The following study is a discourse analysis of the concept of critical thinking within pre-school teacher education. It considers the following questions: how does the concept of critical thinking appear in policy documents, central to the pre-school teacher education, and which possible conceptions of critical thinking are conveyed by students and teachers active within the education. Additionally, the study seeks to discuss, as well as suggest a possible relation, between the findings of those two questions. In reviewing the material (consisting of five semi-structured interviews with students and teachers, and of a selection of policy documents central to the education), I argue the existence of a sort of project within the education, which presents critical thinking as a higher value. At the same time, I argue that the concept is not defined or concretized. This project, however, as I suggest while drawing upon Foucault?s ideas of discourse and government, involves a rather high degree of control.

The purpose of this thesis is to examine if the school's democracy project is successful. The objective is examined in relation to two specific questions. The first question is whether students, after completing their studies in civics A, understand the relationship between the concepts of human rights and democracy. The second is if the students understood the concepts of practical significance and impact on society and the individual. Variation theory comes from the phenomenographic theories and is central to this work. The approach to learning, in this essay, is a change in how a person experiences, understands or perceives a phenomenon. Variation theory focuses on a learning object and contextualization sees as crucial to how the individual perceives the object.The study is based on a quantitative research method in the form of a survey at a secondary school. A number of students may respond to valuation questions about how they perceive democracy and human rights in practical situations. The results are related to curriculum goals.The results of the study is not positive in relation to curriculum objectives, where many students respond negatively to questions..

This study describes and analyzes how one teacher perceives her monitoring of the students´individual plans of development as expressed in the Education Act chapter 10, 13§. Today there are nonational guidelines published in the monitoring area for these plans of development, although this is anobligation for all teachers in Sweden. Also, it presents some students´ opinion on this and how themonitoring affects their learning.The progressive perspective on learning with the content spirit of the concepts responsibility,participation and experience, as well as research in this field provides the background for the study.The most important features of the data were presented in relation to these three concepts and thecommon themes found between them.The study reveales that the monitoring of the individual plans of development can never be taken forgranted due to the absence of national guidelines on this matter. Either the intention of this absence isto hand over to a professional profession, such as teachers, to decide themselves how the work shouldbe designed, or they are not capable of doing this based on their education and the other conditionsgiven in their work. The conclusion is therefore that it is up to each school and each teacher to decideon how to work with this matter..

The aim is to examine how students with attention difficulties may demonstrate their mathematical understanding through visual representations. A curiosity about how students think about mathematics, national tests and Concepts cartoons has also permeated the study. With help of observations combined with interviews and actively work for a week, the study shows an idea of how visual representations can help students with concentration difficulties to stay focused on their tasks. I chose a selection of pupils to do some mathematical tasks from the national tests which they had not been able to solve before. Now in the form of Concepts cartoons, which I designed, they managed to solve the same mathematics data. In my study treatment and interaction reveals as key pillars for a successful educational work with the students with concentration difficulties. Thus, all pupils who previously have been unable to solve these assignments on the National test were now able to show their mathematical understanding supported by visual representations..

This case study attempts to examine how students of Religionswissenschaft at Södertörns University reflect about their philosophy of life and if their studies have some impact on their tendency to reflect. Also what aspects the students tend to reflect over will be investigated. In this study the term ?philosophy of life? includes humans thought and conceptions of the world and their outlook on mankind. To answer these question an interview study with 6 students took place, and the transcriptions produced 5 categories; ?The philosophy of life, to believe or not believe?, ?Development of concepts?, ?Outlook on mankind?, ?The founding of meaning? and ?Understanding and progress?.

Nathalia Edenmont is a controversial and uncompromising photo artist who has caused the whole world to rage over her obscene photographs. In this thesis I have researched Edenmonts artistry with help of the sociologist Pierre Bourdieus field analysis. By using Bourdieus's different field concepts I have researched Edenmonts artistic career by concepts such as habitus, consecration and different principles.The starting point of this research has been that Nathalia Edenmont is in the autonomous artistic field. I give examples of images that have been highly debated and I have collected information of how Edenmont sees her own images and her artistry. In this thesis I show amongst other things an example with Edenmonts photograph of dead rabbits with Elizabethan hair styling, cut up mice that work like finger puppets and children who are bound up in wire.Nathalia Edenmont autonomous artistry is deeply rooted in her background and the environment in which she was raised.

This study concerns unaccompanied refugee children and their experiences of living in Sweden and also their thoughts about identity and security. The aim of this study was to find a deeper understanding of these children?s situation. We formulated three research questions in order to obtain this deeper understanding:? What experiences do the informants have of living in Sweden?? What are the informants? views of their identity in their new life situation?? What is security to the informants?This is a qualitative study based on six semi-structured interviews with six youths whom have come to Sweden as unaccompanied refugee children.

