Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 1999 / Vita Includes bibliographical references (p. 202-206)

Arbetet handlar om en ny förordning som kommit till i januari 2006. Förordningen innebär att alla elever i skolåren 1-9 ska ha en individuell utvecklingsplan. Vi har undersökt hur arbetet med förordningen fungerar ute på fyra skolor i södra Halland och hur skolorna arbetat fram sin individuella utvecklingsplan samt hur den används i det vardagliga arbetet. Den viktigaste frågan för oss har varit att ta reda på om lärarna har ansett att arbetet med den individuella utvecklingsplanen tagit tid från undervisningen eller om det är ett hjälpmedel. Vårt resultat visar att de intervjuade lärarna tyckte att från början tog arbetet mycket tid, men efter att ha arbetat med den en tid ser alla lärarna en stor fördel med att alla elever har en individuell utvecklingsplan. Fördelarna lärarna ser är bland annat att det är lättare att individualisera undervisningen, eleven ser sitt eget lärande och vid eventuella skol/lärarbyten så underlättar den individuella utvecklingsplanen övergången.

Introduction – Project-based organizations face a series of challenges when trying to implement and manage their project portfolios successfully in line with their strategic goals. Good project portfolio management (PPM) practices play a crucial role in maintaining well performing portfolios, but PPM is still a fairly new academic field. And it was found that the current PPM literature embodies a gap in providing explicit governance criteria to assure consistent portfolio decision-making. Problem – What are the criteria of portfolio governance that contribute to better aligning the project portfolio to organizational strategy? Do project-based organizations in fact not implement a governance framework to guide their decision-making rationale? If there is some sort of a governance framework, do project-based organizations implement it in a consistent manner every time they take portfolio-related decisions? Purpose – The purpose of this study is two-fold. First, we attempt to fill a gap in the current PPM literature by proposing a portfolio governance framework that could enhance project portfolio decision-making. Secondly, it is our goal to find out whether decision makers in project-based organizations consistently cover all issues related to portfolio governance at portfolio meetings. Methodology – The study employs both qualitative & quantitative methods to fulfill the two-fold nature of the study. A Portfolio Governance Framework, comprising 26 statements, was developed on the grounds of existing literature on PPM, strategy & governance. The proposed Framework was then used as a basis to carry out an online survey in which 31 respondents (executive level) from 25 project-based organizations (operating in Sweden) were asked about how consistent they are in discussing relevant portfolio governance issues. Conclusion – The empirical findings of this study indicate that the majority of project-based companies do not employ a governance framework when it comes to portfolio decision-making. In the few cases that they do, it is mostly a set of policies that is not applied on a consistent basis.

The purpose of this study was to examine through interviews, how preschool teachers describe educational documentation and how they use this educational tool in their everyday activity. To get an overview of what educational documentation can be, the study takes its startingpoint in the educational movement in Reggio Emila in Italy after the second World War, where educational documentation was an important part of the educational philosophy. The background also gives an overwiev of the policy documents for preschools in Sweden. The study shows that educational documentation run the risk of being confused with or reduced to the children’s folders, where the aim is to describe with a few chosen pictures the child’s growth trough the years in preschool. But this is no educational documentation. The study pointed at the educational factor as an important aspect of how teachers describe their work with educational documentation. Further and recurring education is essential in the dynamic profession of preschool education. Leadership seems to be important, especially for the teachers that has not had any further education. The time for work with educational documentation is described as adequate, but when the question of joint refexion came up, the time was said to be too short. The dialogue that is important for the educational documentation does not take place. ICT, Information and Communication Technology, plays an essential part in today´s work with educational documentation. The access to technical equipment and knowledge how to use it is varying and in need of improvement.

