Past Plenaries and Panels

Links to recorded plenaries when available

2024 Auckland (PME 47)

2023 Haifa (PME 46)

  • Abraham Arcavi – Let’s talk history…
  • Alf Coles – Teaching in the new climatic regime: Steps to a socio-ecology of mathematics education
  • Patricio Felmer – Implementation of collaborative problem solving: Experiences in Chile
  • Paola Valero – Mathematical subjectivation: Death sentence or chances for a terrestrial life?
  • Plenary Panel: Rina Zazkis – Pat Herbst, Gabriele Kaiser, Despina Potari, David Wagner – A manuscript’s relationship to global sustainability should be a criterion in determining its acceptance for a mathematics education journal.

2022 Alicante (PME 45)

2021 Khon Kaen, virtually hosted in Israel (PME44)

  • David Wagner – Gatekeeping in mathematics education
  • Michal Tabach – Competencies for teaching mathematics in the digital era: Are we ready to characterize them?
  • Berinderjeet Kaur – The enacted school mathematics curriculum – Mastery learning in Singapore secondary schools
  • Roberto Araya – What mathematical thinking skills will our citizens need in 20 more years to function effectively in a SuperSmart society?
  • Plenary Panel: Keith Jones, Hamsa Venkat, Anna Baccaglini-Frank, Lew Hee-Chan, Oi-Lam Ng – The 4th industrial revolution will transform / disrupt the teaching and learning of mathematics

2020 Khon Kaen, Virtual meeting (no full conference, due to Corona pandemic)

  • Marcelo Borba – Future of mathematics education post-Covid-19: Digital technology, critical education and epistemology

2019 Pretoria (PME43)

  • Sizwe Mabizela – Mathematics and mathematicsal literacy: Gains and losses
  • Núria Planas – Transition zones in mathematics education research for the development of language as a resource
  • Ravi Subramaniam – Representational coherence in instruction as a means of enhancing students’ access to mathematics
  • Peter Liljedahl – Institutional norms: The assumed, the actual, and the possible
  • Plenary Panel: Judit Moschkovich – Mercy Kazima, Robyn Jorgensen, Yeping Li, Hee-jeong Kim – What is proven to work (according to international comparative studies) in successful countries should be implemented in other countries

2018 Umeå (PME42)

  • Mogens Niss – The very multi-faceted nature of mathematics education research
  • Nathalie Sinclair – An aesthetic turn in mathematics education
  • Kim Beswick – Systems perspectives on mathematics teachers’ beliefs: Illustrations from beliefs about students
  • Markku Hannula – From anxiety to engagement: History and future of research on mathematics-related affect
  • Plenary Panel: Márcia Pinto – Francesca Morselli, Wee Tiong Seah, Wim Van Dooren, Qiaoping Zhang – Chicken-egg cycles: What needs to come first, high performance or positive affective variables regarding mathematics?

2017 Singapore (PME41)

  • Olive Chapman – Mathematics teachers’ perspective of turning points in their teaching
  • David Clarke – Using cross-cultural comparison to interrogate the logic of classroom research in mathematics education
  • Jarmila Novotná – Problem solving through heuristic strategies as a way to make all pupils engage
  • Y C Tay – Mathematical thinking in computing
  • Plenary Panel: Ruhama Even – Mike Askew, Roberta Hunter, Leong Yew Hoong, Guri A. Nortvedt – Should research inform practice?

2016 Szeged, Hungary (PME40)

  • Roza Leikin – Interplay between creativity and expertise in teaching and learning of mathematics
  • Alan Schoenfeld – Solving the problem of powerful instruction
  • Masataka Koyama – Dynamic cycle driven by the dialectic cycle of two complementary reflections in lesson study on school mathematics
  • Barbara Jaworski – How to solve it: with a focus on problems in mathematics teaching
  • Plenary Panel: Helen Chick – Miriam Amit, Szilard Andras, Markku Hannula, Berinderjeet Kaur – Is problem solving teachable?

