This study where designed to investigate if there are any positive relationship between the extent of physical activity during adolescent's leisure time and the academic performance, and also if there are any negative relationship between the academic performance and the time spent in front of the television or computers. Another part of the study tried to find out if physical activity has a direct and immediate influence on the performance in school. 91 pupils (51 girls and 40 boys) in the 8:th year of the Swedish primary school, from three different schools participated in the study. All 91 pupils first responded to a questionnaire concerning there activities in leisure time. They where then tested in a mathematical test and the results where compared with the extent of physical activity and TV/computer time they had stated in the questionnaire.

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.

This study was designed to describe and understand how children perceive and explain mathematical situations. During our work based training we have met several students who have been insecure in the subject of mathematics and therefore come to think that it's difficult and boring. The questions we have asked ourselves are why and how this insecurity occurs. In preschools around the country teachers actively worked to create opportunities for children to meet and discover mathematics. The question is whether the teachers are aware of how children perceive mathematics and how children think in mathematical situations. We chose to conduct a qualitative study using different methods of data collecting in order to approach the children's world.

The students are usually eager to develop their mathematical learning. However, the Skolverket can see that this eagerness passes in the early years of school. A study shows that a varied mathematical education creates enthusiasm to learn, which can decrease the negative view of mathematics.The purpose of this study is to see how five pedagogues use laboratory mathematics, their approaches to laboratory mathematics as well as to find out their role in the laboratory education. The result of the study is based on interviews with the pedagogues, who are all teachers for students in year F-3. All of the pedagogues work in a laboratory way, but to different extents.The study shows that the pedagogues aim to make the mathematics as concrete and everyday as possible.

Syftet med denna studie är att undesöka vilket matematiskt innehåll förskollärare synliggör vid användning av bilderboken Lilla nollan och dom andra. För att besvara studiens frågeställningar har både observationer och kvalitativa intervjuer använts. Två förskollärare från en förskola valdes ut. Barnen som deltog vid observationerna var 4-5 år gamla. Resultatet visar att förskollärarna synliggör ett brett matematiskt innehåll i den ovannämnda bilderboken.

The aim of my study is to investigate how last year students in upper secondary schoolunderstand certain mathematical concepts, in particular the unit circle and its trigonometry.I have used intentional analysis to interpret student?s actions when they solve certain tasks onthe basis of a cognitive, situated and cultural context.Interviews with four university teachers in mathematics about the unit circle, trigonometry,and mathematical understanding, serve both as background for the study and as basis for adiscussion, where I relate students understanding to what the teachers want new students toknow about these concepts when they begin university studies in mathematics.The students were arranged in three groups with three students in each group. Each group waspresented with two tasks, one in which they were asked to calculate the cosine values for onepointed, one blunt and one straight angle, each located in a separate triangle. They were alsoasked to decide whether the points (0,71; 0,71) and d (1 2 , 3 2 ) are located on the unit circleor not.My conclusion is that students mainly have an operational conception of the unit circle andtrigonometry. The lack of structural conceptions result in difficulties in seeing connectionsbetween the concepts in unfamiliar situations.

Thanks to I have got to explore different teaching ways around the problem solving in a year 3, in a multicultural school which is located south of Stockholm, I have been able to answer my question at issue in my degree work. My question at issue on this investigation and the purpose with my degree work was to explore different teaching ways that promotes pupils with another mother tongue than Swedish, to develop reading comprehension and to get a better understanding of mathematical concepts in problem solving tasks. On this investigation have I chosen to teach these pupils to explore, reach and gain a deeper understanding of what teaching about problem solving promotes these pupils. I have when it concerns choice of method and material collections assumed from a qualitative investigation and gathered the material with help from participation notices and interviews. I have in my investigation reached the conclusion that those pupils with another mother tongue than Swedish developed reading comprehension and got a better understanding of mathematical concepts in problem solving tasks by being taught in a creative and varied teaching. A creative and varied teaching as I taught those pupils in contained:the pupils had to work with living-related problem tasksthe pupils had to work in pairs to resolve problem solvingthe pupils had to work in larger groups to resolve problem solvingthe pupils had to work in a creative way, by writing and drawing pictures and do their own mathematical fairy tale in problem solvingthe pupils had to work with manipulatives to resolve problem solving in half classes..

