The theme of this essay is literacy training in pre-school. The theme takes it starting point in a project, where my colleagues and I noticed our children playing with writing and symbols. It leads to an exciting, reflecting and developing project, a project that will go on for six months together with twenty children in the age of five and six. The essay describes how I and the rest of the staff work with the project, and also how we try to find challenges that are meaningful for our children. When we worked with the project I ended up in a dilemma how I as a teacher was to retain the children’s joy and curiosity for writing without making it boring. How shall I as a teacher behave in this matter? Is there any right or wrong here? The research authorities in this field agree on a number of things: They agree about the importance of literacy training in pre-school. The learning should be playful in a meaningful context. The scientists also agree that self-esteem is important for the children when they are writing. If the pre-school works with self-esteem in different ways, and also with a positive reinforcement combined with an inspiring environment, this can prevent difficulties in school with writing and reading. But literacy training in pre-school seems difficulties according the scientists, which I illustrate in my essay. The essay also describes three girls writing in different ways according to the theories of the scientists. I describe literacy training and also place high emphasis on the influence of the pre-school environment. I also place emphasis on the importance of the knowledge and the pedagogical approach of the teacher.

The children's ways of showing interest in writing and reading in pre-school have always fascinated me. The joy and pride they show when they start writing their own doodles and then eventually go on to write real letters and words, is a joy so see.The origin of this essay is based on Dante 3.5 years old. He wants me to spell my name so he can write to me. When I mention the second letter, Dante happily says "E, that's what my name starts with! From the other direction" I am amazed by his thoughts, and my enthusiasm for his knowledge knows no bounds. In the same moment I become aware of Alma, who quietly has seen my reaction to Dante's skills. Alma, who doesn't claim the same adult attention, is also interested in letters and writing, but she performs her writing in silence. How did I respond to her knowledge? How do we at pre-school see the more silent children and how do we handle their abilities?In many ways this situation made me start thinking about children's writing and reading in pre-school, and how our responses might affect their abilities to become literate. I have asked myself questions like; Do we see all children's abilities and how do we encourage them?I have come to the conclusion that our main tool in pre-school is our adult presence and our total commitment to all activities of the children. I have during the writing of this essay always come back to the fact that children's development is dependent on our ways of meeting them, and on how we can help them to believe in their own abilities.On the basis of the literature I have read, I can also see how important it is that pre-school ensures that we really encourage children when they show interest in writing and reading. It's not really difficult. The only thing we need to bring is ourselves, our listening and a genuine interest. The children will show us the rest.

Title: A Multiple Case Study on Contradictions and Pre-conditions for Outsourcing Agile Software Development ProjectsAuthor: Maksim Buslovič & Samson DeribeSupervisor: Jonas SöderlundDate: May 30th, 2012Background: In today’s turbulent business environment organizational success depends on its ability to embrace change and adapt quickly. The ability to satisfy customer is core to profitability; thus being agile is a prominent factor, because customer expectations are never static. One of the project management methods which is quite popular in the software development are is Agile Method. Agile methods depart from the classical project approach as it emphasizes more on interaction among participant, short iteration and continuous feedback to embrace the continuously evolving customer requirements. However, implementing Agile methods in a distributed project work seems to be challenging, thus limiting projects to optimize form their distributed resource as well as external parties.Aim: The purpose of this thesis is to understand how Agile methods contradict with the Outsourcing practice, which ultimately lead to identifying the possibilities to successfully outsource project work based on Agile methods. In addition, the study aims in providing a good ground for future study in ‘Outsourcing within Agile Methods’ to fill the big theoretical gap identified in the area.Methodology: The thesis used a qualitative approach that intends to build theory through iteration by waving back and forth between data and literatures in an inductive manner. The research design was based on multiple case study that used five interviews and one direct observation as an instrument to collect primary data along with secondary data; all three together ensure proper triangulation resulting in higher research validity. Open coding system was used to analyze data; and findings were presented by tables, figures, models and direct quotations.Results: The study shows that values and principles of agile software development which gives much emphasis on proximity in order to have a daily stand-up meetings, visualizations, constant contact with customers and other team members, knowledge sharing and fun disappear when the project is involved in outsourcing partly the development process; because the need use more plans & documentation, clear contracts and less interaction implying a contradiction in both ‘Agile methods’ and ‘Outsourcing’ practices. However, the study identified preconditions that must be considered while involving in outsourcing part of Agile software development: Outsource only if the part to be outsourced is not related to core product; Put a complete team in a co-located manner; Minimize interdependence among distributed teams; and there should be enough time before delivering product to customers.

