Purpose: The purpose of this work is to investigate teachers' professional attitude to homework as a method. The study will also provide answers to the purpose for which the homeworks are used in teaching and if the individual circumstances and needs are met by this method.Method: Qualitative research was conducted through interviews with four teachers from three different schools. In addition, published surveys were used in support of reasoning.Results: Neither the curriculum or the syllabus mentions homework. There are no directives for how much time should be dispensed with and the extent of a homework should be. In teacher training literature the homework is not discussed.

The aim of this study is to gain an understanding of former criminals' own experience of their entry into criminality and to identify and analyze the factors they use to explain their path into criminality. To study this area, a qualitative method has been applied with five semi-structured interviews of ex-criminals from an organization that works to help and support people who have previously been involved in crime by offering employment, education, and rehabilitation in order to be further integrated into society again. To analyze the respondents' stories about their way into criminality, the theory of social bond by Hirschi has been applied and contribute with insights in later criminal acts as well as the theory has been problematized to some extent. Today, there is a lot of research on different aspects that can explain the way into criminality in different aspects, on the other hand, research has largely been measured with a quantitative approach with statistics and self-reported data. This study therefore intends to apply a qualitative approach, where ex-criminals themselves describe their path into criminality.

This master thesis is discussing ten pony books from 2006 in relation to the heterosexual matrix. It contains a rather extensive research overview regarding horse riding from a gender perspective, pony books, traditional feminist studies of girls? books and queer readings of girls? and children?s literature. The aim of the empirical study is two folded; firstly to show how the girl protagonists? horse riding is presented in terms of masculinity and femininity (as defined by Natalie Koivula), secondly to analyze the relations between the girls appearing in the books from a queer perspective attempting to find some queer leakage in the depictions.

This study addresses mandatory non-trading periods for Swedish stock market participants which have implemented an open-market share repurchase program during the period 2000 until 2010. By locating the date of publication of interim reports, these mandatory non-trading periods called silent periods are examined. The result indicates that repurchase trading activity occurs despite the statutory prohibition. By studying the price support hypothesis assumptions about long- and short-term effect on share price and performance, this study tries to explain these tendencies. An average decline of share price and performance is shown among companies entering silent periods.

The purpose of this thesis is to examine how gender is constructed in presentence reports written by social workers? as mandated by 11§ LUL. Young offenders are often assigned normative masculine or feminine attributes by personnel at treatment centers, girls are considered emotional and in need of support while boys are considered disorderly and in need of structure. Young female delinquents are victimized which affects their culpability; they are less likely to be held responsible for the crimes they committed. Young male delinquents are viewed as aggressive and in control; they are more likely to be held accountable for their criminal actions.

The purpose of the present study is to investigate mindfulness as a New Age phenomenon in the modern western society. Since a religious phenomenon does not exist in a vacuum, but is dependent on its historical and cultural context, my aim is to give a broad depiction of mindfulness and New Age in its wider context, the historical background and the societal implications of common values, themes and concepts that are frequent in the literature, how mindfulness is presented by the authors of popular literature and also how it is presented in science. In order to bring forward a deeper understanding of New Age and mindfulness? role in the modern western society, my intention is to see how the authors of mindfulness claim validity of their doctrines in the discourse. Mindfulness attracts a wide range of perpetrators and is used in many areas in the society today.

Forestry in Sweden is currently conducted in a manner aiming at equating the production objectives and the biodiversity. To ensure that biodiversity is maintained, patches that are considered to be valuable now or in the future is saved in final fellings. How the tree retention areas will grow into the future forest stands is yet unknown.The purpose of this study was to visualize how different scenarios of natural consideration taken at final felling will evolve in a long term perspective, for two rotation periods. Projections of the forest conditions were executed with the decision support system Heureka and its applications PlanStart and PlanWise. The information about the projected forests was then used for the visualizations which were created in the software Visual Nature Studio.

Denna rapport är resultatet av ett examensarbete inom Industriell Produktion vid KTH, utfört vid Avalon PLM AB. Syftet har varit att grundligt utreda vad som krävs för att sätta upp en "first line"-support för användare till Siemens Industry Softwares produktportfölj. Målet med examensarbetet var att ta fram en kravspecifikation för det system som ska hantera kundernas supportärenden, samt hitta och utvärdera ett befintligt system som lever upp till kraven. Vidare togs också en support- och ärendehanteringsprocess fram, vilken beskriver hur ärenden ska skötas.Inledande frågeställningar för examensarbetet var frågor som; Hur hanteras ett ärende? Hur många ärenden kommer supporten hantera per dag? Hur kan supportingenjören få hjälp om ärendena är för avancerade? Är kundsupport bara en kostnad för företaget eller vilka bieffekter kan det medföra?En litteraturstudie gjordes för att få grundläggande förståelse för olika typer av supportkällor, CRM, kunskapsförmedling, syftet med kundsupport och supportingenjörens roll.

