<p>My aim with this paper is to see whether there are any differences, when it comes to learning English, between students in practical and theoretical programs at upper secondary school in Sweden. I have looked at what differences there are when the students begin the programs and how the English A course differs in material, the students’ influence on their own studies and the atmosphere in the classrooms. Earlier studies have shown that adolescents from the lower social classes more often choose a practical program while students from higher social classes tend to choose a theoretical program. The students’ grades from lower-secondary school have an influence on the choice of program as well. Those with low grades from elementary school frequently choose a practical program whereas students with better grades more often choose a theoretical program. Though in my study, the students’ former grades did not differ that much. Further, studies have shown that students who would like to learn languages are divided into two types. The students are either so-called instrumental or integrative learners. My study showed that integrative exercises are used more often than instrumental exercises in upper-secondary school. Unfortunately, there are also some students that do not want to learn a second language at all and such students are in almost every class but they can be found more often in practical courses. To conclude, I found out in my study that there were differences between the courses in theoretical and practical programs. The differences affected the students in a way that made it easier to achieve a better grade in English in a theoretical program.</p>

<p>The aim of this study is to examine the language from a small sample of texts from the chat channels of World of Warcraft and analyze the differences found between World of Warcraft English and Standard English. In addition, the studywill compare the language found in World of Warcraft with language found on other parts of the Internet, especially chatgroups. Based on 1045 recorded chat messages, this study examines the use of abbreviations, emoticons, vocabulary, capitalization, spelling, multiple letter use and the use of rare characters. The results of the investigation show that the language of World of Warcraft differs from Standard English on several aspects, primarily in the use of abbreviations. This is supported by secondary sources. The results also show that the use of language is probably not based on the desire to deliver a message quickly, but rather to reach out to people. In addition, the results show that the language found in World of Warcraft is more advanced than a simple effort to try to imitate speech, thereby performing more than written speech.</p>

<p><strong> </strong></p><p> </p><p>The concept of outsiders has been argued to be one of the main themes in childhood fairy tales in general and in J.K. Rowling's <em>Harry Potter</em> novels in particular. Severus Snape is one of the most evident outsider characters in the novels, described as an unpleasant, ugly man presented as a double agent with uncertain allegiances. When the truth is revealed, in the very last pages of the series, he is discovered to have been an undercover spy for the good side all along. This essay examines Snape as an outsider, and analyzes his effect on the novel, especially his relation to the three characters with whom he interacts most: Dumbledore, Voldemort and Harry. All three of these characters are main characters and are also outsiders themselves in different ways. Examining the relations between good and evil and showing that these concepts are closely tied to choices and reactions towards being an outsider, the essay argues that the analysis of Snape as an outsider helps distinguish between aspects of good and evil in the novel. By focusing on Snape and the concept of the outsider, different dimensions of the novels become visible. Snape is here an instrumental character on his own, and may well be seen as the main character. Although the series in some aspects has been described as a fairy tale, the complex character of Severus Snape gives the novels a further depth appealing not only to children, but to adults as well.</p>

<p>Being a skilled reader makes it easier to learn a new language. It is important to teach students how the knowledge and use of reading strategies can facilitate learning. This study was made in a Swedish fourth grade class with eighteen participant pupils. They were asked to translate two texts from English into Swedish: one was a poem with nonsense words, and the other a prose text. The texts were taken from <em>Through the Looking Glass</em> by Lewis Carroll and <em>The Garbage King</em> by Elizabeth Laird. After this an interview was made with all of the pupils in pairs, where they were asked about their reading strategies normally and in this situation. The results found were that the reading strategies used were: <em>likeness with their native language</em>, <em>previous vocabulary knowledge of the L2</em>, <em>syntactic knowledge</em>,<em> </em>and<em> guessing the meaning through the context</em>. The result confirms previous research in that the pupils who liked reading and did so in their spare time, did better when it came to making syntactically correct translations.</p>

<p>The purpose of this essay is to investigate what different ways there are to teach English grammar at upper secondary level and what guidance experienced teachers have to offer. This is done by studying different theorists’ ideas on language acquisition as well as what researchers’ opinions are on how to teach grammar. I have also interviewed seven experienced teachers who work at upper secondary level.</p><p>The results of this investigation show that explicit grammar teaching has decreased over the years and been replaced by implicit grammar teaching and communication exercises. Grammar teaching has become integrated with activities focusing on meaning and is taught more through examples than by using grammatical terminology. Since students frequently come into contact with English they are not thought to need grammar rules as much, since they learn the language in a native-like way almost. However, they repeatedly make some mistakes. Each teacher had different methods for dealing with these mistakes, but they seemed to be keeping in mind the students’ needs and the curriculum.</p><p>In this study, I will highlight some methods for teaching grammar, factors that can influence learning and provide information on some existing theories about how students learn their second language.</p>

