Unlocking potential in the midst of constraints

A praxeological–ecological analysis of meta-didactical practices in mathematics teacher education in Ghana

Bibliographic Data

ID22422650
AuthorsFarouq Sessah Mensah (0000-0002-5437-6199, Stockholm University, corresponding author)
Year2026
Publication date2026-07-08
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Mathematics Teacher Education (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1386-4416 • E-ISSN: 1573-1820
PublisherSpringer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1007/s10857-026-09769-8
OpenAlexW7167671567
LanguageEN
References cited43

Calls for integrating instructional technology into mathematics education often assume ideal classroom conditions that rarely exist in Global South contexts. Such assumptions overlook the complex realities faced by educators who must adapt global pedagogical visions to resource-constrained and structurally fragile ecologies. In response to this disconnect, this study examines how mathematics teacher educators (MTEs) in Ghana support pre-service teachers (PSTs) in the didactics of mathematics, integrating instructional technology amid systemic constraints. Grounded in the Meta-Didactical Transposition model, the study adopts a praxeological–ecological perspective to analyse the meta-didactical praxeologies through which didactic practices are taught in teacher education. The analysis traces how type of tasks, techniques, and justificatory discourses are organised across pre-didactic, didactic, and post-didactic phases, and how these are conditioned by material, institutional, and policy ecologies. Drawing on course plans, national and institutional policy documents, and interviews with MTEs, the analysis reveals a consistent privileging of performative and assessable meta-didactical praxeologies, oriented toward visible artefact production and lesson demonstration, while the logos dimension, particularly explicit theoretical justification, remains weakly transposed as an object of learning. Rather than interpreting this pattern through a deficit lens, the study conceptualises these configurations as ecologically rational adaptations to large class sizes, infrastructural scarcity, assessment regimes, and PSTs’ limited prior exposure to instructional technology. However, these adaptations also generate praxeological discontinuities, particularly through the marginalisation of logos-rich meta-didactical work, which constrains PSTs’ opportunities to develop theoretically grounded didactic reasoning about instructional technology integration. Foregrounding the situated agency of MTEs, the study reframes instructional technology integration as meta-didactical translation under constraint rather than as failed implementation. It concludes by calling for teacher education policies and professional development initiatives that support praxeological coherence and the explicit transposition of justificatory discourse, enabling ecologically responsive yet conceptually grounded engagement with instructional technology-integrated mathematics teaching.

Foregrounding · Grounded theory · Performative utterance · Philosophy of education · Situated · Teacher education · Teaching method · Vision · Educational Theory and Curriculum Studies · Mathematics Education and Teaching Techniques · Science Education and Pedagogy

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