The process of internationalization has been one of the major areas of interest for researchers for over four decades. The phase that precedes internationalization for firms, known as the pre-internationalization phase, has also been of interest to study. Firms that are in this early stage of becoming international, are characterized by being active only in the domestic market but with intentions to expand. However, within this phase, little is known about the stimuli that affect firms to expand their operations to foreign markets. By combining the traditional theories of the drivers and barriers to internationalize, with the new theories concerning the entrepreneurial influence in small and young firms, this study serves to complement a particular research gap in the pre-internationalization phase. The purpose of this study is to describe the pre-internationalization phase of SMEs, analyze how drivers, barriers and entrepreneurial characteristics of managers affect the decision to internationalize and to contribute to a further understanding of the research gap in the preinternationalization phase. A deductive research approach and a qualitative research method have been chosen for this study. In this way, in-depth answers can provide understanding to a phenomenon that is still partly undiscovered. To increase understanding in a broader environment than within one organization the multiple case study design is used for this study. Therefore, three managers from different firms participated in interviews, which is the basis for the empirical data. When the empirical data is combined with relevant theories it provides a basis for the analysis where the effects of drivers, barriers and international entrepreneurship are evaluated. This analysis provides a foundation for the conclusion that it is a necessity to combine traditional and new theories, with further empirical research, to fully understand why young domestic small and medium-sized enterprises decide to internationalize. When these are put together, it is possible to establish that barriers that are neglected by entrepreneurs are seemingly small impediments, in comparison to the drivers to reach success and the entrepreneurial urge to expand.

Introduction: In Sweden the definition of ambulance nursing is the examination and treatment of sick or injured people done by ambulance nurses during transport.  This means not only focus on the illness or injury but also the human being treated. The paramedic service must be based on the presumption that the medical needs of the patients are guaranteed, and that the expectations and demands of the public are satisfied. Competence and availability are basic terms for a well-functional paramedic service. There is a lot of pressure put on the people working with pre-hospital nursing. One mistake can lead to serious consequences for the patient. Purpose: The purpose of this study is describing patient’s experience of pre-hospital nursing. Method: The study is based on ten scientific articles. The articles were found on the internet by searching in the databases Academic Search Elite, Cinahl and MedLine. Results: The following themes have been identified: a feeling of uncertainty of the patient – how ill am I?, ambulance or own car?,  the patients worry about if the ambulance will arrive in time, voluntary self-surrender, patients experience of the competence of the staff, lack of understanding that an ambulance is more than a transport service. Discussion: Since the study is based on such a limited material it's not reasonable to draw any extensive conclusions. Still the results are so unanimous so we think that they are well worth to take into consideration. / Introduktion: I Sverige definieras ambulanssjukvård med undersökningen och behandlingen av sjuka eller skadade människor, vilket utförs av ambulanspersonal i samband med transport. Ambulanssjukvården måste bygga på förutsättningen att patientens medicinska behov säkerställs och att allmänhetens förväntningar och krav blir tillgodosedda. Kompetens och tillgänglighet är grundläggande begrepp för en väl fungerande ambulanssjukvård. Det ställs stora krav på personalen inom den akuta prehospitala sjukvården. Ett enda felaktiga beslut kan få svåra konsekvenser för patienten. Syfte: Syftet med studien är att belysa patienters upplevelser av prehospital sjukvård. Metod: Litterturstudie vars resultat baseras på tio vetenskapliga artiklar publicerade 2003-2008. Litteratursökningen utfördes med de elektroniska databaserna Academic Serch Elite, CINAHL och MedLine. Resultat: De rubriker som identifierades var: en känsla av osäkerhet hos patienten, hur sjuk är jag?, ambulans eller egen bil?, oro hos patienten, när kommer ambulansen?, frivilligt "självöverlämnande", patienters upplevelse av personalens kompetens, och brist på insikt om att ambulans är mer än en transportservice. Diskussion: Att, utifrån ett begränsat material som det vi har arbetat med, dra några långtgående slutsatser är inte rimligt. Vi anser dock att samstämmigheten i resultatet är så god att vi vill klassa resultatet som väl värt att ta i beaktande. / Presentation är gjord via webben.

