This essay aims to investigate four upper secondary school teachers’ perceptions of the use of peer review in English language teaching through a qualitative study. The theoretical framework of this essay includes both sociocultural theory and process theory of writing. The study itself consists of four semi-structured interviews with English teachers and the research questions aim to investigate these teachers’ motives for doing peer review, their practices involving peer review, and the perceived difficulties they have with using peer review in their language classrooms. The main findings show that while teachers think highly of peer review and believe it to be beneficial, peer review is still not an integrated method in three out of the four teachers’ practices. Some of the reasons for this included a perceived lack of time and opportunity to do peer review, as well as a lack of encouragement from their surroundings to use peer review in their classrooms. This study presents some teachers’ perceptions and practices of peer review and further discusses why teachers have these perceptions in relation to the essay’s theoretical background and previous research. Moreover, this study shows that peer review is highly thought of but rarely implemented in Swedish upper secondary schools and that peer review needs to be brought up more in the discussion of English writing if we want it to become an integrated part of English language teaching in Sweden.

The important aspect of speaking in an L2 classroom is well-known for language acquisition to occur. But what happens when students, for whatever reason, are unwilling to communicate. In that case, teachers must apply different pedagogical practices to support them. With this in mind, this degree project essay aims to investigate the English syllabus in upper-secondary school in Sweden to explore what recommendations teachers are given to increase learners’ willingness to communicate orally. The analysis of the English syllabus is done using a constructed framework based on previous research on the best pedagogical practices to increase students’ willingness to communicate and explore if there is an alignment between the two. The findings show that the most often-included suggestions aligned with international best practices are: connecting the teaching to students’ knowledge and experiences, providing students with linguistic competence, and providing students with different interactional activities with different purposes. The essay will further give some pedagogical recommendations and future research directions.

