to the sun, but it never in the same place twice, even though humans don’t feel it. The spiral is divided into three different spirals. 

 

This spiral is constant. This spiral represents ordinary or routine activities. A student always wakes up at 5 a.m. and takes a prayer. A father always works from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. A mathematics teacher always teaches mathematics. 

 

This spiral is not constant, but it becomes smaller. This spiral represents an attention to something. People give attention to something directly, more focus. For example, students study all lessons from elementary school to junior high school. After in high school, pupils in Indonesia will divides into some different classes: science, social, and language. After the division, pupils will focus to only one type of lesson, which will deliver them to the university. Some cases show some pupils choose different type of program from what they choose in high school. But at least there are efforts to make pupils focus on what they want.

 

This spiral is also not constant, it becomes bigger. The spiral represents knowledge people have. People have their prior knowledge to start or build new knowledge. By the time pass, knowledge becomes bigger and bigger. People learn all knowledge from nature. All knowledge comes from nature. If people don’t want to learn from nature, they will get lot lost. It also means that people don’t want to be an innovative person.

This life has two things: translating and translated. Example is a family’s life. Mother needs money to buy daily needs; father translates mother’s need by working hard to earn money. The last child is so annoying, he/she disturbs his/her brother/sister. It means he/she needs attention from his/her parents. Parents translates his/her needs by giving advises and explanations to not disturb his/her siblings. The problems will show after some quiet time where there is disability to translate and translated people needs. For another example, the last child is so annoying, he/she disturbs his/her brother/sister. It means he/she needs attention from his/her parents. But parents don’t give any attention or explanation why he/she cannot disturb his/her siblings. Parents have disability to translate what their child needs. It is getting worse if parents give punishment to their child for simple problem. If children need attention or explanation, parents should give it because attention is one of children  rights.

The same way comes to mathematics and language. Mathematics and language are alive, still alive until now. To learn about mathematics and language, people should open their eyes and open their mind, so they could translate and translated into mathematics and language. One requires in learning mathematics and language: sincere, with all your heart and soul. Sincere defeats intelegancy.