<div>This dissertation investigates three utterance fluency features and two vocabulary features of 409 speech samples from advanced intermediate and advanced L2 English speakers, who participated in the Oral English Proficiency Test (OEPT) between the year of 2009 and 2015. Among the 409 L2 English speakers, there are 80 L1 Hindi speakers rated as advanced intermediate, 32 L1 Hindi speakers rated as advanced, 286 L1 Mandarin speakers rated as advanced intermediate, and 11 L1 Mandarin speakers rated as advanced.</div><div><br></div><div>Hierarchical Cluster Analysis (HCA) was conducted and presented four different clusters among all the L2 English speakers. The four different clusters are: (1) Low Mean Syllables per Run (MSR), low Speech Rate (SR), very high Pause Rate (PR), medium Measure of Textual Lexical Diversity (MTLD), and medium percentage of words on the Academic Word List (AWL); (2) Medium Mean Syllables per Run (MSR), medium Speech Rate (SR), high Pause Rate (PR), low Measure of Textual Lexical Diversity (MTLD), and low percentage of words on the Academic Word List (AWL); (3) High Mean Syllables per Run (MSR), high Speech Rate (SR), low Pause Rate (PR), medium Measure of Textual Lexical Diversity (MTLD), and medium percentage of words on the Academic Word List (AWL); (4) Medium Mean Syllables per Run (MSR), medium Speech Rate (SR), low Pause Rate (PR), very high Measure of Textual Lexical Diversity, and very high percentage level of words on the Academic Word List (AWL).</div><div>Chi-square results show that L2 English speakers’ cluster membership is strongly associated with both their L1 background and level of L2 oral English proficiency. While most of the advanced intermediate L1 Mandarin speakers are in Cluster 1 and Cluster 2, the majority of the advanced intermediate L1 Hindi speakers concentrate in Cluster 3. A large number of advanced L1 Mandarin speakers and L1 Hindi speakers are also located in Cluster 3.</div><div><br></div><div>Twelve raters were invited to evaluate speech samples representative of the four clusters in terms of accent difference and listener effort. Twelve speakers were selected from the four clusters, whose speech samples have values of the five linguistic features closest to the cluster mean.</div><div><br></div><div>Multi-facet Rasch Measurement (MFRM) results show that L1 Mandarin speakers generally received lower ratings in accent difference and listener effort. The connection among fluency, vocabulary, and accentedness/listener effort, however, functions differently for L1 Mandarin speakers and L1 Hindi speakers. For advanced intermediate L1 Mandarin speakers, those who speak slower and use more diverse vocabulary and more academic words were evaluated to be less accented, meanwhile costing less listener effort. However, advanced intermediate L1 Hindi speakers were rated as less accented and cost less listener effort when they demonstrate higher fluency measures and lower vocabulary measures.</div><div><br></div><div>Advanced L2 English speakers, in contrary, received reverse rating results. The advanced L1 Mandarin speaker, who speaks faster and uses less diverse vocabulary and fewer academic words, was evaluated to be less accented and cost less listener effort. However, the advanced L1 Hindi speaker, who speaks slower and uses more diverse vocabulary and more academic words, was rated as less accented and cost less listener effort.</div><div><br></div><div>This dissertation reemphasizes that holistic rating rubric does not deny the existence of multiple linguistic profiles. Raters are sensitive to different combinations of fluency and vocabulary features even if they have been asked to use a holistic scale. In addition, L2 English speakers may adopt individual strategies to accommodate while delivering, which calls for further pedagogical attention.<br></div><div><br></div>

This study aims to examine if English as a L2 influences the construction of Swedes’ social identities but also whether any linguistic strategies are used to strengthen their identity. Furthermore, the study aims to study if there is a difference in bilingual Swedes' reflections on the topic compared to multilingual Swedes. With Giles and Johnson’s Ethnolinguistic Identity Theory and Gumperz’ Interactional Theory as theoretical backgrounds, data was gathered through both quantitative methods, such as an online questionnaire, and qualitative methods in the form of a focus group consisting of both bilingual and multilingual Swedes. The results vary as some of the participants see English as influential to their identity construction while others view it merely as a practical tool. Moreover, the data also shows that it is more common amongst multilingual Swedes to use linguistic strategies such as code-switching, to strengthen their in-group relationships whilst bilingual participants used linguistic strategies for a different purpose: to distance themselves from their in-group identity.

