This study is focused on the deaf upper-secondary school students’ education in English. English is one of the core subjects in the Swedish school system and considered an important factor in students’ opportunities to participate in the global community. On this basis, the aim of this study is to understand how the English subject syllabus is adapted to cater for the deaf students’ needs, whether normative values are expressed in the English subject syllabus for the deaf, and whether those values might affect the deaf students’ opportunities to use English as a communicative language. More specifically, my questions are: What similarities and differences between the National Syllabus for English compared to the National Syllabus for English for the Deaf can be found under "English" and "Aim of the subject"?; what values and norms do these similarities and differences carry?; and how might those values and norms affect deaf students’ English education? To answer these questions a discourse analytic approach inspired by critical theory is conducted, where the two English subject syllabi, and the supplementary commentary material to the syllabi are compared. Analysis based on interviews of two upper-secondary school English teachers and a questionnaire answered by the students of the interviewees is provided as a supplement to the analysis of the syllabi. The findings show that the curricular texts contradict themselves on several occasions when applied to the deaf student as the intended learner, because they do not adapt to the plurilingual needs of the deaf students. The findings also show how the norm of spoken and written English is valued higher than the signed forms of the language. I argue that this might cause limitations to the discourse and development of an English education adapted to the needs of the deaf upper-secondary school students in Sweden.

In this study, I analyse Shakespeare’s revenge tragedy Hamlet with a Bakhtinian close reading. Using Bakhtinian concepts, such as carnival, dialogism, polyphony and heteroglossia, together with contextualising materials, I analyse Shakespeare’s use of ambiguous language as contextual communication. I also discuss the pedagogical implications of my analysis for ESL in Upper Secondary School in general and the Swedish curriculum in particular, by drawing on sociocultural theory. My findings suggest that Shakespeare consistently enacts carnivalesque elements through heteroglossia, manifested in ambiguous language filled with juxtaposition and sociohistorical allusions. Moreover, the Bakhtinian perspective enables a reading where even the soliloquys become expressions of dialogism as emotions, explicit or implicit, are played against each other in a polyphony also populated by voices, living and dead. My findings also shed light on the analysis’s consistency with sociocultural theory and the pedagogical potential in an approach that embraces the plurality of arguments and complexity of contexts in relation to teaching Hamlet.

This study aims to investigate the relationship between students’ perceived selfmonitoring awareness and their perception on reading. The reason for conducting this research is to see if students self-monitoring awareness matches their beliefs and perceptions of their own abilities in reading. If students can become aware of the relationship between perception and self-monitoring awareness it will be beneficial for them since they can become aware of eventual discrepancies in their use of selfmonitoring strategies and their perception on reading. Participants of this study were 10 senior-year students from an upper-secondary school in Söderhamn, Sweden. The data collection tool for this study was a questionnaire that consisted of three parts. Findings indicate that in some cases there was a relation between students’ self-monitoring use and their perception on reading. In addition, results show that most students have a positive perception on reading comprehension, and that they use different self-monitoring strategies when comprehending a text. This study can provide insights on how knowing and reflecting about the relationship between students’ perceptions and their self-monitoring awareness can help teachers to notice areas where students need to self-monitor their learning in reading activities.

The Swedish Ministry of Education has in recent years implemented revisions with aims to make students more digitally competent. This implementation demands that teachers adapt their lesson planning accordingly. Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL) has shown promising results in L2 learning during the last decades and has assisted the process of this implementation. The aim of this study is to conduct a materials analysis of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt video game, evaluating it for use as a potential CALL-based language learning resource for integration into language learning classrooms in Sweden. The evaluation was conducted using a digitally modified set of ELT criteria. The evaluated material was shown to successfully fulfill some of the core content in the English syllabus for Swedish upper secondary school, and it was concluded that the material could work as a potential CALL resource to provide students with certain aspects of L2 learning. However, it was determined that successful integration would require guidance from digitally cunning teachers. Further research must be done to determine if this evaluation is adaptable to a Swedish context.

This paper presents a qualitative study investigating whether exercises inspired by spoken word poetry can be used as anxiety-lowering speaking exercises for Grade 9 students in Swedish secondary school and increase their motivation for speaking English in class. My initial hypothesis was that the students would feel less anxious to speak English in class when performing spoken word than when doing oral presentations. I also thought that the students would feel less anxious performing found poems, where the words in poems are taken from a model poem. To test my hypothesis, I conducted a lesson study consisting of three research lessons and interviews with an in-service teacher and three case students. The findings show that while some students did feel less anxious speaking English when performing spoken word poetry, most of the students’ motivation to perform was unaffected by the exercises used in the research lessons. Instead, the research showed that giving the students the opportunity to choose between writing and performing in groups or alone had the most impact on their motivation to perform. Understanding the poems was another factor with great impact on the students’ motivation to perform. These findings are discussed, and it is proposed that teachers who want to use spoken word poetry in their classroom practice should focus on accommodating their teaching practice to the students’ needs, and that more lesson time should be spent on analyzing the poems than on writing them.

Collocations receive considerable interest in the second language acquisition literature, with a growing interest in the way they are covered in English as a foreign language (EFL) textbooks. Despite this, corresponding studies in the Swedish context are sparse. The aim of this study was therefore to evaluate one of the most popular textbooks used in Swedish EFL classrooms, Blueprint B 3.0, by identifying how it covers collocations in terms of frequency and mode of presentation and how the collocational profile aligns with best practices as recommended in the existing literature. A total of 529 unique collocations were identified, of which 35 were targeted in exercises. The selection of collocations given explicit attention follows recommendations from the literature in terms of type, but not in terms of frequency, as less than half of the targeted multi-word units could not be identified as collocations with the Longman Collocations Dictionary and Thesaurus (2013) and none with the list of first 100 collocations (Nation & Shin, 2007). As for mode of presentation, the identified exercises did not follow recommendations, and by design increased the risk of learner error. I discuss a number of pedagogical implications for teachers and textbook authors and offer some suggestions for future research in this area.

