The purpose of this study is to find out teachers view on manipulatives as a way to concretize a certain mathematical content and to highlight knowledge and experiences within the range of using manipulatives to concretize. By answering the questions below different approaches a teacher may have towards the manipulatives and how that may impact on student?s learning will also be discussed in comparison to mainly traditional and socially constructive theories of learning.What is the teachers view on manipulatives as a way to concretize?What purpose do they have when using manipulatives?According to the teachers, what does it mean to concretize a certain mathematical content?According to the teachers, what connection is there between manipulatives and concretizing?Through interviews and observations conclusions can be made that the teachers are in general positive towards using manipulatives as a way to concretize a certain mathematical content although the definition of what a manipulative is differ somewhat between the teachers. The teachers working with manipulatives do it in a well thought out fashion but more research is needed to furthermore define the purpose of using manipulatives. Few countries spend so much time concretizing and working with manipulatives as Sweden do, but still Sweden score below the OECD-average on the mathematical PISA-tests.

I förskolan idag strävar man efter att arbeta jämställt, vilket innebär att man utgår från varje individ. Man vill ge varje barn samma förutsättningar och chans till att utvecklas. Något som man jobbar mycket med är genus, vilket handlar om att i stället för att se könet så ska man se barnen och deras handlingar. Det jag ville med min undersökning var att titta på hur pedagoger agera i olika genusrelaterade situationer i förskolan. Om man kunde se någon skillnad i pedagogers agerande och varför de agerar som de gjorde.

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate emotions and collective identity in the handicraftmovement. Which are the collective identities of craft movement, and is it possible to speak ofan over all collective identity among the handicraft people? I will also examine the emotion workboth on individual and group level.Eight qualitative interviews were conducted to achieve the aim of this thesis. Research haspreviously drawn attention to handicraft from a gender and a historical perspective but neverfrom an emotional one. The theoretical framework derives from an emotion sociologicalperspective where Collins interaction rituals, emotional energy and Hochschild?s emotionmanagement is the main theses.

The aim of this Master's thesis is to investigate the library needs of distance students. This user study has a student perspective and concentrates on the main question of which way library needs might be expressed by distance students. Associated topics addressed by this study include; the problem of learning centres lacking their own library support, how distance students look upon library support as a concept and whether distance students prefer public libraries or university libraries, and why they make this choice. These questions may give the answer to how distance students deal with information literacy. Theories chosen by the study are in the fields of pedagogical and library science, the social cultural theory by Roger Säljö and in Tom Wilson's theories on user studies and information needs.

In July 2010 the curriculum Lpfö 98 was readjusted and was enhanced with new chapter, and the purpose of this essay is to study how preschool teachers discuss and describe how their conduction to the new chapter 2.6 of the readjust Curriculum Lpfö 98. I want to understand how they experience their work with the documentation.My question formulations are:How do three pre-school teachers reason around what they document in the pre-school?Which practical conditions do the pree-school teachers claiming to have on the pre-school to perform the documentation?How do they describe that they use the documentation to advance the tutoring in the preschool?In order to find out more, I interviewed three pre-school teachers, and analyzed the results I got based on prior research on documentation, and quality in preschool. My results show that the main focuses for documentations are how the children interact with each other, how they react and behave with new materials or activities. My informers emphasize that the main purpose of documentation are to be able to show the children their own process of learning.The practical conditions differ among my informers, which can lead to consequences when they want to make documentation and/or use the documentation for its purpose.  My results also indicates that the documentations are used to plan the pedagogical activities in regard to the children?s interests and according to the curriculum Lpfö98 rev.2010.

The aim of this study is to describe successful strategies to include children in free play activities at the preschool. The methods that pedagogues use to act and work with excluded children will be examined. To get answers to my questions I have conducted interviews with five pedagogues in four preschools. During interviews they mention two different approaches to encourage free play activity. One way was to participate and play along with the children.

The problem, which I want to highlight in this essay, is about my fear of losing face in conversationwith the parents of my text. I'm going through different approaches to find out what is happening inmy meetings with parents. I will also see if the knowledge that I get will help me to get deeperunderstanding of my reactions in different situations and if this opens up new possible ways ofhandling them.In my text there will be two stories where the conversation with parents has been difficult. Theyboth illustrate my uncertainty concerning the unpredictability of conversations with distressed orstressed parents. I can prepare the environment, by cleaning and making it look nice before meetingwith the parents.