As technological advancements and improvements are made, the concepts of school digitalization and distance teaching become increasingly interesting and relevant. While distance teaching has existed for over a decade, it was not commonly practiced until the global pandemic 2020 where schools all around the world decided that teaching would be conducted remotely reduce the risk of spreading COVID-19. Sweden was one of these countries and decided that teaching in Swedish upper secondary schools would transition into being conducted at a distance. This master thesis focuses on students’ and teachers’ experiences of distance teaching in upper secondary school mathematics in Sweden during the years 2020-2022. The study is divided into two parts, one with a research purpose of examining how distance teaching has influenced students’ and teachers’ experiences of teaching and learning mathematics, and the other with the intent to create a support material in the form of a handbook to facilitate and integrate distance teaching in upper secondary school mathematics. Quantitative and qualitative data were gathered from 80 students using an online survey and nine interviews with three being with teachers and six being with students. The quantitative data were analyzed thematically to identify focus points and resulted in the focus of five different aspects of mathematics teaching - students’ general work, student motivation, the possibility of receiving help from a teacher, classroom communication and classroom participation. The theoretical frameworks used were sociocultural theory and equivalency theory. Results from the quantitative data revealed that students’ experiences of distance teaching were mostly negative with a very small amount noting positive experiences. A small but notable amount stated that distance teaching had no effect on their learning experiences. Qualitative findings revealed that the reason for the negative experience was that most students were dependent on external factors such as outer motivation, social interaction, teacher help and classroom communication. Students who were not negatively affected were self-regulating and whose studies and learning were independent of external factors. The development part of this study aimed at developing a handbook that could help schools implement and utilize distance teaching. The handbook was created through analyzing previous findings to identify challenges and difficulties with distance teaching that the writers could provide potential solutions for, and advice on, how to prevent. The initial prototype of the handbook was exposed to a limited form of testing due to upper secondary schools having transitioned back to traditional teaching at the time of the study. Therefore, the presented version of the handbook remains a prototype. / I takt med att tekniska framsteg och förbättringar görs blir digitalisering inom skolväsenden och distansundervisning alltmer intressanta och relevanta. Även om tillgängligheten till distansundervisning har funnits i över ett decennium, var den inte vanligt förekommande förrän den globala pandemin 2020 där skolor runt om i världen beslutade att undervisning skulle bedrivas på distans för att minska risken för spridning av COVID-19. Sverige var ett av dessa länder och beslutade att undervisning i svenska gymnasieskolor skulle övergå till att bedrivas på distans. Detta examensarbete fokuserar på elever- och lärares erfarenheter av distansundervisning i matematik på gymnasieskolor i Sverige under åren 2020–2022. Studien har två huvudsakliga syften, det första syftet är att identifiera hur distansundervisning har påverkat elever- och lärares upplevelser av undervisning av gymnasiematematik. Det andra syftet är att utveckla ett stödmaterial i form av en handbok vars syfte är att underlätta utförande och integrering av distansundervisning i matematikundervisning på gymnasieskolor. Det första syftet korresponderar till studiens forskningsdel och genomfördes med hjälp av kvantitativ och kvalitativ datainsamling genom 80 elev respondenter i en webbenkät och nio intervjuer varav tre var med lärare och sex med elever. Kvantitativa data analyserades tematiskt för att identifiera fokuspunkter och resulterade i fokus på fem olika aspekter av matematikundervisningen – elevernas allmänna arbete, elevmotivation, möjligheten att få hjälp av en lärare, kommunikation i klassrummet och deltagande i klassrummet. De teoretiska ramar som användes var sociokulturell teori och ekvivalensteori. Resultaten från den kvantitativa forskningsdelen visade att elevernas upplevelser av distansundervisning var mestadels negativ med endast en liten andel som noterade positiva upplevelser. En liten men anmärkningsvärd andel uppgav även att distansundervisning inte hade någon effekt på deras inlärning. Resultaten från den kvalitativa delen visade att orsaken till den negativa upplevelsen var att de flesta elever var beroende av yttre faktorer som yttre motivation, social interaktion, hjälp från läraren och klassrumskommunikation. Elever som inte påverkades negativt var självreglerande och vars studier och lärande var oberoende av dessa yttre faktorer. Det andra syftet motsvarar studiens utvecklingsdel. Handboken skapades genom att analysera resultaten från forskningsdelen för att identifiera utmaningar och svårigheter med distansundervisning. Sedan skulle potentiella lösningar och råd om hur man kan förebygga dessa utmaningar och svårigheter ges i handboken. Den ursprungliga prototypen av handboken genomgick en begränsad form av testning på grund av att gymnasieskolan vid studietillfället redan hade övergått tillbaka till traditionell undervisning. Därför förblir den presenterade versionen av handboken en prototyp.

The aim for this study is to analyze teachers’ view on coloring and their perception of student motivation at vocational upper secondary school programs history class in Sweden. Five semi-structured interviews were conducted with five history teachers who taught at the same school and have experience of teaching the history course for vocational programs. The interviews were analyzed in relation to self-determination theory and vertical and horizontal knowledge. The result showed that students following vocational programs were seen as less motivated towards the subject of history than the students following theoretical programs. However, upon closer analysis the differences were found to correlate more with the teachers’ perceptions of the student’s inner motivation than the programs being followed. These groups provided an inner motivation for the students and the deciding outcome for how hard they were going to work at the course. At the same time, they performed better in the subject of Swedish than in history. This can be interpreted as the students adopting an autonomous-or inner motivation because they were willing to work harder on a subject that they deemed as more important for their future vocation. The results also showed that teachers’ use of coloring knowledge related to the perception of their student’s future salary and that this image contributed to the students’ loss of inner motivation and to a focus on external motivation in relation to the students’ future vocation. Teachers perceive that students following vocational programs want knowledge that gives them an understanding of society. However, as vocational programs devote fewer hours to subjects such as history and Swedish, they do not have time to study these subjects in as much depth. The time limitations and coloring of horizontal knowledge made the vocational students experience fewer opportunities of vertical knowledge. This means the information that they saw as relevant and interesting, such as modern history, is limited. This is as consequence of the curriculum dividing students into vocational -and academic students. This potentially limits the students in their learning about democratic public discourse. Students following vocational programs are perceived by their teachers as less motivated to achieve higher grades, or to work to get a pass grade, even when their teachers perceive they have the ability to achieve a pass or higher grade. This connects to the course plan’s structure by people in power, giving them no chance for higher education when graduating, and the grades are in the hands of the teachers.