2015 Hobart, Tasmania (PME39)

  • Lynn English – STEM: Challenges and opportunities for mathematics education
  • Oh Nam Kwon – How to teach without teaching: An inquiry-oriented approach in tertiary education
  • Johan Lithner – Learning mathematics by imitative and creative reasoning
  • Martin Simon – Learning through activity: Analyzing and promoting mathematics conceptual learning
  • Plenary Panel: Helen Forgasz – Gilah Leder, Kai-Lin Yang, Jinfa Cai, David Reid – Grouping students by attainment is essential for their learning of mathematics

2014 Vancouver, Canada (PME38)

  • George Hart – Informal education that teaches “Math is Cool!”
  • Orit Zaslavsky – Thinking with and through examples
  • Gabriele Kaiser – Professional knowledge of (prospective) mathematics teachers – its structure and development
  • Luis Radford – On teachers and students: an ethical cultural-historical perspective
  • Plenary Panel: Mamokgethi Setati Phakeng, David Wagner, Paola Valero, Margaret Walshaw, Anjum Halai – The calculus of social change – mathematics at the cutting edge

2013 Kiel, Germany (PME37)

  • Kristina Reiss – You can’t teach an old dog new tricks? Developing mathematical competence over the life span.
  • Doug Clarke – Understanding, assessing and developing children’s mathematical thinking: Task-based interviews as powerful tools for teacher professional learning
  • Iddo Gal – Mathematical skills beyond the school years: A view from adult skills surveys and adult learning
  • João Filipe Matos – Trends and opportunities for research methodologies within the PME community
  • Plenary Panel: Peter Liljedahl, Marcelo Borba, Andualem Tamiru Gebremichael, Heidi Krzywacki, Gaye Williams – Education of Young Mathematics Education Researchers

2012 Taipei, Taiwan (PME36)

  • Wann-Sheng Horng – Narrative, Discourse and Mathematics Education: An Historian’s Perspective
  • Maria Alessandra Mariotti – ICTs as Opportunities for Teaching-learning in a Mathematics Classroom: The Semiotic Potential of Artefacts
  • Merrilyn Goos – Creating Opportunities to Learn in Mathematics Education: A Sociocultural Journey
  • Marta Civil – Opportunities to Learn in Mathematics Education: Insights from Research with “Non-dominant”        Communities
  • Plenary Panel: Lulu Healy, Richard Barwell, Karin Brodie, K. Subramaniam, Jean-Baptiste Lagrange – Opportunities to Learn in Mathematics Education

2011 Ankara, Turkey (PME35)

  • Janet Ainley – Developing Purposeful Mathematical Thinking: A Curious Tale of Apple Trees
  • Ali Doğanaksoy – Morals of an Anecdote as Starting Point of a Lecture in Mathematics
  • Brian Doig – Children’s Informal Reasoning: Concerns and Contradictions
  • Konrad Krainer – Teachers as Stakeholders in Mathematics Education Research
  • Plenary Panel: Gabriele Kaiser, Uri Leron, Frederick K.S. Leung, Carolyn Maher – Supporting the Development of Mathematical Thinking

2010 Belo Horizonte, Brazil (PME34)

  • Ubiratan d’Ambrosio – From EA, through Pythagoras, to Avatar: Different settings for mathematics
  • Brent Davis – Concept studies: Designing settings for teachers’ disciplinary knowledge
  • Fou-Lai Lin –  Mathematical tasks designing for different learning settings
  • João Filipe Matos – Towards a learning framework in mathematics: Taking participation and as key concept
  • Anne Watson – Locating the spine of mathematics teaching
  • Plenary Panel: Jeff Evans, Silvia Alatorre, Henk van der Kooij, Despina Potari, Andrew Noyes – Mathematics in different settings

