Because of the globalization of society, English as a foreign language (EFL) has become easier to access through internet and outside school English activities, so called ?extramural English activities? (EEA). Previous research indicates a positive relation between pupils? EFL vocabulary development and EEA (Sundqvist, 2009). This development may influence teachers? lesson planning, because of pupils? wide span of interests and the resulting different levels of EFL vocabulary.

Common wisdom dictates that because payment of dividends decreases funds available for investment, a high payout ratio is to be associated with low earnings growth. This notion has been challenged in recent years by empirical research that has found a positive relationship between payout ratio and future earnings growth, both on the aggregated market level and the company level in different countries. This study investigated the aforementioned relationship on the Swedish market by statistically analyzing future earnings growth as a function of payout ratio on a large sample of publicly listed companies over the period 1980 to 2011. The results are in line with those found in previous research and indicate that companies with high dividend payout ratio tend to experience strong future earnings growth. The results are robust to the presence of mean reversion, the use of an alternative accounting measure of earnings, non-symmetrical earnings growth cycles and alternative practices for dealing with outliers..

This is a qualitative analysis that, based on systemic functional linguistics, or SFL, and genre theory, has aimed to study the genre pedagogical implications on written language as they occur in narrative stories and expositions whilst the model is introduced. Systemic functional linguistics is a linguistic theory that views the organisation of language as functional options for meaning; language is a set of resources to channel meaning through realisation. Genre theory elucidates the pragmatic and educational uses of SFL in the categorizing of language in configurations of meanings as they are set and understood in different cultures.  The purpose of the survey is to do so with focus on successful and less successful writers by attempting to answer two primal issues:How is development of written language in reference to the introduction of the genre pedagogical model visible in the studied texts?How does genre pedagogical teaching influence successful and less successful writers as visible in their writing with a certain purpose?To answer these issues the survey is based on narratives and expositions written by high school students who have been divided into two groups according to the purpose of the survey. One text in each genre has been written by the students before and after lessons based on the genre pedagogical learning wheel explaining the relevant genres.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects ofparticipation in an integrated intensive stuttering program (IST) on stutteringbehavior, intelligibility and communication attitude, at individual and grouplevels. Five children aged eight to twelve years participated in the study.Stuttering behavior and intelligibility were judged by two independentstudents in speech and language pathology based on a total of eight videorecordings, before, during and after therapy. Communication attitude wasmeasured by the Swedish version of the self-report questionnaireCommunication Attitude Test (CAT-S). At an individual level, the initialstuttering profile and the changes shown during and after the IST varied. Ata group level, a significant decrease in stuttering frequency and asignificantly higher level of intelligibility were found, after as compared tobefore therapy.

The purpose of this study is to investigate and describe the role of course books for teaching English to children at intermediate level of primary school in Sweden. The essay is based on a descriptive, qualitative method and interviews have been conducted with seven teachers in different schools, teaching English in year 4, 5 and 6.The result of the study shows that course books have considerably influence on the teaching of English in the schools who took part in this investigation. The participating teachers use a course book as main teaching material and almost everybody follows the traditional routine working with Textbook and complementary tasks in Workbook every week. They base their lessons on course books and use alternative teaching material mainly for fun activities, speaking practice and individualization. Even though all teachers rank speaking and listening as most important for new learners, it is reading which has the largest impact on their teaching.

High school students of today frequently come into contact with the English language throughradio and television. Many students even manage to read instruction manuals and understandhow technical devices work, such as, for example, computer games. However, most teachersunderestimate their students? ability and persist in using Swedish to explain how the Englishlanguage works. I have analysed how high school students manage when they take an Englishgrammar test in English.

My purpose with this paper related to my questions was to find out how professionals preeschool teachers working on multilingualism. I also wanted to get answers on how pedagogues in the preeschool may promote multilingual children´s language development, the factors that promote multilingual children´s language development and the role parents have in the language development of multilingual children. I chose to do my study in the form of interviews with professional preeschool teachers and interviewees described including the need for more knowledge of pedagogues around multilingualism. My result based on theoretichal background and the study is that pedagogues should let the children´s all languages esemble together. A factor influencing the multilingual children´s language development is ambient attitudes to multilingualism.

