Towards an understanding of the shaping of research outcomes by contextual issues: reflections on the contributions of the ReMath project

Abstract

In this paper, we react to Lagrange and Kynigos’s contribution to this special issue, in which they present some of their experiences from two cross-case studies in the ReMath project (associated respectively with the use of two dynamic digital artefacts, Casyopée and Cruislet). They described how the project, which involved teams from three different countries (France, Italy and Greece), working in different conditions and relying on different theoretical approaches, was structured in order to address the role played by contextual characteristics. We consider how the ReMath approach of using cross-studies, and especially the inclusion of a cross-analysis phase, served to identify particularities associated with designing and implementing mathematics learning scenarios using digital tools. In their discussion of the process of re-contextualising, one of the factors which appears to have been particularly influential in shaping research activities was theoretical framework and they show how this factor both influences and is influenced by institutional and cultural characteristics. To further explore some of the other important contextual factors they pinpoint, such as the role and engagement of teachers, student characteristics and issues related to the empirical settings, we reflect upon the processes of re-contextualisation that we could identify in our own research.