Syfte: Att beskriva personers upplever att få pre-diabetes som en del av livet. Metod: Kvalitativ design. Studien genomfördes med fokusgrupper bestående av personer med pre-diabetes. Tre olika grupper med totalt 12 personer ingick i studien. Resultat: Ur diskussionerna kunde tre olika kategorier urskiljas. Pre-diabetes som en del av livet, egen erfarenhet och kunskap om tillståndet samt behov av information och stöd för ökad kunskap om livsstilsförändringar. Pre-diabetes var för de flesta studiedeltagare ett okänt begrepp. Känslor som osäkerhet och rädsla för tillståndet, samt för eventuell utveckling till manifest diabetes var vanligt. Det ansågs värdefullt att få besked i tidigt skede om förhöjda blodsockervärden, eftersom individen då hade möjlighet att påverka sin livsstil och förebygga annan sjukdom. Alla deltagare önskade mer kunskap och stöd kring pre-diabetes och livsstilsåtgärder. Respondenterna beskrev besvikelse över vårdpersonalens bemötande i samband med beskedet om förhöjda blodsockervärden. Informationen ansågs vara för knapphändig vilket gav uppfattning om att tillståndet inte var något att bry sig om. Konklusion: Respondenterna ville i största möjligaste utsträckning förhindra utvecklingen av T2DM genom egenvårdsinsater i form livsstilsförändringar. För att lyckas med det uppgav studiedeltagarna behov av information om vad tillståndet pre-diabetes innebär. Personer som får pre-diabetes bör få saklig information, råd och stöd om tillståndet i samband med beskedet.

The discovery of proteomic information through the use of mass spectrometry (MS) has been an active area of research in the diagnosis and prognosis of many types of cancer. This process involves feature selection through peak detection but is often complicated by many forms of non-biologicalbias. The need to extract biologically relevant peak information from MS data has resulted in the development of statistical techniques to aid in spectra pre-processing. Baseline estimation and normalization are important pre-processing steps because the subsequent quantification of peak heights depends on this baseline estimate. This dissertation introduces a mixture model to estimate the baseline and peak heights simultaneously through the expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm and a penalized likelihood approach. Our model-based pre-processing performs well in the presence of raw, unnormalized data, with few subjective inputs. We also propose a model-based normalization solution for use in subsequent classification procedures, where misclassification results compare favorably with existing methods of normalization. The performance of our pre-processing method is evaluated using popular matrix-assisted laser desorption and ionization (MALDI) and surface-enhanced laser desorption and ionization (SELDI) datasets as well as through simulation.

Improving the efficiency of a Pre- Rinse Spray Valve (PRSV) is one of the most cost effective water conservation methods in the Food Services Industry. A significant contributor to this cost efficiency is the reduction in the energy costs required to provide the mandatory hot water. This research paper estimates the potential quantity and dollar value of the water and energy that can be saved annually in Texas A&M University's dining services with the installation of low flow pre-rinse spray valves. The data collection was obtained from four of Texas A&M University's Dining Services facilities. The annual savings were estimated by contrasting the water consumption of the existing T & S Brass B 0107-M PRSVs with the latest and most advanced available low flow T and S Brass B 0107-C PRSV. The annual water consumption of the existing and new PRSVs were predicted by measuring an individual average flow rate for each and observing the number of hours per day the PRSV would be used. The observed and measured values were extrapolated to amount rates to determine cost savings. The dollar value was ascertained using the utility cost data recorded over a semester by the Facilities Coordinator of the Department of Dining Services. The findings of this study show that the water savings from a single PRSV could lead to an estimated annual saving ranging between 46% and 78% of the current operation cost. The T & S Brass B 0107-C PRSV is currently priced between $52- $60 per valve resulting in a payback period ranging between 1.5-6 months per valve. If every valve on campus was replaced, the University could reap a savings in the range of $ 5,400- $22,590 over the 5 year useful life of the valve, having initially invested less than $550.

