How Spiderman Can Teach You Math: The Journey of Memes From Social Media to Mathematics Classrooms

Memes are humorous digital artifacts created by web users copying an image and overlaying a personal funny caption. They are virally shared in the web and represent an important part of the online discourse young learners are exposed to on a daily basis. The aim of this paper is to show how memes on mathematical subjects can inspire learning activities that harness the participatory and playful nature of these digital artifacts, connecting positive emotions, focal for learning achievement, to serious mathematical reasoning. The paper presents a collection of 3 examples taken from different learning scenarios: 1 from a spontaneous out-of-school learning environment and 2 from intentionally designed school experiences conducted with 6th- and 12th-grade students, all pivoting on the use of a popular meme based on a Spiderman cartoon. The analysis elicits the core properties of these experiences in order to show how they fit within the connected learning framework. I hope the outcome of this research can shed some light on how educators can leverage on students’ popular culture embodied in memes to foster interest-powered learning outcomes in mathematics.