In the school subject of the natural sciences it is imperative that the students are given opportunities to ?talk science?, since the dialogues that occur in the classroom have a significant importance for the students? abilities to engage in meaning-making in their learning process. Hence, the student and teacher interaction in the classroom and the feedback given there play a significant role in the students? learning process. The aim of this study is to contribute to the development of formative assessment tools that can mediate the students? meaning-making in natural sciences subjects in upper-secondary school.

Syftet med denna studie var att undersöka skriftspråkslärande efter nybörjarstadiet, hos elever utan eget tal; med severe speech and physical impairment (SSPI) samt alternativ och kompletterande kommunikation (AKK). Frågeställningarna var följande:- Hur beskriver dessa elever själva sitt skriftspråkslärande?- Vilka fruktbara arbetssätt och miljöer för dessa elevers skriftspråkslärande finns dokumenterat i forskning?Metoderna innebar en livsberättelseintervju genom computer assisted personal interviewing (CAPI), samt systematiska litteraturstudier med en kvalitativ metasyntes som mål.Resultaten visar vikten av att dessa elever når en god läs- och skrivförmåga. Möjligheter öppnar sig för lärande och inte minst kommunikation över tids-, rums- och persongränser. Avgörande för elevers fortsatta skriftspråkslärande var förväntningar, kvalitet på undervisning samt stimulans inom den grundläggande emergent literacy-fasen.

This survey aims to investigate and analyze how six teachers on a high school in Stockholm reflect on pedagogical aspects of problem based learning( PBL). The survey focuses on ana-lyzing how the teachers relate to the benefits and problems of PBL and how they reflect on the students development. The survey was conducted on a high school and the method used for the study was interviews, each taking 30-45 minutes. The outcome of the survey indicates that the teachers sees problem based learning as an alternative to what they define as tradi-tional education regarding its epistemology. They indicate that PBL allows the students to define their own questions, to be carriers of knowledge and to evolve analytic skills in relation to the basegroup.

The purpose of this study was to examine and compare what six preschool teachers thought about their opportunities to take advantage of children's interest in natural sciences and technology, across four kindergartens. The following questions were explored in order to achieve the aim of the study: How do the preschool teachers interviewed describe their work with science and technology in the preschool and what these preschool teachers think about the meaning of motivation in the children?s learning of natural sciences and technology in preschool.  The study used a qualitative approach in the form of semi-structured interviews and interviewed a total of six trained pre-school teachers from four kindergartens with different profiles. The first kindergarten focuses on mathematics, science and technology.

In today?s´ multicultural society increasing numbers of school librarians are faced with a relatively new target group of pupils. This group is linguistically less homogenous than previously and this requires modern adaptations of pedagogic methods.Information literacy and reading promotion are two important topics that school librarians work with. Information literacy is essential for problem based tuition and to increase it requires a well developed language. This study is focusing of the school librarians work with reading promotions.

This research is about six pedagogue´s and their reflections about the size of the children´s group in the preschools. Then I will discuss the pedagogue?s recommendation on the significance of the size of a children´s group learning and development and it´s practical significance for the preschool function. The pedagogue?s statements will be discussed in relation to The Swedish National Agency for Education (TSNAE) guidelines on group size.The theoretical framework of this essay will take an overview of the social cultural perspective, the group size and its significance for both the children´s learning and development, for interaction and communication and TSNAE advice and guidelines.

This study focuses on oral communication in the classroom involving discussion and dialogue amongst pupils, but also between teacher and pupil. The overall aim is to study the choices regarding the group composition and working methods that might occur in four individual teachers? lessons plans with the intention of increasing the pupils? knowledge through oral communication. The main focus is to explore what the teachers think of the choices they make and how they believe these changes affect the pupils. It is also focused on how the teachers perceive their pupils? learning is improved by oral communication and how they incorporate all pupils, especially the pupils who rarely participate in classroom activity.The methods used are qualitative studies using interviews and observations.

This study is based on interviews with five directors of educational administration within the Stockholm County. The purpose is to investigate how the directors of educational administrations, in the different municipalities, describe the relationship between the administration and the local school units. Moreover, the aim is also to describe the administration director?s work in relation to the various levels of the administration. To what extent can it be identified as a dimension of the learning organization described in this report.The study shows that skepticism is usually directed upwards toward the next level in the organization and that the decision-making right for local schools is consistently safeguarded.