Abstract__________________________________________________Sara NilssonAnnette OlofssonMatematik ses som tråkigt och svårt? hur kan elevers motivation och självkänsla hanteras?Mathematics is viewed as boring and difficult? how can pupils? motivation and confidence be dealt with?Antal sidor: 42__________________________________________________This report delves into primary school pupils? difficulties in mathematics, with emphasis on their lack of confidence and motivation. By researching literature and Internet sources associated to this issue, an in-depth view of these problems has been illuminated. Two teachers at a Swedish primary school were interviewed, in order to get their perspective of the matter. Questionnaires were sent to two teachers at an English primary school and their responses were returned.

AbstractThe purpose of this investigation was to understand how teachers/pedagogues nowadays work with mathematics in school. In what way can they pin point the difficulties a pupil with another language might have with mathematics.I started the process of this investigation by reading litterature on the subject. Then I did interviews with several teachers and pedagogues teaching in different schools with children at different ages.The results found in my investegation pointed to a lack of practical work with mathematics especially in classroom and revealed from the teachers a strong desire to work with mathematics in different ways.?Talking maths? with pupils in class will help them understand the subject better. Several teachers are of the opinion that the pupils will reach the goals in school with this method.The teachers are also aware of the importance of having practical mathematics.

This report will focus on the folkhigh-school in its general form and the role of the libraries on these types of schools in particular. A library on folkhighschools have a tendency to be forgotten and ends up being somewhere in the middle of the libraryworld and the general educational organisations. The purpose of this essay is to examine and provide general views on the different roles that a library on a folkhighschool can have, as well as looking into the unique aspects of the type of school that a folkhighschool is in terms of influencing the libraries placed there. The methodology used in this study is qualitative. Interviews have been held on three different folkhighschools in south of Sweden.

Gender is a universal factor that is unavoidable in classroom interaction between pupils and teachers. The principle aim of this essay is to illustrate whether, during the interaction between pupil and teachers still occurs behavior that expresses a gender order. We also want to establish if the ones who attract attention from the teachers is the individual, or if teachers still on a subconscious or conscious level, think of the pupils gender and ascribes him or her some characteristics or qualities. Especially we want to bring out the pupils thoughts and sights of there is a difference on how teachers treat boys and girls. Another purpose we wanted to achieve was to illustrate how teachers work with the concept of equivalence between the sexes, according to Lpo94.Our essay is built on our studies around what teachers think on how they treat the pupils, on the basis of gender perspective.

Title: "In the verdict, reality is reconstructed" - a documentary study of how sex is reproduced in verdicts of LVU-cases.The aim in our study is to see how existing circumstances revolving power between the gender, are contained in court, through language and differences in the sentences and expressions that are used in the verdicts. In this study we have reviewed verdicts about young people who are taken in to custody care by Lag (1990:52) med särskilda bestämmelser om vård av unga.We have reviewed verdicts from the county administrative court in Kalmar, from January in 2007 to October in 2008. Through the analysis we have taken into considerations and worked with earlier research and litterateur containing different theoretical approaches to feminism.The result of the study shows, that despite of a neutral law, girls and boys, women and men are judged and treated different, because of their sex. Depending on your sex, you are expected to behave according to norms and values. These norms and values are not the same for girls and boys.

A Geographic Information System (GIS) is about presentinginformation with the map as a base. This is increasingly being used on internetsites and in mobile apps. With a GPS it is possible to see where you are andhow to reach a destination or check if the bus is in time. A question to ask isif this technology is possible to implement in ordinary primary schooleducation. If it is, learning history, geography, religion and so on with a GISlearning tool might be possible.

Essay means attempt, and is a paper written based on self-experienced dilemmas, which the writer then returns to, reflect upon and discusses on the basis of literature and accepted theories. In this essay, I reflect upon my own professional role as a leisure-time pedagogue. The leisure-time pedagogue must provide activities that in different ways relate to the curriculum 2011. I have therefore a responsibility to influence the students' desire for knowledge. Focus of learning is different from the one in school, with an emphasis on informal learning.The dilemma is that I am unable to do any pedagogical work at the museum because of many conflicts.

The aim of this study is to examine how two Kenyan school's approaches gender roles, by what the curriculum says and by how the teachers way of teaching are effecting the creation of gender roles. The aim is further to find out what the Kenyan school settings are, according to gender and equality, and how these are implemented in practice. This was examined through interviews at two local schools in Kenya, with five practicing teachers from grade one through grade six. This work compares the respondents' answers to the research that is related to the topic. Because of lack in the research about Kenya, the research has been based on mostly Swedish investigations.