Introduction: A trend for organisations to change from single to multiple project management has been observed over the last couple of decades. Organizations shifted their focus from single project management towards the simultaneous management of the whole set of projects as one entity – project portfolio. New multi-project settings require a new management approach and practices to successfully manage a portfolio. A common practice in organizations is to evaluate projects after they had been carried out. At that point not much can be done and it is impossible to improve performance and prevent failure. Hence, problems that occur in projects’ implementation phase remain unsolved and even unidentified. Constant control, review and monitoring of projects’ performance in the implementation phase could lead to the problematic portfolio areas being spotted and timely management decisions being made in order to improve the overall portfolio performance. Problem: How do organisations manage projects within a portfolio that perform poorly in the implementation phase? Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is: to describe to what extent and in what ways organizations control, review and monitor project performances in the implementation phase; to identify if organisations use any methods, tools or techniques in order to spot projects that perform poorly according to their expectations; and to discover what happens to the poorly performing projects in the implementation phase after they were identified. Method: An electronic qualitative questionnaire had been constructed and sent out to the 46 sampled Swedish companies currently running project portfolios. 115 most suitable respondents had been chosen to answer the survey. Frame of Reference: Theoretical framework is built on the literature within project portfolio management field, mostly concerning control, review and monitoring of projects of projects’ performance within their implementation phase; practices used to manage poorly performing projects as well as the value of organizational learning. Conclusion: The research results show that even though majority of the studied organizations are aware and striving towards efficient project portfolio control, review and monitoring, a lot of space for improvement still remains. Results reveal that organizations are trying to keep track of projects’ performance within a portfolio, however, very few poorly performing are identified. Moreover, the management practices for underperforming projects are still very limited if not non-existent.

Some studies have shown that managers concentrate large fractions of their wealth in the equity of their own firm. In this paper we use a unique dataset and investigate how Swedish owner-managers invest remaining wealth conditional on a major investment in their own firm. We find no[JR1] evidence that owner-managers seek diversification benefits when they invest remaining wealth. Instead some owner-managers invest remaining wealth in the industry where they already have a substantial capital investment. We conclude that some owner-managers seek to exploit their industry-specific superior information when they invest wealth not tied up in their own firms. / <p>QC 20130515</p>

Syftet med denna studie var att undersöka vilka utvecklingsmaterial som används på förskolorna i en mindre kommun i Sverige och om användandet av dem kan leda till att enskilda barn bedöms. Ett annat syfte var att ta del av förskollärares tankar kring begreppet bedömning då vi själva ville ha en ökad förståelse för detta begrepp. Vi valde att anta en hermeneutisk ansats och arbetade på ett kvalitativt arbetssätt. För att samla in resultat till vår studie genomfördes intervjuer. Intervjuerna skedde med utbildade förskollärare. De kvalitativa intervjuerna transkriberades för att analyseras ihop med relevant litteratur och det låg till grund för studiens diskussion. Resultatet av studien visar att samtliga förskollärare vi intervjuade arbetar med samma slags utvecklingsmaterial och de arbetar med dem på ett sätt som till största del stämmer överens med materialens grundidé. Dock förekom vissa avvikelser men dessa har mindre betydelse för användandet av materialen. De material som användes var främst utformade för att se barnens utveckling och därefter vidareutveckla verksamheten. Förskollärarna var tydliga med att upplysa om att de inte bedömde barnen i förskolan. I resultatet framkom att de dock ansåg att begreppet bedömning var svårt och de hade inga bestämda tankar om det.

Using electronic portfolios (e-portfolios) to assist learning is an important component of future educational models. A portfolio is a purposeful collection of student work that exhibits the student's efforts, progress and achievements in one or more areas. An e-portfolio contains a variety of information about a person's learning outcomes, such as artifacts, assertions from others, self-reflective information and presentation for different purposes. E-portfolios become sources of evidence for claims about prior conceptual knowledge or skills. This thesis investigates using the information contained in e-portfolios to initialize the learner model for an intelligent tutoring system. We examine the information model from the e-portfolio standardized specification and present a method that may assist users in initializing learner models using e-portfolios as evidence for claims about prior conceptual knowledge or skills. We developed the EP-LM system for testing how accurately a learner model can be built and how beneficial this approach can be for reflective and personalized learning. Experimental results are presented aiming at testing whether accurate learner models can be created through this approach and whether learners can gain benefits in reflective and personalized learning. Monitoring this process can also help ITS developers and experts identify how an initial learner model can automatically arise from an e-portfolio. Additionally, a well-structured learner model, generated by an intelligent tutoring system also can be attached to an e-portfolio for further use by the owner and others.