2009 Thessaloniki, Greece (PME33)

  • Andreas Demetriou – The architecture and development of mathematical thought
  • Paul Ernest – What is first philosophy in mathematics educaion?
  • Shlomo Vinner (reactor to P. Ernst’s plenary) – Mathematics education and values
  • Candia Morgan – Understanding practices in mathematics education: structure and text
  • Rudolf Sträßer – Instruments for learning and teaching mathematics  – an attempt to theorize about the role of textbooks, computers and other artefacts to teach and learn mathematics
  • Plenary Panel: David Clarke, Deborah Loewenberg Ball, João Pedro da Ponte, Minoru Ohtani, Barbara Jaworski – Theoretical perspectives in mathematics teachers’ education

2008 Morelia, Mexico (PME32 & PME NA XXX)

  • Jens Høyrup – The tortuous ways toward a new understanding of algebra in the Italian Abbacus school (14th–16th centuries)
  • Aurora Gallardo – Historical epistemological analysis in mathematical education: Negative numbers and the nothingness
  • Patrick W. Thompson – Conceptual analysis of mathematical ideas: Some spadework at the foundation of mathematics education
  • Ruhama Even – Offering mathematics to learners in different classes of the same teacher
  • Plenary Panel: Kathleen Hart, Michèle Artigue, Marj Horne – PME history: Cognitive theories and school practices

2007 Seoul, Korea (PME31)

  • Chris Breen – On humanistic mathematics education: A personal coming of age?
  • Michael Otte – Certainty, explanation and creativity in mathematics.
  • Anna Sierpinska – I need the teacher to tell me if I am right or wrong.
  • Jeong-Ho Woo – School mathematics and cultivation of min
  • Plenary Panel: Koeno Gravemeijer, Cristina Frade, Willi Dörfler, Martin A.Simon, Masataka Koyama – School mathematics for humanity education

2006 Prague, Czech Republic (PME30)

  • Guy Brousseau – Mathematics, didactical engineering and observation.
  • Norma Presmeg – A semiotic view of the role of imagery and inscriptions in mathematics teaching and learning.
  • Pessia Tsamir & Dina Tirosh – PME 1 to 30: Summing up and looking ahead: A personal perspective on infinite sets.
  • Stanislav Stech – School mathematics as a developmental activity
  • Plenary Panel: Romulo Lins, Zahra Gooya, Susie Groves, Konrad Krainer – Mathematics in the centre

2005 Melbourne, Australia (PME29)

  • Fou-Lai Lin – Modeling student’s learning on mathematical proof and refutation
  • Kaye Stacey – Traveling the road to expertise: A longitudinal study of learning
  • Anna Sfard & Anna Prusak – Identity that makes a difference: Substantial learning as closing the gap between actual and designated identities
  • Peter Reimann – Co-constructing artifacts and knowledge in net based teams: Implications for the design of collaborative learning environments
  • Plenary Panel: Graham Jones, Julian Williams, Yoshinori Shimizu, Michael Neubrand, Carolyn Kieran – What do studies like PISA mean to the mathematics education community?

2004 Bergen, Norway (PME28)

  • Kirsti Klette, respondent Inger Wistedt – Classroom business same as usual? (What) do researches and policy makers learn from classroom studies?
  • Barbara Jaworski, respondent Chris Breen – Grappling with complexity: Co-learning in inquiry communities in mathematics teaching development
  • Arthur B. Powell, respondent Paola Valero – The diversity backlash and the mathematical agency of students of color
  • Rina Hershkowitz – From diversity to inclusion and back: A lens on learning
  • Plenary Panel: Peter Gates, Marit Johnsen-Hoines, Madalena Pinto Santos, Renuka Vithal – “Suffer Little Children” Tensions, conflicts and opportunities in working for inclusion and diversity in mathematics education.

