Thesis defense Emmanuel Vergnol

Emmanuel Vergnol will defend his thesis on September 10, 2021, at 2:00 p.m. at the Faculty of Education (2 Place Marcel Godechot, 34000 Montpellier) in room A109 (NB: university rules regarding the health crisis require the presentation of a health pass to attend the defense and reception).

Thesis title:Speech therapy treatment for academic difficulties in mathematics

The jury is composed of
Ms. Floriane WOZNIAK, thesis supervisor
Ms. Caroline LADAGE, rapporteur
Ms. Claire MARGOLINAS, rapporteur
Mr. Hamid CHAACHOUA, jury president
Mr. Thomas HAUSBERGER, examiner
Ms. Anne-Marie RINALDI, examiner.

Thesis summary:

The purpose of this thesis, which draws on anthropological theory of teaching, is to study the praxeologies of speech therapists in France when they treat individuals with recurrent learning difficulties in mathematics. The first part presents the context of French society that leads to the medicalization of academic failure (Morel, 2014). It discusses the definitions of academic difficulty in mathematics and dyscalculia and presents the theoretical and methodological frameworks of the research. The second part addresses the history of the profession and how its subjugation to the world of medicine was constructed. The theoretical foundations of the profession with regard to the treatment of recurrent learning difficulties in mathematics are revealed by cross-referencing various data: initial and continuing training plans; questionnaires and interviews with students, trainers, and professionals; and a corpus of theses by students in speech therapy schools. The last two parts are based on naturalistic observation of speech therapy assessments and follow-up sessions on multiplication. The praxeological analysis of mathematical organizations in the sessions observed, contrasted with that of textbooks, identifies differences and similarities between speech therapy and school praxeologies. The mapping of task types based on the ostensive materials used represents and reveals the didactic challenge of speech therapy follow-up and the epistemic role of the material. Finally, the analysis of didactic organizations within the sessions leads to the definition of the speech therapy therapeutic relationship as a model for the situation. This relationship between the speech therapist and the student-patient, the terms of which are most often negotiated implicitly, is asymmetrical. It is based, on the one hand, on adherence to and trust in the therapist and, on the other hand, on a didactic contract established in the follow-up sessions based on entirely controlled environments that reduce the student-patient to the execution of repetitive tasks where manipulation is omnipresent.

Keywords: speech therapist, praxeology, mathematics, learning difficulties, multiplication, theory
anthropological approach to teaching.