The purpose of my study is to investigate teacher?s perceptions of their mission in the preschool class, and how they work to promote children?s written language development. What methods and working methods they use to awaken curiosity and motivate children to read and write. I am using the qualitative research method to get answers to my questions. I have made four qualitative interviews with four teachers in preschool classes from different schools.My questions are:What conceptions does teachers have about their mission in a preschool class?What different methods and approaches does teachers use to stimulate and wake children?s curiosity for reading and writing development?The theoretical basis for my study is the socio-cultural perspective, where learning occurs in interaction.

The following paper is about degrading treatment in preschools and the essay discuss degrading treatment according to the Swedish school law, in preschools and the chosen focus for this study is three to four year old children. The aim is to see whether or not preschool children proceed with degrading treatment towards other children and if preschool teachers believe that children this young have the ability to do so. The questions for this study are: Can children proceed with degrading treatment towards each other? Which conflicts evolve through children?s interactions? Can children in pre-schools have a degrading behavior? To answer these questions participant observation at two preschools and interviews with four preschool teachers were chosen as method. The perspective of this paper is based on the view on children as actors, which is used to acknowledge and enhance the possibilities of letting the children?s own voices be heard.

The purpose of my study was to find out how staff in after-school activities thinks they work with norms and values, we may call this values education, and how this in turn may influence children's norms and values. By extension, how children are socialized with each other and develop socially. In my research, I have interviewed five of the after-school activities staff who work with children aged 6-9 years at a school in the neighbourhood Rinkeby-Kista in northwestern Stockholm.The results show that after-school activity according to the staff can play a very important and sometimes crucial role in children's social development. Staff believes that if they do not learn the social rules by participating in playing and games in early childhood, when growing up they are outside and cannot participate. By their pedagogical approaches, in terms of values and norms, the adults in after-school activities can help children to become socialized into a community of solidarity and eventually as adults become responsible citizens able to function and participate in society..

AbstractIn my work on language development in preschool the purpose was to examine how and to what extent the pre-school supports children with special needs in their language development. Trough qualitative interviews with four preschool teachers, I wanted to see how they work with language development in preschool. In the study, Main questions asked in the inquiry :How do teachers and support children?s language development?What techniques, resources and tools available to facilitate language development? The conclusion that I made from my inquiry is that the primary language stimulation methods teachers use to encourage children?s language development are rhymes telling, books reading and song singing based on active selection of pieces that match the children?s maturity level.And how they are using different language stimulation techniques Karlstad model, TAKK (Signs of augmentative and alternative communication) and TRAS (Early registration of language development) to promote children?s language development. Keyword: Language development, language stimulation, treatment, communication, methods..

The purpose of this study is to find out which attitudes, norms and values exists about lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) families in preschools. Based on five qualitative interviews with teachers that work at a LGBT-certified preschool and one that is active in their work with norm critical pedagogy. To be able to fulfil my purpose of this study I concentrated on why these teachers believed that it was of importance to counter society?s heteronormativity, to prevent discrimination and mistreatments towards children and their LGBT parents in preschool. I wanted to find out what the teachers thoughts were on the concept of what a family is and how the diversity of families is shown in the preschools material and pedagogy.When I analysed the results of my qualitative interviews I used queer theories that include heteronormativity and norm critical pedagogy.

Abstract   Study: Degree project in teacher education, Advanced level, 15 hpUniversity of Skövde.Title: ?The aim is for them to manage as much as possible on their own? ? a qualitative study of preschools´ indoor environment as a pedagogical tool for the independence of children.Number of pages: 31Author: Jenny Karlsson, Marie PerssonTuto: Gunvi BrobegDate: 2009-01-28 Keywords: Independence, indoor environment, preschool, pedagouge This study aims at examining the indoor environment of three different preschools as a pedagogical tool for the independence of children. Is the design of the premises adapted to the height of the children? Can they themselves reach the material they need and is it possible for them to reach their outdoor clothes or do they constantly have to ask for help? In order to acquire a deeper understanding of the different views of the three preschools, the question is asked: what are the pedagogues thoughts of the indoor environment of their own preschool in the perspective of childrens independence and what affects their choice of furnishing, planning etc? The preschool curriculum clearly states that the children must be given the opportunity to develop their independence. We have experianced that the pedagogues feel that they are unable to plan the environment as they wish and thus, interest is also pointed towards the question: are there any limiting factors that affect the design of the indoor environment, and, that being the case, which are they? The study is based on qualitative observations and interviews because it is in its interest to discern patterns and categories rather than quantity.