2003 Honolulu, Hawai’i (PME27)

  • Jo Boaler – Creating useful knowledge for teaching: Lessons learned from studies of student learning
  • Barbara Dougherty & Joseph Zilliox – Voyaging from theory to practice in teaching and learning
  • Toshiakira Fujii – Probing students’ understanding of variables through cognitive conflict: Is the concept of a variable so difficult for students to understand?
  • Nicolina Antonia Malara – The dialectics between theory and practice: Theoretical issues and classroom episodes.
  • Nainoa Thompson – Navigating between theory and practice
  • Plenary Panel: Jarmila Novotná, Agatha Lebethe, Gershon Rosen, Vicki Zack – Teachers who navigate between research and their practice

2002 Norwich, United Kingdom (PME26)

  • Margaret Brown – Researching primary numeracy
  • Herbert P. Ginsburg – Little children, big mathematics: Doing, learning and teaching in the preschool
  • Carolyn Maher – How students structure their own investigations and educate us: What we’ve learned from a fourteen year study
  • Richard Noss – Mathematical epistemologies at work
  • Lieven Verschaffel -Taking the modeling approach to word problems seriously: promises and pitfalls
  • Plenary Panel: João Filipe Matos, Suzie Groves, Joop van Dormolen, Rosetta Zan – Learning from learners

2001 Utrecht, The Netherlands (PME 25)

  • Gilah Leder – Pathways in mathematics towards equity: A 25 year journey
  • Jan De Lange – The P in PME: progres and problems in mathematics education
  • Martin Hughes – Linking home and school mathematics
  • Paulo Abrantes – Revisiting goals and the nature of mathematics for all in the context of a national curriculum
  • Erna Yackel – Explanation, justification and argumentation in mathematics classrooms
  • Plenary Panel: Catherine Sackur, Alan Bell, Andrea Peter-Koop, Fred Goffree, Jorge Tarcisio Da Roca-Falcão – 25 years of PME: Past and future challenges

2000 Hiroshima, Japan (PME 24)

  • Rafael Núñez – Mathematical Idea Analysis: What Embodied Cognitive Science Can Say About the Human Nature of  Mathematics
  • Raymond Duval – Basic issues for research in mathematical learning
  • Ferdinando Arzarello – Inside and outside: Spaces, times and language in proof production
  • Nobuhiko Nohda – Mathematical teaching and learning by ‘Open approach method’
  • Plenary Panel: Peter Sullivan, Paolo Boero, Margaret Brown, Fou-Lai Lin – Teaching and learning in school mathematics: What has research told us about mathematics teaching and learning?

1999 Haifa, Israel (PME 23)

  • Kenneth Ruthven – Constructing a calculator-aware number curriculum: The challenges of systematic design and systemic reform
  • Rina Hershkowitz – Where in shared knowledge is the individual knowledge hidden?
  • Heinz Steinbring – Reconstructing the mathematical in social discourse – aspects of an epistemology-based interaction research
  • David Chillag – Mathematics education from mathematicians’ perspectives
  • Geoffrey Saxe – Professional development, classroom practices, and students’ mathematics learning: A cultural perspective
  • Plenary Panel: Anna Sfard, P. Nesher, Stephen Lerman, E. Forman – Doing research in time of paradigm wars

1998 Stellenbosch, South Africa (PME 22)

  • Stephen Lerman – A moment in the zoom of a lens: Towards a discursive psychology of mathematics teaching and learning
  • Paul Cobb – Analyzing the mathematical learning of the classroom community: The case of statistical data analysis
  • Cyril Juilie – The production of artefacts as goal for school mathematics?
  • Jill Adler – Resources as a verb: recontextualising resources in and for school mathematics
  • Michael Apple – Markets and standards: The politics of education in a conservative age
  • Plenary Panel: Chris Breen, Barbara Jaworski, Konrad Krainer, Lena Licón Khisty – Diversity and change in mathematics teacher education

