AbstractThe aim of the study is to investigate what the concept of ?love of reading? means and how selected teachers act strategically to increase the love of reading in pupils in grade two. The Swedish concept of love of reading (läslust) has not always had the same meaning; in the past it was used in connection with the desire to pursue further studies, while the term is used today when talking about pupils? own will to read books. The ability to read is a significant part of a pupil?s schooling, and therefore it is important to work to ensure that pupils love reading.

The academic underachievement of looked after children is well known. By involving foster carers in a Paired Reading intervention a Swedish project tried to address this issue, replicating a successful British trial. The aim of my thesis was to study the variations in the foster carers? experiences of this literacy intervention. Reading reports from 100 children were collected and qualitative interviews with 15 foster parents were analyzed using concepts from motivational psychology.

The aim of this paper is to examine how gender roles are described in two children's books and compare the results against the curriculum Lgr11 's values. The compared books have different aims though one of the analyzed books claimed to go against the gender roles and the other one isn?t. The method of analysis is discourse analysis and deconstruction of the text by using Nikolajeva´s (2004) pattern for stereotype gender descriptions and Kåreland´s (2005) analysis of story actions based on gender representations in children's literature. The analysis of the texts shows that there are differences between how the two books characters are described depending on gender. What emerges is that in one of the books femininity is valued high but instead it lacks equality between the sexes, while in the second book the main characters are described as equal even though the other characters are described in a stereotypical way.

The aim of this masters thesis is to examine how some childrens librarians in public libraries reason about Wahlströms series books. During the 1970s, there was a discussion about the series books, and the general meaning was, among other things, that the books should not be available at libraries. Therefore, we also want to study if the arguments for and against the series books presented today are any different than those presented in the 1970s. For this examination, two methods have been used. We have done qualitative interviews with nine childrens librarians, and in order to find the arguments presented in the 1970s, we have studied the literature regarding the mentioned discussion.

The main aim of this study is to analyse the grotesque characterization of adults in four novels by Roald Dahl, from Michail Bachtin?s definition of the carnival-grotesque in Rabelais and his world. From this view I have examined how the conflict between children and adults is described in these books, and to what extent the grotesque motifs have a function in this conflict.For this purpose I have applied theories of the literature-grotesque by Michail Bachtin, and of the meaning and function and ? in this context ? the necessity of fright and horror in children?s fiction, in particular by Bruno Bettelheim and J.A. Appleyard.

Why should teachers devote themselves to reading aloud? Reading aloud has a given place in most of the Swedish preschools. Many teachers read to children. Research on the subject has shown that it is very rewarding for preschoolers to have stories read to them. They hear how the language is constructed, becomes aware of matter of text, and they are able to take part of how other people live.

My curiosity concerning what pupils read and write during leisure time led me to gather information using a quantative method. The study's aim is to investigate which reading and writing habits they have during their time outside school. A comparison was done of pupils at school year level 3 and level 4 in two different schools with the intention of investigating the influence of social background on reading and writing habits. 137 pupils filled in survey forms and thereafter the MYSTAT statistic program was used to process the information. The results point towards that the pupils read story books both more often and for a longer time than any other type of literature and that they read them often or very seldom.

The purpose of this study was to find out how gender roles are described in two popular children?s detective stories, one of them written in 2002 and the other in 1946, to be able to compare the two. In order to do this, I used a qualitative research method in which I read and analyzed the text and illustrations of the books out of a gender perspective.I used gender theories describing how stereotypical gender roles are displayed, and these theories were later associated with the books I studied. I also used previous research concerning gender roles in other children's books in order to compare those results with my own.After having read, analyzed and compared the two books, I found vast resemblances between them, but also certain differences. However, it is obvious that the gender roles in both books for the most part are traditional.

