The purpose of this study is to highlight how Swedish primary school teachers teach of and about democracy and based on this then compare with how the primary school teachers in South Africa teaches of and about democracy. This comparison will then highlight what can be developed in the teaching of and about democracy in Swedish schools. The method used in this study is mind maps because it gives a greater depth in the way teachers look at teaching democracy. The result of this comparison is that South Africa's history pervades the entire democracy education in school but both Sweden and South Africa use methods as dialogue and discussion in teaching of and about democracy. Furthermore, the community, curriculum, teacher and cooperation with other teachers also have an influence on how democracy's teaching looks like in schools.

In this thesis I set out to study how the reading of fictional literature is viewed, legitimatized and operationalized in two educational domains: the recently revised steering documents that all Swedish teachers must relate to, as well as a selection of teaching materials designed for education in the Swedish language for upper secondary school. The teaching material I have studied has been recently updated in order to correspond with the new steering documents. I relate my analysis to previous research about the use of fiction in education, and I also combine my analysis of the two educational domains to see whether the underlying intentions of the steering documents have influenced the revision of the teaching material. The outcome indicates that the steering documents? previous focus on culture has diminished although a certain insecurity as to how to use the concept and deal with the issue of whose culture should be taught can be identified.

Objective: The aim of the study is to describe pupils' understanding of the mathematical concept of function. How do pupils define the concept of function? What images of the concept of function evoke when they solve tasks, which involve identifying and constructing functions?Theory: A student's thinking about a mathematical concept depends on more than just the formal definition of the concept; therefore Tall and Vinner introduce the term concept image to describe the role cognitive structures play when students learn about concepts. The cognitive structure includes all mental images, associated properties and processes that an individual associates with a given concept. According to Sfard, an individual's understanding of mathematical concepts may have different character: an operational conception, where a concept is conceived as a process and a structural conception, where the given concept is conceived as an object, that is, as a whole.Method: 16 pupils at the Science Program at two different upper secondary schools inSweden answered a questionnaire on the mathematical concept of function.

Meaningful teaching in physical education ? A study of pupils opinions of the contents and teachers methods to activate and account inactive pupils.Nowadays people in society are getting more and more inactive, and we have during our practice at different schools, noticed that many pupils are uncalled for and inactive at the lessons in physical education. The purpose with the study is to see what pupils in the ninth grade thinks about the contents of the subject and what they want it to contain to make the teaching more meaningful. The study also looks in to different methods that teachers in physical education use to make the lesson feel meaningful for all the pupils and how they work to activate and account inactive pupils. To collect the information we chose to distribute questioners to pupils and do interviews with teachers.

 During our education time, we have heard on several occasions how the high changing rate in the society also influences the education area. That changing process mainly originates from the transform that a school underwent, i.e. the decentralization meaning a delegation of responsibility from a national to local government and the particular school. The main idea that started a changing process goes under the slogan ?a school for everyone?.

Manual signs are an augmentative and alternative communication mode which enables and facilitates communication for persons with impairments in speech, language and hearing. There are different ways of teaching signs to persons with intellectual disabilities. One of them is milieu teaching, which is a method where the teaching takes place in natural settings. This method has proven to give good results in generalization and maintenance. Teaching signs to staff in groups has been shown to be effective.

In today?s society there is a discussion regarding students? level of knowledge and personalisation. The classrooms consist of heterogenic groups of students with different learning needs and levels of knowledge. The purpose of the present study is to find out how the students who participated perceive the teaching of English as an additional language with regards to personalisation, and how they believe differentiation can help develop and deepen their learning. This study has been conducted using a qualitative method with interviews as the core, complemented by observations. The results have been analysed and interpreted hermeneutically. The results show that those students who have a positive attitude to English education, irrespective of their grade, are those who see the benefit of knowing English outside the classroom, and thereby create a connection between reality and studying English.

The question how teaching should be organized in order to give the students the help and support they need to reach their goals is always of vital interest. All students are unique individuals with different prerequisities, possibilities and needs. Streaming in mathematics could be one solution.The first week at upper secondary school a diagnostic test is carried through. Thereafter, the result is used as a basis for dividing the classes into different teaching groups. Thus, the groups working with mathematics become more homogeneous and the students? previous knowledge is approximately at the same level.

AimThe purpose of this study is to investigate how schools who have a health concentration and schools who haven?t are teaching physical education and if possible compare these schools.This study is based on following questions: How do schools with a health concentration and schools who haven?t, in compulsory school, teach physical education and health. How do physical education teachers describe their teaching and how do the students describe it.MethodMy study is a qualitative study based on interviews with teachers and students from different schools. The interviews have been made on four different schools from all over the country. I have interviewed one physical education teacher and four students, two boys and two girls, from each school.

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.

The aim of this study is to investigate English teachers? communication when teaching English in grade three in Swedish schools. The investigation seeks to find out what language is, and why it is, dominant and how the proportions in the teachers? uses of English and Swedish in time are distributed. The study also describes what attitudes teachers have to the English language and if, if so how, two categories of strategies, namely body language and code switching are used.The study was performed in two steps with different methods for collection of qualitative empirical data.

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.

The aim of this study is to investigate a number of class teachers' thoughts on the use of information and communications technology (ICT) in early literacy learning. The study has been conducted as a qualitative study, interviewing five teachers with the help of an interview guide. Three central questions were posed.What perception do the teachers have about the use of ICT in their tuition?What perception do the teachers have about the pupils' literacy learning in teaching with ICT tools?What perception do the teachets have about teaching and learning by means of ICT when it comes to pupils with reading and writing difficulties/dyslexia?The overall theoretical basis of the study is Vygotskij's sociocultural theory.In conclusion, the result of the study is as follows.Most class teachers feel that the training they have undergone in ICT education was adequate, but they also call for skill development.Most teachers believe that the use of ICT tools provide opportunities to adapt their teaching to pupils' knowledge level. The teachers' opinion is that ICT in teaching is useful for pupils' progress in early literacy learning.Most teachers also believe that ICT tools in teaching can be of some help for pupils with reading and writing difficulties/dyslexia.One obstacle in helping these pupils is lack of time.Therefore, the majority of the teachers hand these pupils over to special education outside the classroom..

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 purpose of this paper is to investigate some aspects of teaching environmental issues, as they are manifested in another culture. In this paper, I will discuss how you teach environmental issues, how the teaching environment is formed, and what an environmental issue means to a South African teacher, as well as, if there are any cultural aspects to what an environmental issue is. Seven observations were made and qualitative interviews with four teachers teaching Life Science in Cradock, South Africa - The results showed that these South African teachers, independent from each other, followed a similar pattern in their teachings. These patterns contain gathering information concerning environmental issues in the immediate surroundings, as well as using the text book and teaching environmental issues through lectures. It was not possible to draw a conclusion about the cultural aspects in association to environmental issues.