Forming conjectures within a spreadsheet environment

This paper is concerned with the use of spreadsheets within mathematical investigational tasks. Considering the learning of both children and pre-service teaching students, it examines how mathematical phenomena can be seen as a function of the pedagogical media through which they are encountered. In particular, it shows how pedagogical apparatus influence patterns of social interaction, and how this interaction shapes the mathematical ideas that are engaged with. Notions of conjecture, along with the particular faculty of the spreadsheet setting, are considered with regard to the facilitation of mathematical thinking. Employing an interpretive perspective, a key focus is on how alternative pedagogical media and associated discursive networks influence the way that students form and test informal conjectures

Downscaling scenarios of future land use and land cover changes using a participatory approach: an application to mountain risk assessment in the Pyrenees (France)

International audienceBetter understanding the pathways through which future socioeconomic changes might influence land use and land cover changes (LULCCs) is a crucial step in accurately assessing the resilience of societies to mountain hazards. Participatory foresight involving local stakeholders may help building fine-scale LULCC scenarios that are consistent with the likely evolution of mountain communities. This paper develops a methodology that combines participatory approaches in downscaling socioeconomic scenarios with LULCC modelling to assess future changes in mountain hazards, applied to a case study located in the French Pyrenees. Four spatially explicit local scenarios are built each including a narrative, two future land cover maps up to 2040 and 2100, and a set of quantified LULCC. Scenarios are then used to identify areas likely to encounter land cover changes (deforestation, reforestation, and encroachment) prone to affect gravitational hazards. In order to demonstrate their interest for decision-making, future land cover maps are used as input to a landslide hazard assessment model. Results highlight that reforestation will continue to be a major trend in all scenarios and confirm that the approach improves the accuracy of landslide hazard computations. This validates the interest of developing fine-scale LULCC models that account for the local knowledge of stakeholders