Past events and present environmental conditions may alter vegetation cover and composition over decadal timescales by exerting persistent effects on modern vegetation patterns and consequently influencing species distribution and abundance. My aim was to reconstruct vegetation and analyze cover during early-European settlement in Brazos County using historical sources, mainly the surveyor’s files from the Original Texas Land Survey. The decoded trees from the surveyor’s notes resulted in 24 witness and bearing tree species being recorded, the most abundant species on the uplands was Post Oak (Quercus stellata) and for bottomlands was Pin Oak (Quercus phellos). Using the distances and directions given in the surveyor’s notes for witness and bearing trees, coordinates were calculated and species classified according to their National Wetland Indicator’ (NWI) status. Indicator kriging was performed to create a continuous vegetation cover of Brazos County by interpolating the point biogeographical data (i.e., witness trees, bearing trees and stake, mound and post locations) that had been spatially located and mapped onto the shapefile. The vegetation map showed 49% of vegetation in the county was covered by grassland during pre-European settlement. Most of these prairie areas were located in the northern portion of the county along the Old San Antonio Road. The bottomland forests covered 15% of Brazos County along the Navasota and Brazos Bottoms. Major expanses of bottomland hardwood occurred in the northwest of the county and at the confluence of the Navasota and Brazos rivers in the south. The Upland Oak Woodlands, mainly dominated by Post Oaks covered 36% of landscape, occurred mainly towards the western and eastern parts of the county and were interspersed with Grasslands. The vegetation map was verified using old photographs, traveler’s accounts and field checking for bottomland hardwoods. This research proves that the OTLS is a valid source for vegetation mapping during Pre-European settlement and for analyzing the tree species present at that time and helps in protecting and conserving our pristine environment at the present time.

Typical energy audits are sufficiently expensive and time-consuming that many owners and managers of buildings are not willing to invest the time and money required for a full audit. This dissertation provides a methodology to identify buildings with large potential energy savings using limited information, specifically, utility bills, total area and weather data. The methodology is developed based on the hypothesis: if a commercial building is properly designed, constructed, operated, and maintained, the measured energy consumption should approximately match the simulated value for a typical building of the same size with the most efficient HVAC system; otherwise, there may be potential for energy savings. There are four steps in the methodology: 1) testing to determine whether the utility bills include both weather-dependent and weatherindependent loads; 2) separating weather-dependent and weather-independent loads when both are present in the same data; 3) determining the main type of HVAC system; 4) estimating potential energy savings and recommending an energy audit if appropriate. The Flatness Index is selected to test whether the utility bills include both weatherdependent and weather-independent loads. An approach to separate the utility bills based on thermal balance is developed to separate utility bills into weather-dependent and weather-independent loads for facilities in hot and humid climates. The average relative error in estimated cooling consumption is only 1.1% for 40 buildings in Texas, whereas it is -54.8% using the traditional 3P method. An application of fuzzy logic is used to identify the main type of HVAC system in buildings from their 12-month weatherdependent energy consumption. When 40 buildings were tested, 18 systems were identified correctly, seven were incorrect and the HVAC system type cannot be identified in 15 cases. The estimated potential savings by the screening methodology in eight large commercial buildings were compared with audit estimated savings for the same buildings. The audit estimated savings are between 25% - 150% of the potential energy savings estimated by the screening procedure in seven cases. The other two cases are less accurate, indicating that further refinement of the method would be valuable. The data required are easily obtained; the procedure can be carried out automatically, so no experience is required. If the actual type of HVAC system, measured weather-dependent, and weather-independent energy consumption are known, the methodology should work better.