Protracted social conflicts, as those in Cyprus and Northern Ireland, are based on deep rooted perceptions of identity and definitions of "the other". According to the theory of discursive conflict transformation, war is primarily a social phenomenon, which is legitimated by a discourse of identity defined in terms of exclusionist boundaries and structural ideas of the social relations in society. In order to develop positive peace, the discourse of violence has to be challenged and the discursive structures that enable war have to transform into a counterdiscourse of inclusion and individuality. For the purpose of making a critical peace analysis, I have, with the assistance of established conflict theories, analysed the basic ideas behind the the Annan Plan and the Belfast Agreement and thus been able to interpret to what extent they may foster positive peace. I argue, that in order to provide basic needs on a group basis, power sharing arrangement, based on ethnicity or religion, exacerbates division rather than ameliorating it.

The study´s purpose is to investigate the underlying norms of how the concepts of language development and learning, used in the preschool curriculum. Knowledge of the concepts underlying norms can help to make visible what approach preschool teacher is expected to have to children's language, in relation to development and learning. The results of the study may in turn provide a picture of societal norms on children in preschool and a deeper understanding of the importance of preschool to review and analyze the content of the curriculum, then it is not a foregone conclusion.Theoretical basis is curriculum theory, which involves studying curricula in order to create a knowledge of a society and its cultural, social and economic demands. Norman Faircloughs critical discourse analysis is used as a method, in order to achieve the study´s intention and answer the questions at issues in the study. The critical discourse analysis considers that the discourse is creating the social world through language.The results of the study show that there is a language in the curriculum as normatively may influence preschool teacher.

This thesis explores the position of book blogs in the literary system through Robert Escarpit's socio-literary model of the book market. Simultaneously the thesis serves as a test for Escarpit's theory: by actively applying his theory and model to a very new and contemporary actor on the book market I hoped to reach or confirm new insights into the usefulness and validity of Escarpit's work for contemporary socio-literary studies.Three book blogs were selected for the analysis and interviews were carried out with the authors. The interview questions were formulated specifically for the purpose of extracting the kind of information necessary for an analysis using Escarpit?s theory. As a complement to the interviews, statistics on the type of books reviewed on the blogs were also compiled.

Amyotrofisk lateralskleros (ALS) är i nuläget en obotlig sjukdom och sjukdomsförloppet går ofta väldigt fort. Omvårdnaden måste därför vara specifik för dessa patienter. Syfte: Huvudsyftet med denna litteraturstudie var att belysa vårdpersonalens stöd och bemötande av patienter med en obotlig sjukdom som ALS och deras närstående. Syftet var även att belysa hur de närstående påverkas av att vara vårdgivande åt sin närstående med ALS. Metod: För att besvara våra frågeställningar har vi valt att göra en litteraturstudie som bygger på tio vetenskapliga artiklar.

Background: To be a parent to a child dying of cancer affect not just the parents themselves, but the whole family. Experiences of fear, powerlessness and anxiety surrounds them. Nurses need knowledge about parents? experiences to help and support these parents adequately. Aim: The aim of the study was to describe parents? experiences of losing a child to cancer, from diagnosis to the child?s death.

The aim of this paper is to investigate and analyze practices in multilingual classrooms of mathematics in a compulsory school in Sweden where immigrant students have been known to succeed. The school is situated in a suburban and segregated area outside a major city where pupils come from mainly limited socio-economic backgrounds. The rate of second language learners are 70% of all pupils in this school.By using ethnographic methods, mainly interviews and participant observation, data was collected in four mathematics classrooms which corresponded to consecutive ages of education. The data include field notes and observation of artifacts in the environment as well as interviews and informal conversations with teachers and school leadership. Information from the school website, the authority in charge of quality in Swedish schools (Skolverket) and the municipality were also used.The analysis is based on a socio-political viewpoint that power is relational and reflected within schools.

With the collapse of the Soviet Union and the 9/11 attacks, the landscape of the freedom of religion has changed. The issues now facing freedom of religion varies greatly from the issues that the drafters of the universal declaration of human rights faced after World War II.In the light of the new issues that States face in the intersection of religion and societal interest, scholars have criticized the European Court of Human Rights to give too much leeway to the States in determining how the human rights should be implemented, by using the doctrine of margin of appreciation. Critics of the margin of appreciation claim that it is based on culture relativism and that the doctrine undermines the universality of the human rights. In order to decide if the margin of appreciation has indeed led to a relativization of the human rights I compared it to the jurisprudence of the UN Human Rights Committee and its use of the Syracusa principles. My conclusion is that the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights cannot be considered to be based on culture relativism.