The drama of Kristina Lugn?s Kvinnorna vid Svansjön (The women by the Swan Lake) takes place in the dialogue and language; the same ambiguous language that is found in Lugn?s poetry. In this essay I examine how meaning and dramatic tension is created in the dialogue of Kvinnorna vid Svansjön.I describe the play, using concepts from various drama theories. However, the most important concepts of classical drama theory such as "story" and "plot" are not really applicable. This is because of the contradictory information given in the dialogue.

The aim of this thesis is to show gender equality in school for teacher's choice of words with gender-sensitive language related to children's literature "Do you know Pippi Longstocking?". Work has focused on preschool and grade 1. The theme of the thesis is that the teaching profession should look human. The study provides a literature review of the teacher's choice of words in the gender order as the words hen, man, gender, sex, etc., and a review of Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren on the basis of the related concepts.

The following essay aims at the interplay between regional och municipal growth work, and theway cultural heritage is used in growth work strategies. The main issue has been whether theregional strategies are followed up in the municipal strategies, which has been investigated bymeans of question which impact the region?s strategies has at the local level.The essay draws upon an instrumental perspective on cultural heritage and cultural environment,here defined as instruments in the national development and growth efforts. Three publicationsthat highlights potential roles of cultural heritage and cultural environment to act as instrumentsin the regional and municipal development and growth efforts has thereby been selected astheoretical models. These roles has further been summarized in a tabular form as a schematicdivision of main themes with sub-categories, used as a framework for deciphering the regionaland municipal strategies.A content analysis of available strategies at both regional and local levels have been used as amethod for investigating the issue, where the role of cultural heritage and cultural environment(as defined in the schematic table) has guided the reading.

The Picture book - text and image in interaction. A study of Tove Jansson's picturebook: The Book About Moomin, Mymble and Little MyThis study examines Tove Jansson's picture book The Book About Moomin, Mymbleand Little My, to show relationships between text and image in the narration of thestory. This is done through an analysis based on Ulla Rhedins dissertation The picturebook - towards a theory where the conclusion is that the picture book as book mediumcan be divided in three different picture concepts. The various concepts are; the epicpicture book, the expanding text as well as the genuine picture book. This study hasperformed a text and image analysis showing that the image colors, the differentspreads, landscape scenes and characters' placement, et cetera play a role in placingthe picture book in its concept.Tove Jansson used more than text and image to work out the story of theMoomintroll, Mymble and Little My, there are holes in the picture book that have animportant role, which the analysis will show.

Our post-modern society is being continually more characterized by the working life, where corporate relations and the understanding of human momentum, limitations and knowledge is the basis of the quality of the corporation. In other words, it is of the greatest importance to keep in mind the attitudes, behaviour, stress levels and motivations that constitute a good working environment. We find it interesting to study what social psychological approaches and social processes could be of importance to good cooperation. The research has its starting point in a qualitative method focused on semi- structured interviews, where we have interviewed eight respondents working within the psychiatry. The research has strengthened our pre-understanding but also made clear the existence of other social processes and approaches that affect cooperation.

The essay discusses underlying racism in the Swedish community and has, as a specific purpose, to illustrate and analyze how images of immigrants are constructed in a local setting. The questions at issue are: What established conceptions about racism exist and how are immigrants described by the youth in Sweden? Which racist manifestations are evident? To answer these questions, twelve interviews with students from an upper secondary school in Lund are done. Discourse analysis and other central aspects to alienation such as categorization and stereotyping, concepts about ?the Others? and underlying racism, have been used to analyze the interviews.

This essay examine how temporal claims (past, present and future) are used in two Official Government Reports (SOU) in Sweden considering rape and sexual assault. The Official Government Reports constitute an important and particular system for long-term planning, and the reports are used as an instrument to achieve desirable changes within the nation. The temporal pretensions in SOU 1976:9 Sexual offences: proposed new wording of Penal provisions against virtue, and SOU 1982:61 Rape and other sexual assaults, are analyzed in relation to the concepts realization of the possible and actualization of the virtual, in order to see how the concepts correspond to the process of desirable change in the reports. The temporal claims are used in a spatially sense where space is assimilated to the concept of time which in return create notions of spatio-temporal images of the past, the present and the future. This is partly a problem for the reports in their aspiration to transform old norms and create innovatory values and ideals..

Many of today?s societies are built on established financial structures that are controlled by states and central banks. These structures are built on a clear perception of economic systems as established but invisible institutionalised concepts that are operated by millions of organizations worldwide. An idea of counteracting against centralized economies by introducing a currency that no state or bank controlled was developed in the beginning of the 20th century. In 2008 the idea was realised by the introduction of Bitcoin, which is a digital currency and transaction system without any centralized emitter or controlling organ.