The purpose of this thesis was to examine teachers? perception of communication in the Mathematics lesson. I wanted to find out how teachers look at communication as a didactic manner and how they view their role in encouraging communication and discussion during the Mathematics lesson and what communication can contribute to students? learning in Mathematics, according to their beliefs. I have chosen a qualitative approach; I have interviewed six Mathematics teachers working in three different schools.

Syftet med detta examensarbete är att undersöka undervisning och lärande under en matematiklektion som präglas av traditionell skolmatematik. Metoden för undersökningen var en deltagande observation av en matematiklektion i åk 3 på gymnasiet. Med hjälp av begreppen matematikens lärandeobjekt, matematiska resurser, eleven som lärande aktör och sociomatematiska normer har jag tolkat de resultat som genererats från observationen. Två slutsatser som kan dras av undersökningen är att eleverna stimuleras till att bli oberoende lärande aktörer i undervisningen av traditionell skolmatematik samt att det i första hand är läraren som synliggör potentiella matematiska resurser för eleverna. Medvetenheten om elevernas användande av matematiska resurser skulle kunna påverka elevernas lärande genom att läraren synliggör matematiska resurser på ett mer medvetet sätt..

Studien undersöker hur matematiska begrepp etableras i diskursen i klassrummet och hur lärare planerar för, iscensätter och bearbetar matematiska begrepp. Studiens syfte är att studera hur lärare hanterar matematiska begrepp i undervisningen ur ett specialpedagogiskt perspektiv. Utifrån studiens ansats väljs två kvalitativa datainsamlingsmetoder. Till detta infogas Selander & Kress (2010) formellt inramad lärsekvens och Hallidays (2004) tre metafunktioner och en ny metafunktion, den institutionell funktion (Boistrup- Björklund, 2010). Studien visar att procedurkunskap har en stor plats i undervisningen. Lärarna hanterar begrepp i förbifarten och funderar inte på vilken roll de språkliga uttrycken har.

The aim of this thesis is to look for signs of students? understanding of algebra by studying how they make the transition from arithmetic to algebra. Students in an Upper Secondary class on the Natural Science program and Science and Technology program were given a questionnaire with a number of algebraic problems of different levels of difficulty. Especially important for the study was that students leave comments and explanations of how they solved the problems. According to earlier research, transitions are the most critical steps in problem solving.

Swedish students' knowledge of both mathematics and reading comprehension has deteriorated in recent years. Scientists are discussing whether there is a connection between these areas and that the pupils deteriorating math skills may have something to do with their increasingly lower results in terms of reading comprehension. To investigate this possible connection, I conducted a survey among students in ninth grade and have come to the conclusion that the scientists are right: this connection absolutely exist. Students who received a high score on tasks designed to test students' mathematical problem-solving skills, also received high results on the reading comprehension test. And students who received a poor performance on the problem-solving tasks, were also low performers in the reading comprehension test.

Arbetets syfte är att undersöka hur högstadieelever för matematiskt resonemang. De frågeställningar som studien inriktas på är vilka lösningsstrategier elever väljer då de resonerar matematiskt såväl som vad  det finns för skillnader och likheter mellan de yngre elevernas lösningar och de äldre elevernas lösningar.Undersökningen genomfördes i två klasser, den ena i årskurs 8 och den andra i årskurs 9, på en grundskola. Eleverna fick lösa uppgifter, vilka uppmanade dem att föra matematiskt resonemang, individuellt. Resultatet av studien visar att majoriteten av undersökta elever har valt att resonera deduktivt. Jämförelsen av elevers lösningar i två årskurser visar att årskurs 9 elevers resonemangsföring präglas av större förtrogenhet med den algebraiska demonstrationen.

The aim of the study was to do an analysis about the conceptions of units and unit con-version. Investigating the students´ attitudes towards their own mathematical ability and the students´ understanding of the conception of units..

The purpose of the present study is to describe adult second language learners? experiences of mathematics learning from a past and contemporary perspective. What experiences in mathematics do they bring? What does it mean to learn Mathematics through their new language?The study is based on life-world narratives from five second language students with another native language than Swedish. Today they all study at a Swedish folk high school, at upper secondary level and they have previously studied at this level in Mathematics. The result shows that the meeting with the Swedish school and folk high school context is confusing.