The curriculum emphasizes the importance of social science teachers to affect students to be active, democratic and participating citizens. At the same time the interest in politics among students has been on a steady decline since the beginning of the 21th century. Apart from the diminishing interest in politics, studies have shown that students are given different civic skills and competencies depending on their choice of educational path. This study takes an interest to understand what affects students' engagement in democracy and politics, and how it differs between last-year students from study preparatory and vocational education. This study also aims to understand how the programs differ in the experience of social science teaching and how it has affected their civic engagement. This study utilized qualitative group interviews with students from both educational paths, the results of this study illustrate that differences in political engagement, depending on educational path, do exist. The differences in education of social science has given different prerequisites to be politically engaged for study preparatory- and vocational students. / <p>Godkänd 2024-04-05</p>

The aim of this study is to understand upper-secondary school students’ reading habits and what influences them, with a focus on the possible effect of BookTok, a subcommunity on the social media platform TikTok. Data was based on questionnaires collected from students and interviews with a teacher and a librarian, which were analyzed using a thematic analysis. Findings have revealed that the majority of the participating students do not read for pleasure, though many do. The students who read for pleasure are influenced by social media when choosing books to read, including BookTok. Teachers and librarians also influence students’ reading habits. The interviewed teacher had not noticed any increase in reading but rather a negative attitude towards reading. However, the interviewed librarian noticed a slight increase in reading, as well as BookTok’s impact. Students who use BookTok report that this platform affects their reading habits and has increased the number of books they read, both in Swedish and in English. They also report that reading develops their language skills.

Studien undersöker hur elva gymnasievägledare som arbetar i antingen mindre eller större kommuner stödjer ungdomar med NPF-diagnoser (neuropsykiatriska funktionsnedsättningar)i deras övergång från gymnasiet till vuxenlivet med fokus på karriärval. NPF-spektrat är ett brett område och studien har därför sitt huvudfokus på hur stödet för elever med ADHD och autism ser ut och ett kort avsnitt kommer att beröra dyslexi. Studien betonar individanpassad vägledning och synsätt som innebär att se möjligheter med hänsyn till elevernas preferenser och styrkor. I bakgrunden utforskas utmaningar för elever med NPF i den svenska skolan och behovet av anpassningar diskuteras. Forskning pekar på utmaningar för elever med inlärningssvårigheter och NPF, inklusive ökad risk för avhopp och svårigheter att ta examen. Syftet var att analysera hur studie- och yrkesvägledningen inom NPF genomförs i olika kommuner. Metoden involverade kvalitativa metoder som intervjuer och analyser av data från gymnasievägledare. En tematisk analys användes för att identifiera likheter och skillnader iinformanternas svar och för att skapa teman utifrån det. Resultaten visar variationer i vägledningspraxis mellan små och stora kommuner med betoning på flexibilitet och tydlighet. Genom analysen integreras karriärteorier för att förstå hur gymnasievägledningen kan stötta elevernas karriärval. Diskussionen identifierar strategier för att förbättra vägledningspraxis och pekar på behovet av individanpassat stöd och samarbete mellan olika aktörer. Framtida forskning bör utforska effektiviteten av vägledningsmetoder och samarbetsstrukturer över tid samt generalisera resultaten till andra geografiska områden fören mer omfattande förståelse. / This study explores how eleven career counselors working in either small or large municipalities support youths with neuropsychiatric disorders (NPF) in their transition from high school to adulthood, focusing on career choices. The NPF spectrum is a broad area, and the study therefore mainly focuses on the support for students with ADHD and autism, with abrief section addressing dyslexia. Emphasizing personalized guidance and a strengths-based approach, the study considers students' preferences and strengths. The background delves into the challenges faced by students with NPF in the Swedish school system and discusses the need for tailored adaptations. Previous research highlights the difficulties these students encounter, including a higher risk of dropout and difficulties in graduating. The study aims to analyze how career counseling for students with NPF is implemented in different municipalities. Qualitative methods, including interviews and data analysis from high school counselors, were used. A thematic analysis identified similarities and differences in the informants' responses, forming the basis for thematic development. Results show variations in counseling practices between small and large municipalities, emphasizing flexibility and clarity. Through the analysis, career theories are integrated to understand how upper secondary school guidance counselors can support students' career choices. The discussion identifies strategies to improve counseling practices and highlights the need for individualized support and collaboration among various stakeholders. Future research should examine the effectiveness of counseling methods and collaborative structures over time and generalize the findings to other geographical areas for a more comprehensive understanding.

