The aim of this essay is to get a view of the contemporary approach to children´s learning and how children´s learning and development are influenced by the preschool year for six- year olds, by analyzing the Swedish curriculum. What is the purpose of the preschool- year for six year-olds? What does the curriculum say about what children need when entering primary school? I also wish to investigate how through the curriculum common norms and standards, as far as children´s learning are concerned, are shown and discussed. My result show that the curriculum does not mention much about the preschool year for six-year-olds at all. It seems that this year in school is not given priority, which makes it difficult for the teachers to work with the children of this age and to know what their assignment is.

The study is based on Lev Vygotskijs and John Dewey's learning theory. Such is ?the zone for immediate development? and ?learning by doing?.Purpose: The study's purpose was to examine how four teachers´ work with bilingual children's language development in a preschool and in a preschool class. These questions will be answered in my study: 1). which view of bilingualism have been the educators? 2).

The purpose of this thesis was to study how preschool teachers interpret the values of the preschool curriculum that relates to culture and how the teachers describe how they work with these values in their professional practice. The study is based on social constructive and discourse analytic perspectives. I have studied how preschool teachers construct the concept of culture and the values of the preschool curriculum through a specific way to describe this. A specific way to talk about something is called a discourse. In other words I have studied preschool teachers expressed discourses about culture and their professional practice with the values of the preschool curriculum.To study this, I've done interviews with four preschool teachers.

The aim of this studyhas been to capture preschool children's strategies, when they include and exclude each other in play. My aim was also to find out how children choose to integrate into an already existing game. My questions were: What strategies are used by the children at the preschool when they want to exclude or include each other? How to integrate the children when they want to be involved in an ongoing game and how they will be received during the time of play? My theoretical starting points are from Vygotsky's theory of proximal development zone, and Michel Foucault's perspective on power, and also research on the subject.The empirical study was conducted using the observations at two preschools. The children I observed were between four to five years old.The results show that children used different strategies, and when the strategy did not work so the child could switch to another.

The aim of this study is to observe Swedish preschool children in their natural habitat and without any intervention. Four different observations are made and thereafter analyzed. Throughout the whole study the subject of interest is the children's communication in their play. Children can communicate with each other in various ways, for instance with speech and without speech, i.e. with their physical language, aesthetic and multi language.

How do special educators work to include children with special needs in preschool? That was the question that our thesis proceeded from, and the purpose was to get an insight in the methods used by the special educators to achieve inclusion. Our questions were: ? Is Swedish preschool a place for inclusion? ? How are special educators work organized and focused? ? Which experiences do special educators have working with children with special needs in preschool, and what role do they mean that inclusion plays in this work? Our procedure in this enquiry was to perform semi-structured interviews with 5 different special educators in two different cities. Interpretation and analyis proceeded from three different theories: Urie Bronfenbrenner?s ecological systems theory, John Bowlby?s theory of attachment and Karsten Hundeide?s sociocultural theory. The result showed support for the idea of the Swedish preeschool as a place with many opportunities for inclusion. We have also seen how both money and political decisions has an impact on which possibilities the preschools receive to work with inclusion. In addition it became apparent that the methods used by special educators differed depending on both cities and districts.

AbstractThe aim of our study was that from a Preschool Manager?s perspective to describe, analyze and understand the function of special education and the Special Education Teacher?s profession within preschools. We conducted twelve interviews with Preschool Managers in two northern Swedish municipalities. From a theoretical base, we used both the relational and categorical perspectives. All answers from these interviews have been analyzed from these perspectives.

Abstract  Nilsson, J. (2011) Waldorf preschool and municipal preschools - How they look at the preschool curriculum. Degree in the teacher education program. Gävle. University of Gävle.