<p>Sammandrag</p><p>Med detta arbete vill jag titta på de största skillnaderna mellan en kommunal-, en Montessori- och en Waldorfskola med inriktning på deras engelskundervisning. Detta för att få inspiration till olika sätt att undervisa elever i problem på, i framförallt engelska. För att kunna se de största skillnaderna och likheterna mellan den kommunala skolan, Montessoriskolan och Waldorfskolan började jag med att studera vad som finns skrivit om dem i litteraturen.</p><p>Efter att ha gjort detta valde jag att ta kontakt med en skola av varje sort. Jag besökte de tre skolorna under två dagar vardera under tre veckors tid. Under de två dagarna satt jag med i klassrummet och tittade på hur undervisningen såg ut. Besöket avslutade jag med att intervjua den lärare vars klassrum jag besökte. Intervjufrågorna jag ställde till lärarna var formulerade utifrån den litteratur jag studerat.</p><p>Jag kom fram till att det inte bara finns skillnader utan även likheter mellan skolorna, framförallt mellan den kommunala skolan och Montessoriskolan. Detta både i litteraturen och i resultatet. En av de största skillnaderna mellan de olika pedagogikerna och skolorna var utöver hur de lägger upp elevernas skoldagar, hur de använder sig av de nationella proven. Den kommunala skolan gör de nationella proven i årskurs fem, medan Montessoriskolan gör femmans nationella prov i både fyran, femman och sexan, och Waldorfskolan inte gör dem över huvud taget mer än i årskurs nio. Både Montessoriskolan och Waldorfskolan anser att de kräver mer av sina elever än vad som görs i de nationella målen. Men alla tre skolorna följer målen, även om Waldorfskolorna har sin egen läroplan.</p> / <p>Abstract</p><p>In this study I have looked at some of the differences between a municipal-, a Montessori- and a Waldorf school, with focus on their English teaching. This is because I wanted to find ways to teach English to pupils with various types of learning difficulties. To be able to see the main differences and similarities between a municipal school, a Montessori school and a Waldorf school I began with literature studies.</p><p>When I had finished the literature studies I contacted three schools that applied the different pedagogies. I visited the three schools during two days each through a three-week period. During these two days I was in the classroom when the pupils were there and followed the teachers’ teaching. I ended the visits with an interview with the teacher whose classroom I visited.</p><p>I came to the conclusion that there are both differences and similarities between the three schools. The two schools that are most similar are the municipal school and the Montessori school both in the literature and in the result from the observations and interviews. Two of the main differences between the schools are how they plan the school days for the pupils, in which order they have the lessons, and how they use the national tests. The municipal school uses the national test in fifth grade, the Montessori school uses it in the years four, five and six and the Waldorf school only use it in year nine. The Montessori school and Waldorf school believe that they require more from their pupils that the national goals. All the three schools aim at those goals, but the Waldorf schools have their own curriculum.</p>

<p>Syftet med arbetet har varit att öka kunskapen om musikintegrering i barns språkinlärning. Jag ville ta reda på vilka metoder lärare idag använder för att lära ut språk samt vilka hinder och möjligheter de anser finnas i arbetet med musik. Arbetet är byggt på intervjuer med lärare i grundskolans tidigare år och en musiklärare som arbetat som kompanjonlärare i grundskolan. Samtliga lärare såg musik som en viktig del i undervisningen, men hur de använde sig av musiken var olika. Två lärare spelade själva instrument, medan övriga lärare använde sig av CD-skivor och kassettband. Musikläraren, som skulle samarbeta med klasslärarna, ansåg inte att många lärare var tillräckligt engagerade och lade istället upp sina lektioner självständigt. Lärarna får medhåll av flera författare som skriver om hur viktigt det är med musik i skolans undervisning och då speciellt vid språkinlärningen. Kritiker menar dock att att det ännu inte finns några undersökningar som konkret visar på ett orsakssamband mellan musikintegrering och språkinlärningen.</p>

The purpose of this degree thesis is to investigate what the English teachers in an upper sec-ondary school, think about teaching students in ability grouped classrooms. The questions that I have set out to investigate include what the teachers think about ability grouping in English, the school’s current organisation of ability groups, the pros and cons of ability grouping in English, differentiation in teaching and if students get more individualized teaching with abil-ity groups, how the teachers cooperate and what would be the optimal teaching situation in an English learning classroom. I did a lot of theoretical research on the subject and studied old essays on similar subjects. I also did some classroom observations to use as background information for my interviews. I interviewed five teachers of different sex, age, and teaching experience. The teachers clearly had different views on the pros and cons of ability grouping and how to deal with the stu-dents’ different levels of English. They all agreed on the advantages it creates for the teachers, the main advantages being the small groups and the students being on almost the same level. They also agreed on the difficulty of individualised teaching, even with ability groups. Most of them also agreed that the main problem with ability grouping is how to deal with the weak-est or most basic level. It’s important that they have good pedagogical teachers who want to teach them and know how to. It also leads to problems amongst the teachers, in deciding who should or wants to teach which group and how to teach on a certain level. The teachers all had different ideas on how to improve the organisation of English teaching, from small mixed groups or only two ability levels, to a rotation of teachers between the groups and the different areas of English. In conclusion, upper secondary students are used to different groups, since they have chosen not only schools, but programs and individual courses. If the goal is small groups in English, maybe ability grouping is a possible solution. But above all, it has to be a possibility for the students, not the teachers.

