This report is a qualitative study on children aged three to five years who are in the Swedish preschool. The purpose of the study is to investigate how five experienced preschool teachers view the way children between three and five years acquire basic mathematical concepts, basic numeracy and geometry. The aim is also to find out whether teachers feel that the size of the group of children affects their learning.The study contains information about what preschool teachers think about the way children learn mathematics and how the size of the group of children affects this learning. From the results it can be seen that children learn Mathematics, both in everyday situations and when playing. Moreover, the group size does not seem to affect the mathematical learning of the child.

Men?s magazines is a form of media that has been present and popular among men for decades and even centuries. In the beginning of 1990 the popularity for men?s magazines boosted as the new ideal man was presented. The new lad represented a new masculinity that was more honest about its ideals and point of views.

This essay examines the European Union?s (EU) ability to play a leading role as a global actor on the world stage in international relations. Specifically, this essay studies the EU?s role of negotiator in the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December 2009.  This essay also analyzes explanations for this role. Research is based on case studies, with conclusions drawn using an inductive approach.

Interaction is an important part of children?s development. The school is a main arena in which children learn to interact, mainly through their playing. This study aims at investigating the role of interaction in a leisure school didactic setting. The aim of the study is to gain a better understanding for how the pupils develop though use of social interaction.

The aim of this study was to investigate and compare the availability of construction materials affect children's constructions and play. Observations were made when the children were allowed to play and build with very little and much of the material play-doh dough in preschool. The study is aimed at children aged 3 ? 5 years. Interviews were also conducted with educators in departments where the children spent time to give support to this study.The result shows that the children create as many designs of any material amount.

This case-study examines the correlation between young men and democratic instability in group discussions with two analyzing methods in one. One part of the method used is deliberative democracy which aims to explain how democracy works within the frames of discussion in ordinary citizens groups. In this study the citizens is upper level secondary school students. The other part of the method used is the theory pulled by many scholars lately, the demographic impact on democracy. With these two combined in one this study compare the theory of young men as more active in political violence and as a destabilising factor of democracy on country-level with the results of the study in deliberative democracy in small group discussions.

The aim of the study was to look at a particular work group of housing supporters, whomhave implemented two special working methods in their work. The methods have been implemented by two of the housing supporters that also have special education in the methodsSOC (Sense of Coherence) and solution focused brief therapy. The study is based on anethnographic observation and analysis of documents that are used in the implementation. To analyse the information that was given at the observation and in the document I´ve used a theory which illustrates the significance of developing professions so their knowledge become legitimate. I´ve also used a theory that illustrates the importance of implementation and how it´s done at its best.

The aim of this master?s thesis is to identify differences and similarities, regarding security, in two goods terminals in an organisation in the transport and goods sector. In this thesis we use Cultural Theory as an analytical instrument to investigate organizational culture, as seen from a security perspective. Cultural Theory is a theory seen from two perspectives, the stable perspective and the mobile perspective. These two perspectives concentrate on different research areas.

A reward cycle for investigating the emotional status in animals has been developed and it requires that animals go through three main phases, i.e. anticipation, consumption and relaxation. The reward cycle has not been tested previously for access to play in pigs. Therefore, the aim of this Master thesis was to investigate if growing pigs showed more behaviours indicative of excitement than pigs that were not allowed to play, performed play in a play arena and showed more behaviours indicative of relaxation after play when they were back to their home pen than pigs that were in their home pen the whole time. Forty undocked piglets (10 litters of Specific Pathogen Free half pure-bred Yorkshire and half hybrids of Yorkshire x Landrace balanced for breed between two treatments were used.

The purpose of this study is to gain knowledge and a broader understanding for how pre-school teachers describe the importance of planned play environments including in what manner children are given influence. By qualitative interviews with five pre-school teachers from four different units I was able to gather data that shows how the planning process concerning a specific play environment had worked and why it looked as it did. The results show among other things that the pre-school teachers viewed the play environment as a vital part of the daily operation and pointed out that it was of vital importance that it came from the children?s interests. Depending on how the play environment had been organized and what its purpose was it offered different amounts of affordances..

Interaction is an important part of children?s development. The school is a main arena in which children learn to interact, mainly through their playing. This study aims at investigating the role of interaction in a leisure school didactic setting. The aim of the study is to gain a better understanding for how the pupils develop though use of social interaction.

Abstract   In this thesis, my aim was to investigate how preschool teachers view their involvement in children's free play. In order to answer this, I chose to do semi-structured interviews with four preschool teachers in three different preschools. My interviews has revealed similarities and support for as how history of research looks at the involvement of educationists. Both research and my results stresses the importance of being active in children's free play and to be a supportive teacher, particulary in conflict situations. For those children who have difficulty entering into the free game its the educationists task to co-play and help the children find the game.

The purpose of this thesis was to examine if users of digital music games may acquire skills from the games that may be of use in learning to play a real instrument, that is a non-digitally simulated instrument like an acoustic piano. We have used Gee?s theory regarding a possible interconnection between different semiotic domains, and how this connection may enable a transfer of skills between related domains. In this thesis we examine possible skill transfer between the domains ?digital games? and ?non-digital instruments?. To examine our question formulation we chose to conduct a pilot study from which we collected both quantitative and qualitative data.

This case-study examines the correlation between young men and democratic instability in group discussions with two analyzing methods in one. One part of the method used is deliberative democracy which aims to explain how democracy works within the frames of discussion in ordinary citizens groups. In this study the citizens is upper level secondary school students. The other part of the method used is the theory pulled by many scholars lately, the demographic impact on democracy. With these two combined in one this study compare the theory of young men as more active in political violence and as a destabilising factor of democracy on country-level with the results of the study in deliberative democracy in small group discussions.

Drawing on earlier research, and using observations as the method, this study presents a design of a nature playscape for children. Applying outdoor pedagogy to the fundamental structure of a specific location, the study proposes a design of a playscape, over a more obvious design, for instance one based around a quiz walk.The theoretical framework is Gibson?s theory of affordance, and the goal has been to create a "play flow". The study concludes that spatial rhetorics can be an important tool when teaching children about nature..