In the current study, 34 nine graders in a Swedish school were given a test where they would interpret sarcastic and ironic utterances from the American series Modern Family by explaining the implication in their own words. They were also asked to assess their own knowledge of English by filling out a questionnaire containing both qualitative and quantitative questions. The aims were to investigate whether the students understood the implications and if the total score could be connected to their own perception of their level of proficiency. The results show that although plenty of the students assessed themselves being highly comfortable with English as a foreign language, it did not result in a high understanding of sarcastic and ironic utterances. Out of 646 possible points, the students only reached a score of 156 in total. It was also clear that their self assessments did not comply with their results. While confident students received low scores, insecure students did well on the test.

The purpose with this study is to find out about teachers’ strategies and views on availability when it comes to the English subject for pupils with a different mother tongue than Swedish or English in Swedish schools. This study includes the views of five teachers who teach English in years 4-6. The background is focused on the fact that Swedish schools nowadays are multicultural, meaning that there are pupils from different countries. It is a common conception that this plays a significant role when it comes to pupils’ success in second-language learning, in this case the English language, since it is more difficult to learn a target language for pupils who are not proficient in the language which serves as a medium of teaching. Previous research seems to support this view, but it is currently not known exactly what the role of the pupils’ L1 is in L2-learning. This qualitative study is based on interviews that were conducted in five separate schools in two different municipalities. The results that we have gathered show that there are different views on how learning should be organized, including the most appropriate strategies for the case. Our results also show that these teachers are of the opinion that smaller teaching groups are to be preferred, but that the limited time together with limited resources have a negative impact on pupils’ learning in general.

This independent degree project investigates the vocabulary profiles in English language learning textbooks used in Sweden, and whether the vocabulary profiles follow the expected levels according to the CEFR and The Swedish National Agency for Education. This was done by a corpus-driven method, as well as a lexical analysis using search tools such as the English Vocabulary Profile, Text Inspector, and Compleat Lexical Tutor. The corpus contained texts from six different textbooks used in year 6, year 9, and in the English 7 course, as well as a number of news articles from The Guardian. The news articles served the purpose of comparing the vocabulary levels in the textbooks for English 7 with the vocabulary levels in advanced written English, which is a requirement for students to be able to understand in order to reach the grade E in English 7. The lexical analysis focused on lexical diversity, word families, word frequency, and the CEFR levels. The results showed that the vocabulary levels in the textbooks were appropriate, but that they might not provide enough challenge for students aiming for the higher grades. Results also showed that the vocabulary levels advanced in relation with the school years. The analysis revealed that between 90 and 97 percent of the vocabulary in the texts were categorized as within the CEFR levels that were expected of each of the school years. Pedagogical implictions drawn from this investigation are that teachers should teach about word families and that they can benefit from using the EVP when providing educational material in addition to textbooks.

This study explores the impact of a pedagogic intervention grounded in Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014) designed to support language learners’ development of their English argumentative writing skills. The predominance of argumentative writing in school curricula and language assessment reflects the importance of helping language learners master this text-type in order for them to succeed in academic settings. This pedagogic intervention drew specifically on the Appraisal system of SFL to make explicit to students the interpersonal and evaluative language resources they can use to establish authoritative and intersubjective positioning as key means of achieving the overall purpose of argumentative texts. The study documents the impact of explicating to students appraisal resources during class instruction and helping them make more informed language choices as they engage with the information presented in their texts, and shape the interaction with their readers. The study drew on quantitative data stemming from students’ writing tasks and qualitative data in the form of reflection tasks and a research journal to explore the extent to which students’ understanding and use of different appraisal resources could be positively affected by the pedagogic intervention at the heart of this study. The analysis of the findings suggests that the intervention was successful in helping students familiarize themselves with and incorporate appraisal language to effectively convey their intended meaning in the composition of their argumentative texts. The findings also suggest that the teaching intervention contributed to students’ increased awareness of the range of lexicogrammatical choices available to them when they write as reflected in students’ skillful use of these resources in genre-specific ways. This included using appraisal resources to develop well-supported claims, in addition to establishing a critical authoritative position. Discussion of these findings focuses on the value of this type research on the pedagogic applications of the SFL framework as a way of advancing our understanding of how to better scaffold language learners and help them gain greater explicit control of the language resources necessary to successfully construct academic texts. As such, this study argues for the potential affordances of teaching pedagogies grounded in SFL theory in supporting language learners’ academic writing development. This study presents a case for the ability of SFL-informed pedagogies to empower students as writers by offering them new ways of looking at the writing process and using language to engage in advanced acts of meaning-making.