1997 Lahti, Finland (PME 21)

  • Sari Levänen – Neuromagnetic approach in cognitive neuroscience
  • Judith Anne Mousley &  Peter Sullivan – Dilemmas in the professional education of mathematics teachers
  • Ole Björkqvist – Some psychological issues in the assessment of mathematical performance
  • Shlomo Vinner – From intuition to inhibition – mathematics, education and other endangered species
  • Andrea A. Di Sessa – Open toolsets: New ends and new means in learning mathematics and science with computers
  • Plenary Panel: Kathryn Crawford, Jaine Ainley, N. Balacheff, Jim Kaput – Cognition, technology and change

1996 Valencia, Spain (PME 20)

  • David Pimm – Modern Times: The symbolic surfaces of language, mathematics and art
  • Gila Hanna – The On-going Value of Proof
  • Angel Gutiérrez – Visualization in 3-Dimensional Geometry: In search of a framework
  • Plenary Panel: Teresina Nunes, Colette Laborde, Terasina Nunes, Luis Puig – Language in mathematics education

1995 Recife, Brazil (PME 19)

  • Jere Confrey – Student Voice in Examining ‘Splitting’ as an Approach to ratio, Proportions and Fractions
  • David O. Tall  – Cognitive Growth in Elementary and Advanced Mathematical Thinking
  • Analúcia Dias Schliemann – Some Concerns about Bringing Everyday Mathematics to Mathematics Education
  • Vera John-Steiner – Spontaneous and Scientific Conceptions in Mathematics: A Vygotskian Approach
  • Plenary Panel: Ricardo Nemirovsky, Maria Bartolino Bussi, Luciano Meira, Gérard Vergnaud – Analyses of video extract

1994 Lisbon, Portugal (PME 18)

  • Niels Jahnke – The historical dimension of mathematics understanding – Objectifying the subjective
  • Carolyn Kieran – A functional approach to the introduction of algebra: some Pros and Cons
  • João Pedro Da Ponte – Mathematics Teachers’ Professional Knowledge
  • John Mason – Researching from the Inside in Mathematics Education: Locating an I-you relationship
  • Plenary Panel: Paul Ernest, Lucia Grugnetti, Teresa Rojano, Anna Sfard, Eduardo Veloso – History of mathematics

1993 Tsukuba, Japan (PME 17)

  • Edward A. Silver – On Mathematical Problem Posing
  • Gilah Leder – Reconciling affective and cognitive aspects of mathematics learning: reality or a pious hope
  • Ichei Hirabayashi – Practical requirements to psychological research in mathematics education
  • Kathleen Hart – Confidence in Success
  • Plenary Panel: Fou Lai Lin, C. Comiti, N. Nohda, T. Schroeder, Dina Tirosh – How to link affective and cognitive aspects

1992 Durham, USA (PME 16)

  • Michèle Artigue – The importance and limits of epistemological work in didactics
  • Celia Hoyles – Illuminations and Reflections – Teachers, methodologies and mathematics
  • Gerald A. Goldin – On developing a unified model for the psychology of mathematical learning and problem solving
  • Gontran J. Ervynck – Mathematics as a Foreign Language
  • Plenary Panel: Tommy Dreyfus, K. Clements, John Mason, B. Parzysz, Norma Presmeg – Visualization and imagistic thinking

1991 Assisi, Italy (PME 15)

  • Mariolina Bartolini Bussi – Social Interaction and Mathematical Knowledge
  • Willibald Dörfler – Meaning: image schemata protocols
  • Tommy P. Dreyfus – On the status of visual reasoning in mathematics and mathematics education
  • Tatiana Gabay – The activity theory of learning and mathematics education in the USSR

1990 Oaxtepex, Mexico (PME 14)

  • Nicolas Balacheff – Beyond a psychological approach of the psychology of mathematics education
  • Eugenio Filloy – Yague PME Algebra research: A working perspective
  • Robert B. Davis – The knowledge of cats: Epistemological foundations of mathematics education
  • Plenary Symposium: Alan Bishop – Responsibilities of the PME research community

