The ICMI Representative for France is the President of the Commission Française pour l’Enseignement des Mathématiques (CFEM), the French ICMI sub-commission. CFEM is composed of representatives of all the French entities which have to do with the teaching of mathematics, its board is made up of representatives of these adhering entities, including the mathematical societies. One can consult information on the national presentation at ICME-14.
The Association pour la Recherche en Didactique des Mathématiques (ARDM) represents all French researchers and several from other countries. It holds a national research seminar (two days three times per year, once a year with an afternoon jointly with CFEM) (the proceedings are accessible here), a Summer School of research (every second year), and a young researchers’ event once a year. ARDM is also responsible for an open access space for publications of French researchers and for an international research journal published in French, English and Spanish: Recherche en Didactique des Mathématiques (RDM) that also has an associated collection of monographs. RDM is now published open access on the platform Episciences.
The Association of Mathematics Teachers (APMEP) is also an important vector of teachers’ professional development, with regular publications and an annual national meeting.
Researchers in didactics of mathematics are working in university structures, either embedded in mathematics or educational sciences departments and very often connected to IREMs (see below). There are several PhD programs in various universities. See https://ardm.eu/recherche-en-d-d-m/laboratoires-ed-masters/ for more information.
The Instituts de Recherche sur l’Enseignement des Mathématiques (IREM) were created in the late 1960s and are spread all over the country. They host several research groups including mathematicians, educators, researchers and teachers. They have some local publications and also some regular journals aimed at teachers but with good insights on research. Grand N specifically on primary education, Petit x on secondary education and Repères IREM, for all educational levels.
Apart from RDM , Petit x, Grand N and Repères IREM (see above), there is also a research journal published in France: The Annales de Didactique et de Sciences Cognitives that publishes papers in French, English and Spanish and a bilingual (French/English) journal addressed to tertiary teachers: Epidemes, specializing in the dissemination of research results on university mathematics.
Teachers’ initial training in France is now organized in a component of the university system called the Institut National Supérieur du Professorat et de l’Éducation (INSPE). Students enter the INSPE with a Bachelor degree and choose either primary education (teaching all disciplines) or one or two specific subjects for secondary education. The 2-year training in the INSPE brings them to the Master level, and they also have to pass a competitive exam that entitles them to have a job as a teacher. There is only one exam for primary education, while there are three for secondary education: one for professional education and two for general secondary education (CAPES and Agrégation). Primary school teachers are generalists, while secondary teachers specialize in one subject, or two in professional education.
Several trainers in the INSPE hold a researcher/teacher position in the university and have a doctorate in didactics of mathematics, when it comes to training in mathematics education. Some educators are secondary or primary school teachers with a part time contract at a university and they are often engaged in research groups in IREMs or research teams at university.
More information can be found about:
- status June 2025-