The purpose of this qualitative study is to understand and examine the problem andreason why second language pupils have difficulties reaching the goals of thecurriculum in ?Swedish as a second language?. The study is based on interviews withtwo second language teachers and Vygotskijs and Antonovskys theories. The interviewswith teachers gave a broader view on why these difficulties exist and whatconsequences might occur. This analysis shows that there can be different reasons as towhy pupils can not reach the goals in their second language that are set for them.

The study has been conducted to find out whether aesthetic expressions and experiences can benefit the smallest children's language development. How do the teachers at the preschool relate to aesthetic expression? Do they think that aesthetic expression and experience will be favorable for stimulating children's language? Children perceive through their senses, logically aesthetic expressions should promote children's learning and development. How does this claim stand in relation with the smallest children's language development and teachers' views on aesthetics as a pedagogical tool for language stimulation? To get closer to the answer a survey have been done.

In this literature review the characteristics of two free-floating macrophytes, water hyacinth   (Eichhornia crassipes) and duckweed (Lemna sp.), and two microalgae, Chlorella and Scenedesmus, have been examined regarding their suitability as efficient nutrient removers in the treatment of wastewater with high levels of nutrients and suspended solids from a biogas plant in Loudden. The needs required for the plants to be able to grow in wastewater and the amounts of biomass they can produce have also been studied. The results show that Chlorella is capable of a very high uptake of nutrients in photobioreactors with high nutrient loadings. With an ammonia uptake maximum value at 10900mg/m2/d Chlorella outshines the other organisms in this study. The test organism that performed the closest to Chlorella in terms of nitrogen uptake was water hyacinth with an uptake about 1602mg/m2/d.

Severe floods caused by heavy autumn rains in year 2000 raised the question whether measures to reduce the damage from high water levels, in the area surrounding lake Glafsfjorden and along the river Byälven down to lake Vänern, are possible. One option is to reduce flow resistance along the river and thereby lower the maximum water level a given inflow would cause. Good knowledge of hydraulic and hydrological conditions is necessary in order to estimate the effect of such flow-reducing measures. In order to quantify such effect a 1-dimensional hydraulic flow model has been set up for the river Byälven using the software package MIKE 11. The model is more detailed, especially concerning topography and bathymetry, than earlier models used for studies of the river.

There are different ways of developing a second language. The purpose of this qualitative study is to investigate whether and possibly how music, focused on singing, can improve the development of Swedish as a second language. Through interviews with three vocal teachers, from three different schools in Sweden, and observations of one of the vocal teachers, information about how they work and think about the subject has been collected. The vocal teachers teach groups of second language learners by singing songs made especially for second language learning. The vocal teachers consider singing beneficial in the development of the pronunciation and improvement of the prosody, which affects the students? capacity to sound like a native Swedish speaker.

One of the largest work areas for speech and language pathologists is intervention for children with speech and language disorders. The purpose of the present study was to describe and analyze the clinical management of language impairment in children by studying and comparing medical records and literature from the years 2000 and 2009. The present study is a sequel to two previously published papers by Christina Samuelsson (1997; 1999), in which medical records and literature from the 1920-, 60- and 70?s were studied and a paper by Helén Sämfors (2001), in which the years 1985 and 1995 were studied. The medical records used in the present study came from a medical ward for speech and language pathology at a university hospital in Sweden. The results showed that significantly more children were referred to the clinic for speech and language problems in 2009 than in 2000, and more children were treated for their impairments.

The purpose of my study was to determine whether there are any differences between the language that men use and the one that women use in a context that has not yet been studied. With the results of previous studies from other areas in mind I tried to ascertain if the stereotypes that exist about language and gender may also be transmitted to the comedy stage. I compared two stand-up comedians with opposite sex in a clip from a Swedish television show. The comparison was based on their body language, the use of nouns and verbs and on the length of their words. I used a combination of a qualitative and a quantitative method.

Store windows, as many earlier research studies indicate, is an important factor of the store atmosphere to attract customers into the store. In this study we have narrowed it down and chosen to focus on how different contexts of the store windows will effect customers' evaluation. The purpose is to find out how the context of high creativity and low creativity combined with different time aspect in store windows will affect store image, attitude, entering decisions and purchase intention toward the store. The results are based on a quantitative study where we did an experiment and a field study. The result shows that higher level of creativity is better than lower level of creativity in certain aspects.