1989 Paris, France (PME 13)

  • Jean Dhombres – L’atelier obscur – transformations accélérées de l’education scientifique pendant la Révolution Française
  • Thomas Carpenter & Elizabeth Fennema – Building on the knowledge of students and teachers
  • Paolo Boero – Mathematical Literacy for all: experiences and problems
  • Colette Laborde – Hardiesse et raison des recherches Française en didactiques des mathématiques

1988 Veszprem, Hungary (PME 12)

  • Terezinha Nunes – Street Mathematics and School Mathematics
  • Gustav Habermann & Sándor Klein – A look at the affective side of mathematics learning in Hungarian Secondary Schools
  • Leen Streefland – Reconstructive Learning
  • Pearla Nesher – Beyond Constructivism: Learning mathematics at school

1987 Montreal, Canada (PME 11)

  • David Wheeler – The world of mathematics: Dream, myth or reality?
  • Gérard Vergnaud – About Constructivism
  • Hermine Sinclair – Constructivism and the Psychology of Mathematics
  • Jeremy Kilpatrick – What Constructivism might be in Mathematics Education
  • Plenary Panel: Nicolas Herscovics, David Wheeler, Gérard Vergnaud, Hermine Sinclair, Jeremy Kilpatrick  – Constructivism

1986 London, United Kingdom (PME 10)

  • Seymour Papert – Beyond the Cognitive: the Other Face of Mathematics
  • Christine Keitel – Cultural Perspectives and Presuppositions in Psychology of Mathematics Education
  • Xue-Shi Bian – Pupils’ Experience of Learning Mathematics
  • Kevin Francis Collis – Learning Intellectual Skills and School Mathematics: A Psychological Viewpoint
  • Michael Stubbs – Language Meaning and Logic: a case study of some children’s langauge

1985 Noordwijkerhout, The Netherlands (PME 9)

  • Alan Bishop -The Social Psychology of Mathematics Education
  • Hassler Whitney – Taking Responsibility in School Mathematics Education
  • Fred Goffree & Adri Treffers -Rational Analysis of Realistic Mathematics Education – the Wiskobas Program
  • Richard Lesh – Conceptual Analysis of Mathematical Ideas and Problem Solving Processes
  • Claude Gaulin – The Need of Emphasizing Various Graphical Representations of 3-Dimensional Shapes and Relations
  • Régine Douadi – The Interplay between Different Settings. Tool-Object Dialectic in the Extension of Mathematical Ability – Examples from Elementary School Teaching
  • Frederik Van der Blij – Mathematics and the Visual Arts

1984 Sydney, Australia (PME 8)

  • Graham A. Jones – Research in Mathematics Education in Australia – a brief encounter
  • Gérard Vergnaud – Problem Solving and Symbolism in the Development of Mathematical Concepts
  • Tadasu Kawaguchi – On some tendencies in Mathematics Education Research in Japan with special reference to psychological aspects

1983 Shoresh, Israel (PME 7)

  • David Wheeler – Some problems that research in mathematics education should address
  • Hans Freudenthal – Heuristics a Singular or a Plural?
  • Kathleen Hart – Tell me what you are doing – Discussions with Teachers and Children
  • Efraim Fischbein – Role of Implicit Models in Solving Elementary Arithmetical Problems

1982 Antwerpen, Belgium (PME 6)

  • Willem Kuyk – A Neuropsychodynamical Theory of Mathematics Learning
  • George Papy – The Need for an Epistemological Understanding of Mathematics.

1981 Grenoble, France (PME 5)

  • Gérard Vergnaud – Quelques Orientation Théoretiques et Méthodologiques des Recherches Française en Didactique des Mathématique
  • Richard R. Skemp – What is a Good Environment for the Intelligent Learning of Mathematics? Do Schools Provide it? Can they?
  • Thomas Romberg – Towards a Research Consensus in some Problem Areas in the Learning and Teaching of Mathematics
  • Jeremy Kilpatrick – Research on Mathematical Learning and Thinking in the United States