This study, written in the form of an essay starts with the visualized narrative of a preschool preparatory training experience. The narrative illustrates a troubled conjunction between teacher and parent. The troubled conjunction concerns how long the preschool preparatory training should be. The objective of this study is to explore my own actions and with the outset of my professional role assess and learn what happens in this meeting.My question formulations are: How can I relate to parents with other expectations then mine? What kind of dialog can I hold with the parents?I closely monitor my experiences and my practical knowledge, objectively and meticulously.

The aim of this study is, from a norm-critical approach, to find, investigate and analyse human representation in the visual culture of one preschool in order to understand if the children enrolled are represented or not. The research questions are: In what ways is there imagery of human representations in images and materials designed for play? What skin-colors and origins are dominant in the data collected?We carried out a qualitative study in the form of visual ethnography. This method allowed us to use a combination of different data collection tools such as photography and ethnographic field notes to collect our data. The photographs we took of images and material used for play, was then analysed through semiotic picture analysis.

AbstractThis essay aims to problematize and illuminate the connection between special-education and nature-based activities. With a theoretical ground that is based upon a sociocultural perspective I consider the information from the field. Through a qualitative and critical perspective I performed individual interviews with five pupils from the sixth school-year in the Swedish elementary-school. I also performed Focus-group interviews with two educators and three teachers in the same school-form. By a Hermeneutical working-method I have found out that the informants in my survey have a common experience that activities performed in nature has a positive effect on learning.

Research has shown positive correlations between global self-esteem and physical activity, as well as between global self-esteem and school performance. However, research is ambiguous and other variables have shown importance for global self-esteem. This study aims to investigate the correlations between global self-esteem and physical activities, school performance and social participations within high-school students in the northern part of Sweden. The study also investigates gender differences regarding correlations between the variables. The study was conducted using a questionnaire that included Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale and self-rated physical activity, social participation and grades in Swedish, English and mathematics.

Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to investigate to what a few preschool teachers and mother-tongue teachers consider the influence mother-tongue training has on children. The thesis also looks into how these teachers cooperate and view about the mother-tongue training organization structure and what support mother-tongue teachers get in the concerned preschools. More specifically:What influences do three preschool teachers and three mother-tongue teachers consider that mother-tongue training has on the development of the children?Which support do the three mother-tongue teachers receive from the preschool principals and other preschool pedagogues in their work? - Is there any cooperation between them?In what way do the three preschool teachers and the three mother-tongue teachers think that the mother-tongue training organization structure affect the children?s status in the group?Method: In order to achieve a deeper understanding of the context, a qualitative method based on interviews and observations was employed and relied upon. Three preschool teachers and three mother-tongue teachers from two different preschools in the same municipality were interviewed to acquire answers to the questions concerned.Result: The result of this enquiry shows a direct and explicit comprehension that mother-tongue is immensely important for children?s development.

This paper is about teachers ?attitudes towards their pupils, both today and in the past. It describes various events with Adam, Elsa and Kajsa which I have observed at my preschool. Via a retrospective analysis I have attempted to understand how teachers ?views of their pupils has changed from the beginning of the century to the present day.

Work environment activities, such as work health promotion, can take place at different levels - though the best result is obtained when all levels can interact. The overall aim with this study was to examine the impact of health promotion on work related well-being and stress in an industrial company. The focus was on employee experience of and participation in company initiated wellness activities. A quantitative cross-sectional study was conducted in which parts of the Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire (COPSOQ II) were used to examine factors in the psychosocial work environment, and well-being was examined with the Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS). In all 303 employees (50 %) responded to the survey.

The purpose of this study was to investigate how the special education, for children with language impairment in preschool, was organised in a municipality in Sweden. The study was based on interviews and field studies as the primary research tools in qualitative and ethnographic method. The result showed that special education teachers were localised in different geographic areas of school and that there were preschools that lacked special educational expertise in language impairment. Literature and the importance of playing for language development were emphasised as well as the use of signs and visual aids as augmentative and alternative communication. In the preschool for children with language impairment, the teachers carried their knowledge into practical and pedagogical work.

The aim of this study is, using the Swedish expression ?kulturtant? (cultured lady) as starting point, to understand how and why women consume the products of the culture industry more eagerly than men. The study is using the concepts put forward by Pierre Bourdieu; fields, capital and habitus. It is a qualitative study based on discussions in focus groups, interviews and material gathered through Google Alerts. In the literature this gap between the sexes with regard to the higher consumption on behalf of women has been referred to as the ?puzzle? of women´s cultural consumption.The empirical results show that the women in the study are well aware of what they want to gain by participating in cultural activities like reading, going to concerts, watching plays or going to the movies.