AbstractMany opinions are divided on what religious freedom should protect and the area is unexploredin preschool. Is it the parents, the child or preschool teacher right? The aim of the studywas to investigate Maria klasson Sundin´s concept and theoretical models of religious freedomfor children through three Swedish preschool settings and also how three teachers interpretsand expresses children's freedom of religion. Through a qualitative interview study theaim was to investigate how the concepts of religion, autonomy and freedom is interpreted andexpressed by the teachers so a picture through this three concepts can categorise the teachersin a model; freedom of thought, tradition and life interpretation model so a broader picturecan be made to understand how the children's freedom of religion is expressed in the preschoolsetting and how the teachers work. The Result showed through the analysis that themodels fail to categorise the teachers in any theoretical model but on the other hand the understandingof preschool teacher?s expression and interpretation of the concept of religion,autonomy and freedom showed both diversity and lack of knowledge on the subject mattersreligious freedom which fall within the child rights issues.

The purpose of this study was to explore preschool- and primary school teachers? perceptions of fairytales, why they use fairytales and what thoughts they have about the impact of fairytales on children?s reading and writing development. We interviewed seven teachers and three preschool teachers in northern Sweden to find out how work with fairytales is carried out in preschool and primary school. We also interviewed twelve pupils who were seven and eight years old to find out what they thought of fairytales in primary school. The result showed that preschool- and primary school teachers had a positive attitude towards fairytales and the opportunities provided by fairytales.

My goal in this study was to research how teachers with education in pedagogical drama think about drama and how to use it as an educational tool. The method I used to acquire the results was by interviews. In total I interviewed six different teachers which had some kind of education in pedagogical drama. This study revealed that all the teachers in some way used educational drama in preschool. The purpose with educational drama is to improve the children's fantasy, creativity, empathy, self-awareness and also their ability to co-operate with other children.

This study deals with teachers ideas about the physical environment of a mobile preschool and how it affects children?s learning. The essay describes how the preschool bus is decorated and how a normal day works in the mobile bus. The survey was based on the following questions:Are there disadvantages and advantages in terms of physical environment in the mobile preschool from an educator based perspective?What are the teacher?s thoughts about the impact on children?s learning in terms of the physical environment on the bus?Summary: To answer my questions I have participated in activities during the day and I have used the interviews to find out the teachers thoughts.

This is an ethnographically inspired study focusing on multilingualism in a Swedish preschool setting. The purpose of the study was to find out how the children perceived their multilingualism and how it was expressed by the children in the interaction with teachers and peers. The research questions were as follows: How is the multilingualism expressed in the day to day interaction in preschool? What significance does the daily interaction with peers and educators have for the children?s perceptions of their multilingualism? How do the children perceive their multilingualism and the value in their multilingual abilities?  To answer these question methods inspired by ethnographical studies were used, namely participant observation and semi-structured interviews with the children.   Theory was used from two areas; childhood sociology as theorized by Corsaro with the ideas of peer cultures and interpretive reproduction, and the sociology of language with the theory of collaborative empowerment as introduced and developed by Cummins. The children in the study were seen as social actors who are important here and now and who contribute to the development of society.   The study showed that the multiple languages were visible in the preschool, but that the Swedish language was upheld as the norm and the language of communication; no children were recorded playing in their ?home language? during interaction with other children.

According to the Swedish preschool policy documents all children should have the same opportunities to develop their early language skills regardless of their social background. The purpose of this study is to investigate how preschool teachers work with children's early literacy and language development with focus on reading aloud. The reason is to investigate how the preschool teachers work to create an environment that stimulates children's literacy and language development. Another intention is to study how often reading aloud occurs in the children's home environment and what the preschool teachers thoughts are about that. The study is based on interviews with four preschool teachers and surveys that were answered by parents.

AbstractThis study deals with preschool children's ideas about water in our body. Ten children with the age of four to five were interviewed individually, the interviews were qualitative. The children were also asked to draw their answers and answer questions about a picture that represented the excretory system. The results of my study show that children did not have any knowledge about the water being vital for us. Preschool children had no knowledge of why it is important to drink water.