The steering documents for Swedish upper-secondary school set great store by the cultivation of critical thinking. It is one of the overarching aims. Yet, statistics indicate that young Swedes are not as good at critical thinking as students from some other countries of comparable socioeconomic status (World Economic Forum 7). One way to address this problem might be to teach argumentation. The goal of this paper is to examine to what extent chapter three in Writing Logically, Thinking Critically—a textbook about argumentation and critical thinking—succeeds in helping students develop critical thinking skills through training in argumentation. To examine this, a materials analysis of said chapter is conducted using Ian McGrath’s checklist method. The examination is based in Richard Andrews’s theory that argumentation and critical thinking are in an interdependent relationship, a theory that this research paper supports. In this study, it is proposed that although said chapter does not seem to address critical thinking in full, it seems likely to be suitable for teaching critical thinking to a certain extent. Findings indicate that said chapter seems to address careful analysis, rationality, and discriminating thought successfully, but open-mindedness and dialectical thinking not at all. Therefore, it is concluded that teachers should search beyond said chapter in their attempts to teach argumentation and critical thinking, which the steering documents imply they should teach.

Syftet med denna uppsats har varit att undersöka användandet av läroböcker bland högstadieoch gymnasielärare i idrott och hälsa. Utgångspunkten har varit frågeställningar gällande tillgången till läroböcker, regelbunden användning av läroböcker samt inom vilka ämnesområden läroboken används i störst utsträckning. För att besvara dessa frågeställningar har en kvantitativ metod i form av ett frågeformulär använts. Undersökningen visade att av de 54 deltagande lärarna så hade 68 % tillgång till läroböcker via sin skola, med det var enbart 59 % som regelbundet använde läroböcker i sin undervisning av idrott och hälsa. Det ämnesområde där läroböcker används flitigast var enligt undersökningen hälsa. I en forskningsgenomgång konstaterades det att trots att idrott och hälsa är ett kunskapsämne så råder det bland lärare och elever en osäkerhet kring hur kunskap och lärande ska kommuniceras och tydliggöras inom ämnet. Användning av läroböcker har potential att förbättra denna situation men det tycks vara ett förbisett ämne i dagens didaktiska diskussion inom ämnet idrott och hälsa.

Previous research show that young children’s perceptions of the day/night cycle is based on everyday experiences and are therefore often inaccurate, such as the belief that the earth is flat or that the Moon is equal to night whereas the Sun equals day and disappears behind mountains during night. The following synthesis maps out common misperceptions about, and what characterizes young pupil’s theories about the day/night cycle and furthermore what role education comes to play in regard of developing these misconceptions.  This systematic review is based on a question formulation including two questions; what characterizes middle school-student's conceptions about the earth’s rotation around its axis in regard of the day/night cycle, and how do these misconceptions change by means of education?  To answer these questions, previous research articles were searched for and systematically reviewed with the assistance of the database ERIC. To narrow down the results given from the database, the search was limited to peer reviewed-only and a criterion was set up to match our question formulation. These criteria, apart from peer reviewed-only, were; middle school students, day/night cycle and earth’s rotation. Given these criteria, a total of 12 articles were eligible in regard of the questions asked.   Results showed that young pupils tend to take on a topocentric perspective when explaining the day/night cycle in prior to education, meaning that the earth is flat and day falls where the sun’s rays hit and night falls where the moon is seen. In this perspective, the earth is stationary whereas the sun rotates. Furthermore, older pupils tend to take on a heliocentric model, meaning a more accurate perception that the earth rotates around its axis whereas the sun and the moon are stationary. In conclusion, prior to education, young children take on a topocentric model of the earth whereas after education a more accurate, geocentric perception is acquired.     Nyckelord  Dag och natt, jordens rotation, barns uppfattningar, karaktärisering, undervisning, astronomi

This paper aims at answering how suitable the Netflix show Unorthodox is in Swedish religious education. The paper examines how the Variation theory may be used to implement the show into the syllabus. In order to answer how the show may be implemented, an analysis of how religion, sex and gender is portrayed in the TV-show is necessary. A semiotic tool of analysis is used to analyze all four episodes. The result shows that issues regarding religion, sex and gender contains various contrasts between religious and secular values. The religious context is characterized by collective values, piety, and the importance of a community. The secular context on the other hand underline the liberation and autonomy of the individual. But also, some sort of loss of community. A contrast is also shown in how these two contexts relate to issues of sex and gender. In the religious context it is expected for women to be loyal, not only to their religion but also their husbands. Various scenes show that loyalty is more important than a woman’s own desire. In the secular discourse the norm is a free and autonomous woman. As a consequence, individual desires are more important. This means that the view on sex differs from the religious context where the only purpose of sex is reproduction. In the secular discourse, sexual relationships begin more sporadically and often out of wedlock. The study shows that it is possible to work with these contrasts found in the show, by using Variation theory as a teaching method. However, it is expected that the teacher separates the objects to generalize them in order to create a fusion among the pupils. One conclusion is that the process contains some risks. For example, that Hasidism can be seen as representative for Judaism or religious values in total. By being aware of these risks, as well as the shortcomings with integrating popular culture with teaching, these risks may be bridged.