Syftet med denna studie är att försöka ge en bild av hur fyra lärare verksamma på högstadiet och gymnasiet arbetar och förhåller sig till målspråksanvändningen i ämnena engelska och spanska. Intentionen är att utifrån tre valda teman ur Ulrika Tornbergs teori om språkundervisning i mellanrummet (2000), se hur teorin om mellanrummet kommer till uttryck hos lärarna och deras språkundervisning. Den metod som valts för att besvara studiens syfte är dels kvalitativ intervju och klassrumsbaserade observationer. Fyra intervjuer utfördes där samtliga lärare fick berätta om vilken uppfattning de har angående den muntliga kommunikationen på målspråket i språkundervisningen, språkundervisningens innehåll samt betoningen av den muntliga kommunikationen på målspråket i styrdokumenten. Resultatet av vår undersökning visar att mellanrummet kommer till uttryck hos lärarna samt i de klassrum vi valt att observera. I resultaten framgår även en praktisk anknytning till teorin om mellanrummet i de klassrum vi har observerat. Att tala på målspråket har stor betydelse för samtliga lärare och är något alla fyra lärare strävar efter att förverkliga i sin undervisning. Grundtanken hos samtliga lärare är att övningarna skall vara utformade på ett sådant sätt att alla elever skall få möjligheten att tala på målspråket vid varje lektionstillfälle. När det gäller styrdokumenten och deras betoning av målspråksanvändning, visar resultaten på att de fyra lärarna är insatta i det som står i kursplanerna. Deras uppfattning angående denna betoning är positiv och samtliga lärare tycker att det är bra att den muntliga kommunikationen på målspråket i språkundervisningen understryks i styrdokumenten. I diskussionen kommenterar och diskuterar vi kring de resultat och slutsatser vi kommit fram till i vår undersökning utifrån teorin om mellanrummet.

Domestic science is an interdisciplinary subject. Furthermore domestic science is a combination of theory and practice. The basic competence, a recommendation from ‘The Swedish School Institution’ (Skolverket), is to enter the secondary school with minimum grade G, (godkänd) in the basic themes: Swedish, English and Mathematic. Today there are many pupils finishing their secondary school without grade in one or more basic themes; Swedish, English and Mathematic. The aim of this essay is to show if domestic science could be used as a complement to the basic themes which are suppose to help the pupils to get grades in the basic themes of Swedish, English and Mathematics. A question in the essay is; is it possible to combine theory and practice? The theoretical frame of this essay is constituted by the pedagogies of activities and work. The sources for research of this essay have been the course plan of ‘The Swedish School Institution’ (Skolverket). Comparisons have been made between the basic grades; domestic science and basic themes of Swedish, English and Mathematics. The results indicate that there is a possibility to build bridges between the basic themes and domestic science. Through the use of pedagogies of activities and work, letting the experience fortify knowledge and showing the connection between knowledge and action, will present new ways to inspire the curiosity and creativity of the pupils. / Hem- och konsumentkunskap är ett tvärvetenskapligt ämne, här kombineras teori och praktik i ett ämne. Många beröringspunkter bör finnas till andra skolämnen. Grundbehörigheten till gymnasiet är att ha godkänt i kärnämnena; svenska, matematik och engelska. Många ungdomar som slutar nian saknar betyg i ett eller flera kärnämnen. Går det att använda hemkunskapen som ett stödämne till kärnämnena? Syftet med denna uppsats är att se hur hem- och konsumentkunskapen kan användas som stödämne i skolans undervisning för kärnämnena, svenska, matematik och engelska. Den teoretiska ramen utgörs av aktivitets- och arbetspedagogik. Materialet har varit bl a Skolverkets kursplaner. Jämförelser har gjorts mellan uppnåendemålen i svenska, engelska och matematik med utgångspunkt i hem- och konsumentkunskap. Resultatet visar att det finns många utgångspunkter där det går att bygga broar mellan kärnämnena och hem- och konsumentkunskapen. Genom att använda aktivitets-och arbetspedagogik och låta upplevelsen befästa kunskapen och visa sambanden mellan kunskap och handling prövas nya vägar att nå elevernas inneboende nyfikenhet och kreativitet.