The public library is an institution that throughout history has been associated with anumber of social codes, that seem to be deeply rooted in the minds of the public. Thesecodes regulates how users act and interact in the library environment and as a library useryou have to obtain knowledge about these social codes.This master's thesis aims at studying how these codes are transferred to children in the earlyschool-age, how children react to the social codes and what effects they have on thechildren's development into library users.The empirical material used in this study consists of observations and interviews. Theobservations are conducted during two school classes visits to a public library and focuseson the interaction between librarians, the children and their teachers, and the interviewswere conducted with the two librarians responsible for the library visits.The theories used in this master's thesis consists of symbolic interactionism, in the form oftheories by George Herbert Mead and Erving Goffman, Peter L. Berger and ThomasLuckmanns theories regarding the concept of institutions. Another theory that's used in thismaster's thesis is the one concerning the social aspects of information literacy focusing onthe concept of epistemic communities as presented by Kimmo Tuominen, Reijo Savolainenand Sanna Talja.The result of this study is that the social codes are communicated to the children primarilyby the teachers rather than the librarians.

The purpose of this essay is to show the opportunities and difficulties of teaching within distance education. I will show this from two different parts of the world. One being Sweden and the other Australia, both countries run a distance education program with similar reasons students whom travelling, some living hundreds of miles from any schools and some students with health and or social disadvantages. This study is based on the actual teacher?s accounts and experiences the opportunities and difficulties in teaching in distance.

This study started with my interest in drama pedagogy practices. The aim is to investigate the teacher's conceptions of children's play and learning activities in drama pedagogy practices. Basically drama pedagogy means children and teachers creating play worlds together, usually based on various literary works, where they portray and play. Previous research shows that drama pedagogy as a method can enrich and develop children's play. Also, drama can be important for children's linguistic, social and aesthetic development.In this study, overall three interviews and two observations at different occasions was carried out.

The aim of this Master's thesis is to examine the contemporary educational tasks of the Swedish public library as they manifest in Swedish library journals. Our main question at issue is: Which educational discourses are there? And in relation to our main question: how do the concepts of information literacy, lifelong learning and adult education relate to each other? Is there an antagonism between the public library's duty to supply fiction as opposed to non-fiction? and: What are the consequences of these discourses in the service provided by the library?Our theoretical starting-point is the discourse theory as proposed by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. We analyse 39 texts from four Swedish library journals: Ikoner, bis, DIK-forum and Biblioteksbladet. The analysis is done in two phases.

This study illuminates one part of the mathematic teaching in school, which is mathematical problem solving in groups. It examines teacher?s and student?s ideas about what conditions it takes to be able to learn in groups. Further on, it studies the importance of group structure when it comes to working with mathematical problem solving in groups from a process focused and/or a product focused learning. Through observations of student groups and interviews with the students and the mathematic teachers, the material has been compiled and analysed under three different headings: conditions for learning in a mathematical problem solving situation, importance of group structure in a mathematical problem solving situation and process versus product.

This bachelor thesis consists of an analysis of museum environment. In the research, case studies have been done at the, Stockholm based museums, Swedish museum of Natural history?s exhibition Natur i Sverige (Nature in Sweden) and the Nordiska museet?s (Nordic history) exhibition Modemakt (Power of fashion) and learning environment Lekstugan (playhouse). The purpose of the research was to study how cultural heritage is used and developed within the museum pedagogy aimed at children. The research is based on a multimodal approach with focus on learning resources.The research examines the museums focus on children and youngsters, what the goals for this focus looks like on respective museum and how the focus is visible in the actual museums.

Syftet med detta examensarbete är att utreda Uppsalaelevernas tillgång till skolbibliotek i sina grundskolor, samt hur väl integrerade skolbiblioteken är i undervisningsverksamheten. Frågeställningarna syftar till att belysa hur stor andel av Uppsalas elever som har skolbibliotek som uppfyller skollagens krav, samt i vilken grad bibliotekarier och lärare samarbetar på Uppsalas skolor. Dessutom undersöker jag huruvida utvecklat samarbete mellan undervisande personal och bibliotekspersonal ger avtryck i läsförmågeuppgifterna i de nationella ämnesproven i svenska i åk 3 och åk 5.Aktuell biblioteksforskning i såväl Sverige som Nordamerika lägger tonvikt vid att samarbete mellan lärare och bibliotekarier kan spela stor roll för elevernas kunskapsutveckling, särskilt vad gäller Literacy, det vill säga det vidgade läsbegreppet som omfattar läsförståelse och kunskaper om hur man använder information. Data har inhämtats med hjälp av en enkät som har skickats till 42 grundskolor i Uppsala kommun. Enkäten omfattar flera frågor med fritextsvar och de fylliga svaren från informanterna har analyserats kvalitativt.