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.

The purpose of this study is to investigate what five primary teachers in five different schools with many second language students have for an idea about inclusion, language development, practices and environment of the multilingual classrooms. In my study I discusses teachers 'views on the multilingual classroom, inclusion, development of language in a language developing classroom environment and the importance of language skills has for multilingual pupils' language development and learning of the Swedish language. The method used was unstructured interviews using a digital recording device. The results showed that for these five teachers, meeting second language learners was in there everyday teaching, while it is a challenge to motivate and support them on their level. The teachers work diligently to find a balance and a working classroom environment for the multilingual classroom where all students, regardless of conditions, background, experience, knowledge and language could be offered an equal opportunity to education. .

AbstractThe Swedish society has always been monolingual, but has for the past decades transformed into a multicultural and multilingual society. The aim of this study is to investigate if and in that case how preschool teachers work with language development in bilingual and multicultural preschools. The concept of linguistic and cultural diversity includes several different components, not least the social interactions that are of great importance to every individual's development, learning and participation in the world. By understanding the importance of language, language development and the role of mother tongue in second language acquisition, we look into various researches done concerning the effects of the preschool teachers? opinions, methods used to language developmental primarily for children who are multilingual and how the physical environment is shaped to promote language in multicultural and multilingual preschools.The method used in this study is semi-structured interviews with preschool teacher working in multicultural or bilingual preschool settings.

The aim of this master thesis is to investigate how parents? in multilingual families perceive language learning and reading for young children, and how their practice of this can be understood in relation to their language situation and cultural background.This study focuses on the interaction between parents? and young children in the light of the literacy practice. Important concepts such as early childhood literacy and family literacy have been used to study language, culture and literacy practice as phenomena that interact. The theoretical framework is a sociocultural perspective. Through qualitative interviews with seven parents?, it was found that multilingual families have a strong ambition for their children to learn all the languages spoken in the family.

Sweden has a growing proportion of children living in a multilingual environment. It is thus highly important that caretakers as well as professionals who meet these children have knowledge of multilingualism and its impact on language development. Also, an increase of referrals of multilingual children with suspected language impairment to speech and language pathology clinics is seen.The objective of this study was to investigate the linguistic ability in both Swedish and Arabic in a four year old child with suspected language impairment. A further aim was to implement an intensive intervention and evaluate the efficacy of it. Language testing in both languages showed that the boy?s greatest need was in the lexical domain.

A prerequisite of an international exchange of information is multilingual tools for information retrieval, such as the multilingual thesaurus. There is an ongoing discussion about the construction of, and the guidelines for, multilingual thesauri. In recent years the praxis as defined in ISO 5964 Guidelines for the establishment and development of multilingual thesauri 1985 has been the topic of a scientific discussion. It has been about how equivalence across languages is to be established when it comes to concepts, terms and relational structures. This masters thesis treats the praxis and practice of multilingual thesaurus construction.

The aim of this study was to investigate, illuminate and discuss teacher?s and multilingual student?s view on the connection between their mother tongue and their learning of other languages. This qualitative study is based on interviews with eight students in the 8th grade and two language-teachers from the same school, as well as ethnographic observations during English and Swedish lessons. With the help of some relevant theories, the empirical study is compared, analyzed and interpreted. The results show that the theories and informant?s view on the connection between the mother tongue and other languages are similar, which is that the mother tongue must be fully established before a new language can be taken in..

Swedish preschools have a variety of children of different ethnic origins. The intention of this thesis is twofold; firstly to deeply examine how preschool teachers work with languages and secondly how to integrate the Swedish language with other native languages in practice. Hence, the aim is to get a deeper understanding and knowledge about how to integrate multilingual children that have other languages than Swedish as their mother tongue. The data collection for this dissertation is based on observations and interviews with three preschool teachers and child minders. The theoretical background is taken from literature which describes the social cultural perspective.

The present study investigated free narratives in 72 children between 3;11 and 9;0 years. Participants were recruited from a multilingual environment in eastern Gothenburg. The children were instructed to make up their own stories after being provided with openings, ?Story stems?. The stories were then transcribed and analyzed on micro- and macro level and narrative evaluation.

Detta arbete ska ge oss en insyn i hur samarbete och samspel mellan förskollärare och modersmålspedagoger sker i förskolan..

This is a thesis on the Intranet use in the European Parliament. We investigated the use from a multilingual point of view, but also from a communication perspective. What we wanted to know was how a multilingual group, with presumably different computer skills, in the organisation handle the Intranet information. What are the positive and negative effects of a multilingual information exchange over an Intranet? To find out, we sent a questionnaire as an e-mail attachment to all members of a chosen committee and their assistants.

This research shows and analyses how pupils in ninth grade in the nine-year compulsory school look at being multilingual, at the Swedish language and at Swedish as a second language. I also want to know if language and culture knowledge are taken care of in school as it says in official documents for the Swedish school and as it also is desired in an intercultural education. For my research I do eight interviews in a suburb school south of Stockholm.My work includes a limited account for the current research about being multilingual, Swedish as a second language and about the close relationship between language and culture. The applied theory is a social constructivist theory which in short can be explained like that we construct social structures that have consequences on the individual as well as on the society.I show in my research how the view of the world around the pupils influences their view on their languages, their school and their neighbourhood. I also draw conclusions from my interviews that language knowledge is little appreciated in school and that Swedish as a second language has a low status..

The aim of this paper is to investigate the problems in multilingual thesauri, with a focus on the problem of conceptual equivalence between different languages. This study compares the problems and solutions that have been carried out in the Eurovoc multilingual thesaurus with the ISO 5964 ISO 5964 is a guideline for establishment and development of multilingual thesauri. The Swedish descriptors in the subject area "education and communication", from Eurovoc have been observed and compared with the guidelines recommendations. The results show that, the majority of the investigated Swedish descriptors do not present any problem. Most of the terms that are used as descriptors are found in dictionaries and glossaries or appear with high frequency in Swedish websites.

The purpose of the essay was to investigate the way four different educators, at a pre-school with a bilingual profile, work towards strengthening the children?s bilingualism as well as their identity. The research questions concern which guidelines are being used, the educators perceptions concerning children?s bi- and multilingualism and in what way they believe that their pre-school distinguishes itself from others.Qualitative individual interviews and observations were conducted and the empirical data was analyzed using a theoretical framework, constructed of theories concerning language development, ethnicity and identity.The result presented in the study shows that the pre-school not only follows the national curriculum but also their own guideline. The guideline states that there should be both Spanish- and Swedish speaking personnel and that they are ?responsible? for the education in their own language.

The purpose of this study is to the increase knowledge and understanding of the meeting between children with Arabian as native language and a Swedish school library. The study is made as a qualitative investigation built on interviews with eight-year-olds and eleven-year-olds. Only the childrens needs and views are considered. The study is centred on twelve key issues and aims to document the childrens thoughts and views of reading as well as their reading habits and their use of the school library. Through the childrens own words their evaluation of reading and literature, their abilities to assimilate the text and their de facto use of the books can be known.