External Event
Thursday, 9th Jul 2026 — Friday, 10th Jul 2026
V205, Mathematics Building
Dr Henry Fowler
(Navajo Technical University)
Weaving Mathematics: Navajo Ethnomathematics Through Kinship and the Batten Stick
This presentation demonstrates how Diné (Navajo) cultural knowledge provides authentic contexts for teaching mathematics. The Diné kinship system teaches relationships long before students encounter formal mathematics. Identifying parents, grandparents, and clans develops recursive reasoning modeled through binary trees, exponential growth (2 to the nth power), graph theory, geometric series, and algorithmic thinking. Participants will also explore the traditional batten stick (Beeníłʼíníłtłish), a Navajo weaving tool used diagonally across the warp to create a geometric grid for finding midpoints, symmetry, proportional reasoning, and spatial visualization, illustrating Indigenous mathematics as a living system of mathematical knowledge.