Thesis defense: The didactics of mathematics with instructional technology

Farouq Sessah Mensah´s thesis, The didactics of mathematics with instructional technology: An epistemological-ecological analysis of secondary mathematics teacher education in Ghana and Sweden, examines how pre-service teachers (PSTs) in Ghana and Sweden are prepared to integrate instructional technology into mathematics teaching.

Although both countries promote technology use through policy and curricular reforms, classroom uptake remains limited and uneven. Guided by the Anthropological Theory of the Didactic (ATD), the study employed a qualitative comparative case study design using course plans, video observations, and interviews with mathematics teacher educators (MTEs) and PSTs. Analysis followed an epistemological–ecological approach that combined ATD-informed deductive coding with inductive and abductive interpretation of institutional conditions.

Findings show a shared deficit in logos (didactic rationales) across contexts, where instructional technology use remained largely at the praxis (practice) level. As a result, didactic praxeologies were productive but theoretically thin, particularly at the pedagogy and didactic organisation levels of meta-didactic co-determination.

Teacher education in both settings emphasised representing and decomposing practice, with minimal opportunities for PSTs to approximate practice through rehearsal or reflective enactment. Ecological analysis revealed that instructional choices reflected pragmatic adaptation to local constraints—material and policy-based in Ghana, and epistemic and design-based in Sweden.

The thesis contributes theoretically by conceptualising instructional technology as a didactic object shaped by institutional transpositions and professional norms, and by introducing the notion of performative praxeologies to explain logos-thin practices as rational adaptations.

It also develops a dual-layered didactic reference model and a scale of meta-didactic co-determination that offer a comparative lens for analysing teacher education systems and informing reflective, theoretically grounded technology integration.

Articles included in the thesis:

I.    Mensah, F. S., Pansell, A., & Christiansen, I. M. (2024). The teaching of instructional technology implementation in mathematics teacher education research: A critical analysis from a praxeology-informed perspective. Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education, 24(4), 484-520.

II.    Mensah, F.S. (2024). Learning to teach mathematics with instructional technology: A praxeological analysis of a Swedish mathematics teacher education course. In T. Evans, O. Marmur, J. Hunter, G. Leach, & J. Jhagroo (Eds.). Proceedings of the 47th Conference of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education (Vol. 3, pp. 217-224). International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education

III.    Mensah, F.S. (Accepted). Modelling mathematics teaching with instructional technology in resource-constrained settings: An analysis of didactic structuring through the anthropological theory of the didactics. African Journal of Research in Mathematics, Science and Technology Education

IV.    Mensah, F.S. (Under review). Unlocking potential in the midst of constraints: A praxeological-ecological analysis of learning to teach mathematics with instructional technology in Ghana. Journal of Mathematics Teacher Education

V.    Mensah, F.S. (2025): Learning teaching mathematics with instructional technology: A praxeological analysis of a Ghanaian mathematics teacher education course. In O.N. Kwon & B. Kaur (Eds). Proceedings of the 9th ICMI-East Asia Regional Conference on Mathematics Education (Vol. 3, pp. 761-765). Korean Society of Mathematical Education