The purpose of this project is to survey the presence of folk expressions, i.e. proverbs, proverbial expressions, wellerisms and familiar expressions, in some of the realistic children?s books by Astrid Lindgren. The purpose also includes the study of the contextual and pragmatic functions of the expressions as well as how the expressions are integrated into the text by the change of the formulaic standard structure. The contextual and pragmatic function concern when, how and why the expressions are used and who the users of the expressions are.

Libraries exist around us and for most of us they are a part of our every day life. But how often do we stop and think about their meaning?Libraries in fiction are usually not the center of the narrative, they play a role quietly in the background and offer a backcloth to the story. Yet they are a vital part of the story. Without them a big part of the magic in the stories would be lost.And what is their role in our lives? What do the libraries mean to the books they harbor, the readers who seek them out and society in which they have their axiomatic role?This essay?s focus is my story ?Between the shelves?, which is about the young girl Julia and the mysterious passageway she discovers in her local library.

The purpose of this two years master´s thesis in Archive, Library and Information Museum science is to examine the ideas about children and childhood which have an influence on the storytime at public libraries. The material on which this thesis is based, is a methodbook which is aimed to develop the storytimes and those picture books that are recommend in the methodbook. The theoretical points of departure are discourse analysis and childhood sociology. The concepts of being and becoming are frequently used when analyzing the methodbook. Other theoretical points of departure are the combination of narratologi, semiotics and hermeneutics, which are also used when analyzing the picture books.The result indicates that the storytime, recommended in the methodbook, is based on the idea of a timeless culture of childhood - where the "modern child" including the media used today - is left out. Concepts as nostalgia and pedagogy are tightly connected.

This thesis analyses how friendship between children is described in four Swedish childrens books, published in 1995-2001 and recommended in Barnbokstipset, which is used in libraries for recommending books. Today there are many childrens books that describe various aspects of childrens everyday lives and these books can have an influence on the children who read them. But I found that there has not been much research about how friendship is described in childrens books, although much has been written about the importance of social relationships with peers for childrens lives and development. I analyze the books one by one with the help of a number of questions and categories that I have constructed beforehand. In the analysis I apply Zick Rubins theory of two different stages in childrens understanding of friendship and William Corsaros theory of interactive space which deals with who is allowed to join in games and friendships and who is not allowed to do so and how this is played out.

The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of an intervention that focuses on phonics, decoding, reading speed and phonological awareness for 8-9 year old children in reading difficulties. Participants were selected on the basis of screening test results in grade one (decoding and reading comprehension). The participants were divided into two groups, an intervention group (A1, n=10 children) and a control group (A2, n=10). A1 received 30 minutes of intense reading instruction every day for six weeks from special educational needs teachers on top of their usual classroom based reading instruction. The control group received only their usual classroom-based reading instruction.

The purpose for this Masters thesis is to describe childrens librarians work in supplying literature to children with emphasis on easy-reader materials. Our main questions are: · What do librarians believe characterizes an easy-reader book, and what do they base their decision on when classifying a book as easy-to-read? · How have the libraries in our study solved the hands-on difficulties associated with easy readers childrens literature? · Which factors do librarians consider to be important when supplying literature to children that are not used to reading or are not good readers? The theories we have used are Aidan Chambers Reading Circle and Karner Smidts view on the librarians professional roles when supplying literature. We have used a case study method, which means that we have gathered information through observation, objective papers and interviews. This has been done at six libraries.

AbstractThe purpose of this survey is to examine how educators work with reading- and writing-skills in preschool with six year old children. I want to examine if the new curriculum, Lgr11, has affected the school teachers in their teaching of reading- and writing and if their work has changed through the years. Using a qualitative study, five preschool-teachers, working in preschool for several years, were interviewed to be heard of their thoughts about this topic. The survey shows that preschool-teachers are more familiar with the curriculum of today, in relation to previous curriculums. Much because of that the new one is more addressed to preschool compared with earlier curriculums but also that the teachers in an easier way can see the pupils? way to knowledge.