This study explores the possible relationship between extramural English (EE) and students’ willingness to communicate (WTC) in the EFL classroom in the Swedish upper secondary school. The study employed a mixed-methods approach, and the data was collected through a questionnaire and interviews. The results of the study suggest that EE usage positively affects students’ language proficiency and their self-perceptions of their English ability, which in turn is beneficial for their WTC in all contexts inside the classroom. The results also show that the students who spend the most time in EE contexts reported higher levels of WTC than the non-frequent users of EE. Productive EE activities were also found to be more beneficial for raising students’ WTC than receptive activities. The connection between EE and WTC is, however, not absolute since a minority of the students reported a high frequency of EE but low WTC, which indicates that several other factors might also be influencing upper secondary school students' WTC.

It has been widely debated whether the use of the mother tongue is effective when learning a new language or if teachers should instead use the target language all the time in a language classroom. While some research shows that the use of the mother tongue is detrimental, other studies suggest that it can be used as a tool (e.g. for translations and for instructions) for teaching a new language. This study aims at exploring whether English or Swedish is predominantly used in English language teaching in Swedish primary schools and which factors contribute to the choice of language. Three primary school teachers and their pupils aged between 8 and10 at two primary schools in Sweden participated in the study. The data were collected through surveys and observations and analyzed using qualitative content analysis. The findings show that the Swedish language is predominantly used during English lessons. Moreover, according to the participants in the study, this dominance is linked to the teachers´ need to create a positive classroom environment where the pupils feel safe, comfortable, and confident using their mother tongue as a tool for language learning.

Syftet med denna studie är att undersöka utmaningar som nyanlända elever i grundskolan kan stå inför i den ordinarie undervisning, samt hur de kan övervinna svårigheter i engelskämnet. Studien genomfördes bland elever i grundskolan i Södermanland. Två uppsättningar data användes: En med semistrukturerade intervjuer med fem elever från högstadiet, samt klassrumsobservationer av tre olika klasser under två olika tillfällen (på förmiddag och på eftermiddag). Uppgifterna analyserades med hjälp av en kvalitativ metod och med hjälp av Vygotskijs sociokulturella teori, vilken handlar om att lärande och kognitiva språkkunskaper sker i interaktion och samspel med andra genom dialog och stöttning av kunniga personer (Vygotskij, 2001). Resultaten visade att elevernas tidigare kunskaper i engelska och bristen på ordförråd påverkar deras engagemang under lektioner. Det visade också att elevernas modersmål (L1) och andra språkkunskaper (L2) kan används som resurs för att utveckla elevernas kognitiva språkkunskaper i engelska som ett främmandespråk (L3) med stöd och hjälp av alla aktörer (lärare, studiehandledare, klasskamrater och föräldrar).

This study investigates the potential benefits of reading strategy instruction in the English classroom in an L2 learner context. We examined the effects of reading strategy instruction on reading comprehension for L2 learners and investigated howreading strategies should be taught in the context of Swedish upper secondary school. To this end, six empirical studies were evaluated. We found that reading strategy instruction had a positive impact on reading comprehension in general, but that it was especially effective for certain student groups. Namely, intermediate learners benefitted more than other groups, while the weakest students improved the least in response to instruction. Furthermore, the research we examined suggests that it may be advantageous to focus on teaching a single strategy at a time. However, it is important to eventually expand students’ range ofstrategies long-term, since many pupils tend to over-rely on problem-solving strategies to the detriment of their progress in reading. Thus, emphasizing the less frequently used support strategies during instruction may help students read moreefficiently. Additionally, for reading strategies to best benefit learners, they should be taught in a clear, step-by-step manner. Finally, we argue that using aspects of Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory to inform lesson plans would greatly benefit students, especially those who are less proficient. Due to the lack of research in the increasingly heterogeneous Western world, future research should investigate how reading strategy instruction behaves in a multicultural context in the West.