During my practice as a teacher trainee at an upper secondary school it became clear to me that many pupils had difficulties with mathematics. I was surprised to find that many pupils seemed to get stuck on the level of attainment for the senior level of the nine-year compulsory school. As I have not studied anything about difficulties in Mathematics during my training to become a qualified teacher, I would like to get to know more about this.After studying research done on this subject I made the following approach to the problem:? What fields regarding Mathematics do the pupils themselves find most difficult?? What factors have been contributory causes to these problems?? What are the factors that have helped pupils with difficulties in Mathematics to reach the goals for the syllabuses in Mathematics?The answers to my questionnaire and interviews resulted in the following conclusions:? Pupils find theory of equation and conversion of units as most difficult at senior level of the nine-year compulsory school.? Teaching should be done in special instruction groups to give the pupil the opportunity to develop his/her skills on an individual level.? Pupils find it hard to deal with all moments in Mathematics during the time given for each course.? The pace for teaching Mathematics is too high according to the pupils.? Pupils wish for instructions on a lower level.? There is often a lack of contact between teacher and pupil.? The teacher should use more time to help the pupil receive good self-confidence and increase the motivation for instructions in Mathematics..

Research reports as PISA and PIRLS show that reading comprehension among Swedish students have deteriorated in recent years and that girls have better reading comprehension than boys. The basis for this study is Maj-Gun Johansson's reading comprehension test done during the four years between the years 2005-2008 in the seventh grade in a municipality in Sweden. The main purpose of this study is to examine reading literacy in terms of the influence of content and form of texts viewed from a gender perspective. The study is divided into two parts. The first part is a survey on local reading comprehension compared with results from a similar national text.

A new generation has entered the labour market. The group is presented as Generation Y andis described as egocentric, spoiled, unloyal and money oriented. Lecturer advice companieson how to understand and lead this new generation. The advisement creates stereotypicalcharacteristics of the group, which then reflects on the generations own identity development.But aside the stereotypes that are created on the labour market, the generation puts a lot oftheir spare time into volunteer work, which is seen as altruistic. This gives us a contradictoryportrayal of the new generation.The purpose of this paper is to understand the factors that contribute to the voluntary work ofGeneration Y and how the group experiences their own commitment.

The background to this report is the author?s ambition to understand individuals? work situation, how it?s formed in interaction between the individual and factors in the work-setting. Such an ambition is well in line with the concept of Human-Technology-Organization (HTO), a cross-scientific approach that puts a system-oriented perspective on how human, technolog-ical and organizational factors interact within work systems.The aim of this report was to explore managers? work-situation and generate an understanding of it from an HTO-perspective by using an organizational model as a framework for an interview guide and to analyze the work situation from an HTO-perspective following the ques-tions at issue:1. How does the managers experience their work situation?2.

The background to this report is the author?s ambition to understand individuals? work situation, how it?s formed in interaction between the individual and factors in the work-setting. Such an ambition is well in line with the concept of Human-Technology-Organization (HTO), a cross-scientific approach that puts a system-oriented perspective on how human, technolog-ical and organizational factors interact within work systems.The aim of this report was to explore managers? work-situation and generate an understanding of it from an HTO-perspective by using an organizational model as a framework for an interview guide and to analyze the work situation from an HTO-perspective following the ques-tions at issue:1. How does the managers experience their work situation?2.

The recent development in several countries? legislation and best practice recommendations in relation to corporate governance in general and audit committees in particular have affected Swedish listed corporations in the form of the Swedish Corporate Governance Code and the coming EU-directive. This paper aims to discover what factors affected Swedish listed companies to form audit committees when this was entirely voluntary. We collected data from the annual reports of 121 Swedish listed companies and formed eleven hypotheses as to what factors we believed affected the voluntary formation of audit committees based on Agency Theory, economies of scale and circumstances specific to the Swedish environment. We then analyzed the data through the use of a multivariate logistic regression model.

The purpose of this study is to identify the points-of-difference that should form the basis for Bryggarsalen?s future marketing efforts. Bryggarsalen is a newly established conference business in Stockholm. To be able to identify these points-of-difference, Bryggarsalen?s marketing problems have been studied from the resource-based view, claiming that the source of sustained competitive advantage derive from a firm?s unique bundle of resources.

The purpose of this thesis is to shed light on the various factors that influence the balancebetween the working lives and family lives of social workers. The research questions posedwere: Do social workers consider there is a conflict between their working lives and familylives? Which factors make maintaining a balance between working life and family life moredifficult and which make it easier to do so? How do social workers describe equality betweenthe sexes in their own family? Regarding methodology, the selection method is strategic andcombines data sources with quantitative and qualitative methodologies. The material collectedand via online survey, targeted to 120 municipal employees social workers in a district councilin a big city, and through interviews with four social workers in a rural community. The studywas performed using gender theory and the demand-support-control model.

