ZDM 2006 Vol. 38 (6) Analyses Selected papers from the 2006 German annual meeting of mathematics education Günter Törner, Duisburg (Germany), Christian Gross, Augsburg (Germany), Michael Kleine, Regensburg (Germany),Bharath Sriraman, Missoula, MT (USA) In keeping with the tradition of earlier years, we are pleased to release a special issue of ZDM based on the papers presented at the 40th Annual meeting of the German Mathematics Didactics Society, held at the University of Osnabrueck in 2006. Many of papers presented in this conference revealed a variety and scope relevant to mathematics educators in and outside German speaking counties as well as those working in fields related to mathematics education. The goal of this special issue is to give the international community a flavor for the different types of research currently engaged in by the new generation of mathematics education researchers in German speaking countries. The articles in this issue are not clustered around any particular theme but reveal the diversity in approaches and topics presented at the conference. 435