Aims
Around the world, a considerable number of primary and secondary teachers are involved in teaching mathematics to students with special educational needs ("SEN-S") and a fair proportion of teacher educators are involved in preparing these teachers. But both, teachers and educators, very often are working under somewhat isolated circumstances. They are isolated geographically it is not always easy to identify others working with SEN-S regionally, let alone nationally or internationally. And they are also isolated in terms of particular focus specialists working with blind students, for example, may have little professional contact, if any, with specialists in the education of deaf students and those of Down's syndrome. Professional groups tend to be based more on the nature of the special needs of the students rather than on the learning of mathematics. This means that in the dialogue amongst educators concerned with SEN-S, mathematics education is hardly ever at centre stage. On the other hand, mathematics education researchers and teachers seldom have the specific knowledge about SEN-S. Mathematics educators do consider what mathematics for all should be, but the "all" rarely include SEN-S. Issues related to the mathematics education of students with special educational needs are currently under represented in the research community. What seems to be lacking is a community of mathematics educators dedicated to exploring this domain. Hence, there is a need to create common references and shared resources (in particular in the case of inclusive education). In short, there is a strong need for a common culture of mathematics education for students with special educational needs.
What could Mathematics Education gain from the establishment of such common references and resources?
First, mathematics education could become more significant in the lives of many students. There is a large number of young people and adult students for whom mathematics teaching may be "secondary" because the focus of their education is elsewhere. This is, for example, the case of deaf students: the major focus of their education is on language acquisition and literacy, and consequently their mathematics education is relatively neglected in research and curriculum development.
Second, insights developed in research with SEN-S could benefit mainstream mathematics teaching, through a re-analyses of assumptions about how mathematics is learned and what specific assessments tell us about students' abilities. Work with blind students, for example, can pose a challenge for the usual written tradition of schooling in general, and mathematics education in particular.
Third, SEN-S may show unexpected dissociations between different aspects of mathematical knowledge. It is possible to find, for example, exceptional computational skills with little understanding of their conceptual basis in autistic children but conceptual understanding that surpasses what one would expect from the level of basic skills can also be found. Comparative research across different types of SEN would be crucial for thinking about such dissociations in novel ways.
Finally, the discussion of different sorts of curricula with different resources appropriate for mathematics teaching while keeping mathematics as the focus of the discussion could lead to more diversified approaches to mathematics education.

Call for contributions
We invite submission of proposals for contributions to TSG-4 that could fall into the following themes and issues:
1. International surveys of some educational systems for students with special needs, the practices utilized in the identification of students who face particular challenges in learning mathematics, the legislated support for those identified and the strategies particular to mathematical education.
2. Considerations of impact the worldwide move to "inclusive education" on the mathematics curriculum and classroom practices and the challenges for mathematics teachers associated with the trend in shift the educational responsibility for students with special needs from 'special' to mainstream schools.
3. International surveys of teacher education programs (pre-service and in-service) to prepare mathematics teachers to work with students with special needs, either in specialist schools or in inclusive mathematics classrooms.
4. Activities and programs for

• students with sensory and physical difficulties (including for example, hearing impairment, visual impairment), physical and medical difficulties (including Cerebral palsy, students with Down's syndrome and traumatic brain injury).
• students with cognition & learning difficulties (which would cover moderate, severe and specific learning difficulties in mathematics like dyscalculia, dyspraxia etc.).
• students with emotional and behavioural difficulties conditions such as Attention Deficit Disorder or hyperactivity, as well as student's with emotional difficulties leading to lack of self-esteem, lack of concentration, depression etc.
• students with communication and interaction difficulty, this would cover students with Autism or conditions such as Asperger's syndrome etc.