The purpose of the qualitative study titled An Investigation of Formative and Summative Portfolio Assessment Methods, is to explore the experiences of a self-described eclectic, primarily constructivist writing instructor who employs portfolio assessment methods in post-secondary writing classes taught to pre or in-service writing teachers. This Action Research study focuses retrospectively on the experiences of the instructors formative and summative assessment of post-secondary writing portfolios. The study also explores theoretical grounding of which educators are often not consciously aware and adds insight into the existing body of knowledge on portfolio assessment practices.<p>The research question is as follows: How does a post-secondary writing instructor employ formative and summative portfolio assessment methods within a constructivist writing community and how does s/he describe the teaching/learning relationship that consequently develops? <p>The goal of the study is to explore in depth one instructors experiences in post-secondary writing courses. I used the following questions as a guideline. <br> to discover how the instructor uses a formative portfolio assessment process of teaching to positively affect the development of writerly skills in a constructivist writing community<br> to discover how the instructor uses summative portfolio assessment of writing to provide accountable end-of-term numerical ranking of student achievement for educational institutions<br> to describe the perspective of a constructivist writing instructor on the use of formative and summative portfolio assessment practices at the post-secondary level<br> to discover the effect formative and summative processes and the constructivist writing community has on the teacher/student relationship <p>Upon analysis of the interview transcripts, I found that teaching, for my participant, is a colourful tapestry that stands alone as her well-crafted teaching practice, but can also be viewed as 4 distinct panels that fit seamlessly together. These four themes are: <br>1. Portfolio evaluation of writing provides for the Constructivist conditions for learning as identified by Driscoll (2000).<br>2. Portfolio evaluation is most effective when built on a foundation of Community within a group of writing students.<br>3. Portfolio evaluation promotes balanced transactional experiences that result in transformation for both student and teacher.<br>4. Portfolio evaluation of writing, as a teaching practice, shows promise for the successful education of marginalized students. <p> I also found that this research has only rippled the surface of a pool of anecdotal knowledge that invites full immersion. I am drawn to further exploration, discussion, development, implementation and assessment of models of formative evaluation that will benefit our students of writing. To this end I have included recommendations for further study specifically aimed at exploring the promising practices of portfolio evaluation for marginalized peoples, most particularly First Nations, Métis and Inuit students, at various levels of education, including primary, secondary and post-secondary levels.

Intresset för ämnet uppstod under en av mina verksamhetsförlagda utbildningar då dokumentationsmetoden disskuterades med verksamma inom förskolan. Bilden som målades upp kring arbetet med portfolio var då att pedagogerna nästan inte har någon tid att arbeta med dessa i den dagliga verksamheten, men också att dokumentation inte tas tillvara på i ett senare skede för ett vidare lärande.   Studien syftar till att synliggöra arbetet med portfolio som dokumentationsmetod i ett urval av förskolor. Studien är gjord på tre olika förskolor belägna i två olika kommuner i södra Sverige.   För att få en insikt i ämnet görs kvalitativa intervjuer med pedagoger som arbetar på de olika förskolorna. Pedagogerna som intervjuats är väl insatta i ämnesområdet och har arbetat i förskola och med portfoliometoden under en längre tid. Studien utgår från ett sociokulturellt perspektiv på lärande. Frågeställningarna som studien grundas i är följande: Hur används portfolio inom förskolan för att synliggöra och dokumentera barns lärande? Hur upplever pedagoger arbetet med portfolio inom förskolan? Hur används portfolion vid övergångar till andra förskolor eller till skolan?     Genom studien har jag fått veta att många förskolor just nu genomgår ett förändringsarbete gällande portfolio och dokumentation. Pedagogerna beskriver arbetet med dokumentation som ett krävande men ett absolut nödvändigt arbete. Gällande frågeställningen kring hur portfolio och dokumentation används vid övergångar från förskolan och skolan har jag fått kunskap kring att dessa sällan används eller följer med barnet till en annan verksamhet.