The aim is to describe the factors that influence nurses' assessment and measurement of pain in patients. Literature study based on 13 reviewed articles, searched in the Cinahl. Qualitative and quantitative articles were analyzed. Six themes were identified that can be seen as the factors that influence nurses' assessment and measurement. The themes were   pain education, nurses´ experience in the profession, nurses´ level of knowledge about pain relief, documentation about pain, nurse´s perspective on the patient, and pain measurement.

ÖREBRO UNIVERSITYDepartment of Behavioural, Social and Legal SciencesC-essay in Social work, Advanced course2006To give up a criminal life styleA study of motivation and protectional factors of juveniles after a sentence of institutional care or community workEmma Henriksson & Karin TengnäsABSTRACTThe purpose of the study was to investigate the factors that juveniles sentenced to institutional care or community work perceive as important for their decision to give up a criminal life style. The study approach was based on a few specific questions: (1) What aspects of the treatment have contributed to a motivation to abandon the criminal life style? (2) What have motivated the juveniles to make a decision to leave the criminal life style? (3) Are there any specific internal or external protectional factors that have been decisive for the rehabilitation process and, if so, are they linked to intrinsic or extrinsic motivation? The study rests on the theoretical foundation created by earlier research on institutional care, motivation and protectional factors. Interviews were chosen as a method to secure qualitative data and the interview manual was designed on the basis of themes that reflect the questions of the study. Six young people?s perception of their treatment is documented in the study, as well as their opinion on the effectiveness of the treatment.

AimThe aim of this study is to examine the long term effects of e12 and how they have influenced the lifestyle and perceived awareness about nutrition and exercise in relation to factors from Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) that e12 took in consideration. The questions asked were; How has e12 affected the attitudes, skills, self-efficacy and knowledge relative to exercise? How has e12 influenced the individual?s habits of exercise? How has e12 affected the perceived awareness regarding the impact of nutrition and exercise on the body weight?MethodThe study is pursued by a qualitative method using semi structured interviews on six individuals between the ages of 16-18 years old that completed the project 4-5 years ago. A questionnaire regarding nutrition and exercise habits was also used as part of the study. All individuals from the year of interest were first contacted by the senior physician connected to the project.

The background to this report is the author?s ambition to understand individuals? work situation, how it?s formed in interaction between the individual and factors in the work-setting. Such an ambition is well in line with the concept of Human-Technology-Organization (HTO), a cross-scientific approach that puts a system-oriented perspective on how human, technolog-ical and organizational factors interact within work systems.The aim of this report was to explore managers? work-situation and generate an understanding of it from an HTO-perspective by using an organizational model as a framework for an interview guide and to analyze the work situation from an HTO-perspective following the ques-tions at issue:1. How does the managers experience their work situation?2.

Contemporary society focuses heavily on the individual and this is also characterized by an individual thinking that many people contribute to. This is furthermore shared in the field of entrepreneur research studies where a profound deal of time has been focused on the personal qualities of specific entrepreneurs. However, in modern settings today many corporations originate in a team-based structure, which therefore leads towards a different approach rather than examining exclusively on individuality. Previous research shows that entrepreneurial teams are establishing and growing at a steady pace, yet studies within this field has not developed in an extensive fashion. Entrepreneurial teams can be defined as a group of people who share a common goal, usually consisting of two or more individuals who commenced a foundation from the early stages of that specific firm and who originated an initial idea.

Lean Product Development is a knowledge-based business concept in order to maintain high quality, meetcustomer requirements and to make product development more efficient. An important part of the processis to add a lot of resources at an early stage and execute the development as an iterative process betweendepartments exploring many alternatives thoroughly. The work focuses on how Lean ProductDevelopment is carried out and explores how to manage interaction between different departments andexpertise with regard to cross-functional collaboration and knowledge sharing i.e. learning.The information for the studies was gathered at a major Swedish company from two projects. The projectswere carried out as cross-functional and possible key factors for cross-functional collaboration wasidentified.The results have been correlated with theories of Lean, Product development, Lean product developmentand Learning.

The purpose of this essay is to examine the United Nation?s work and structure to find possible factors that can explain why some peacekeeping operations have achieved to mainstream a gender perspective, when others have not. This study is based on two cases; the peacekeeping operation in Namibia and the peacekeeping operation in Kosovo.The theory I have chosen to apply is feminism, a theory that allows an alternative explanation to this phenomenon. The conclusion is that there are three decisive factors: The leadership and its will to recruit female personnel to decision-making positions, the number of female employees and whether the peacekeeping operation cooperates with local women-organisations or not. All this is of great importance whether the institutional hegemonic masculine culture within the United Nation and its peacekeeping operations, is challenged or not..