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This case study describes and examines the pedagogical practices of urban middle school teachers who execute multicultural literature unit plans with students of color. Culturally relevant theory guides the analysis of the teachers’ planning and pedagogy. The data gathered include; semi-structured curriculum director, teacher and student interviews; field notes of classroom observations; student reflective journals as well as curriculum artifacts. Data were analyzed and coded for findings, and implications for further research are given. Findings show teachers enact some, but not all principles of the framework of culturally relevant pedagogy. / Literacy & Learners

This study investigated the efficacy of culturally adapted bibliotherapy in promoting resilience among American Samoan children aged 5-13 years in response to high adolescent suicide rates in the Pacific Islands and the need for culturally adapted and supportive interventions grounded in mental health wellness. Bibliotherapy, particularly the identification with story characters, has been recognized for bolstering mental wellness, resilience, and emotional regulation in children. In this research, the children's response to bibliotherapy was measured through card sorting and forced-choice exercises, assessing their engagement with literature mirroring their experiences. The materials were developed in collaboration with Samoan cultural brokers on island to ensure cultural relevance, focusing on emotions commonly faced by children, such as sadness, anger, and fear, within the context of school bullying and the grief of losing a loved one. Findings suggest that the adapted stories significantly aided the children in relating to the characters and their challenges, demonstrating that culturally sensitive bibliotherapy may be a promising approach for reinforcing resilience in Pacific Islander communities. The study concludes with a discussion on the practical applications of these findings.

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Culturally responsive education has been an actual topic in teacher education for decades, but most teachers still finish their education without appropriate knowledge and skills for teaching in culturally and linguistically diverse classrooms. Providing quality education to diverse learners remains a challenge, particularly in the fields of mathematics and sciences. The purpose of this systematic literature review was to describe intervention programs preparing in-service and pre-service math and science teachers for teaching in culturally diverse classrooms, and the outcomes of such programs. A search for scholarly journals evaluating such intervention programs has been carried out in several databases, resulting in nine articles included in the analysis. Intervention programs described in these articles covered several important aspects of culturally relevant education and had a limited success in developing cultural responsiveness of teachers. The construct of culturally relevant education is complex and multi-layered, and thus hard to measure without simplifying it to measurable constructs. Limitations of the study and implications for the future research and practice are discussed.

Erfarenheten av och forskning om sex- och samlevnadsundervisningen i skolan pekar på att undervisningen inte är till belåtenhet hos eleverna. För att utröna detta ytterligare valdes en studie med syftet att undersöka flickors och pojkars uppfattningar om innehåll och undervisningsmetoder inom sex- och samlevnadsundervisningen i skolåren 7-9. Hur undervisningen skall vara utformad för att kännas meningsfull för eleverna är av intresse i studien. Studien genomfördes utifrån en kvalitativ ansats med enkäter och gruppintervjuer som metod att skapa ett empiriskt material. Undersökningen genomfördes på två skolor. I enkätundersökningen deltog 47 elever och i gruppintervjuerna deltog fyra flickor och fyra pojkar. Resultatet visar att flickor ochpojkar anser att sex- och samlevnadsundervisning är viktigt och att de fått en relevant undervisning under grundskolans senare år. Gemensamt för flickor och pojkar är att de vill ha en varierad undervisning av såväl innehåll som undervisningsmetoder. Viktigt är att den som undervisar i området skall vara väl insatt och ha stora kunskaper inomområdet. Den som undervisar får heller inte, anser eleverna, bli generad och tycka att det är pinsamt när eleverna ställer frågor. Eleverna i undersökningen saknar dock utrymme för diskussion i undervisningen. Studien visar även att eleverna uppfattar att en stor del av undervisningen läggs på frågor rörande sexualitet, könsorganens anatomi,könssjukdomar och preventivmedel. Däremot läggs endast en begränsad del utav tiden på samtal rörande samlevnad, vilket är ett område som eleverna efterfrågar i undervisningen. För att åstadkomma en meningsfull undervisning i sex- och samlevnad ur ett elevperspektiv förutsätts att eleverna får tillgång till information om vad undervisningsområdet skall innehålla. Genom förhandsinformationen kan eleverna ges inflytande i undervisningen. Av stor betydelse för eleverna är att läraren utgår ifrån elevernas frågor och vad eleverna känner är relevant för dem just nu. / Experience and research of sexual education in school shows that the teaching is not valued as satisfaction by young people. To investigate this statement a study of girls’and boys’ perceptions of content and teaching methods in sexual education in secondary school was conducted. How the teaching should be designed to be meaningful is of interest in the study. The study was conducted with a qualitative approach where the key is to get the different views. To gather the data both questionnaires and group interviews were used. The questionnaires study involved 47 students and group interviews four girls and four boys. The result shows that students believe that sexual education is important and that they had received a good education in secondary school. Common for girls and boys is that they want a varied teaching of both content and teaching methods. It's important that anyone who teaches in the area must have good knowledge. The students also think that the teacher must not be embarrassed and think it's embarrassing when students ask questions. Students in the investigation wants more time for discussions. The study also shows that a large part of teaching is on issues related to sexuality, genital anatomy, STD and contraception. On the other hand is only a bit of time about relationships, which is an area that students are asking for. In order to achieve a meaningful education, from a student perspective, requires that students gain knowledge of what the area contains in order to be able to have influence in teaching. By preliminary information students can be given influence in teaching. It's of great importance that the teacher understands students' questions and what students feel is relevant for them right now.

This thesis examines meaning-making in three different areas of undergraduate physics: the refraction of light; electric circuits; and, electric potential and electric potential energy. In order to do this, a social semiotic perspective was constituted for the thesis to facilitate the analysis of meaning-making in terms of the semiotic resources that are typically used in the teaching and learning of physics. These semiotic resources include, for example, spoken and written language, diagrams, graphs, mathematical equations, gestures, simulations, laboratory equipment and working practices. The empirical context of the thesis is introductory undergraduate physics where interactive engagement was part of the educational setting. This setting presents a rich data source, which is made up of video- and audio recordings and field notes for examining how semiotic resources affect physics teaching and learning. Theory building is an integral part of the analysis in the thesis, which led to the constitution of a new analytical tool – patterns of disciplinary-relevant aspects. Part of this process then resulted in the development of a new construct, disciplinary affordance, which for a discipline such as physics, refers to the inherent potential of a semiotic resource to provide access to disciplinary knowledge. These two aspects, in turn, led to an exploration of new empirical and theoretical links to the Variation Theory of Learning. The implications of this work for the teaching and learning of physics means that new focus is brought to the physics content (object of learning), the semiotic resources that are used to deal with that content, and how the semiotic resources are used to create patterns of variation within and across the disciplinary-relevant aspects. As such, the thesis provides physics teachers with new and powerful ways to analyze the semiotic resources that get used in efforts to optimize the teaching and learning of physics.