This study examines how an analysis of lyrics can be used as a didactic tool when teaching religion at upper secondary school and some pros and cons that may arise. Because this study considers and analyses the experiences and reflections from both teachers and students, qualitative interviews were conducted with five teachers and six students. The result of the study shows that using lyric analysis as a didactic tool in religious studies is a somewhat unexplored field among teachers in northern Sweden. The interviewed teachers and students have positive attitudes towards lyric analysis in religious education. There are some negative aspects that can be seen, for example teachers’ knowledge about music. However, there seems to be more advantages with lyric analysis in religious education, such as viewing religion from different viewpoints and being an enjoyable and enriching way to teach with the interests of students in mind. The study therefore concludes that with flexibility and exploration, there are numerous ways to include lyric analysis in religious education that will broaden students understanding of the complexity and individuality of religion in practice.

This study investigates Swedish upper secondary school English teachers’ definitions of oral proficiency, how they rate the importance of oral proficiency, and how they work with promoting pupils’ development of oral proficiency through their teaching. The study used semi-structured interviews with 11 Swedish upper secondary school English teachers. The results showed that the teachers had different views of what constitutes oral proficiency. More specifically, four themes were identified. These were making yourself understood, fluency, extensive vocabulary, and connecting with the receiver. In addition, the results showed that six of the 11 teachers rated the oral skill as one of, or even the most, important language skill, whereas five of the 11 teachers did not. The discrepancies mostly tied to perceived usefulness and Swedish upper secondary school English courses in general. Furthermore, the results showed that teachers had similar methods and strategies for promoting pupils’ development of oral proficiency, mostly tied to creating communicative contexts. Lastly, the results highlighted the importance of feedback since it makes pupils able to visualize their own learning and development. The present study concludes that oral proficiency plays an immensely important role for pupils, both within and outside of school.

Students only learn what they get the opportunity to learn. This means, for example, that students do not develop their reasoning- and problem solving competence unless teaching especially focuses on developing these competencies. Despite the fact that it has for the last 20 years been pointed out the need for a reform-oriented mathematics education, research still shows that in Sweden, as well as internationally, an over-emphasis are placed on rote learning and procedures, at the cost of promoting conceptual understanding. Mathematical understanding can be separated into procedural and conceptual understanding, where conceptual understanding can be connected to a reform oriented mathematics education. By developing a reasoning competence conceptual understanding can also be developed. This thesis, which deals with students’ opportunities to learn to reason mathematically, includes three studies (with data from Swedish upper secondary school, year ten and mathematics textbooks from twelve countries). These opportunities have been studied based on a textbook analysis and by studying students' work with textbook tasks during normal classroom work. Students’ opportunities to learn to reason mathematically have also been studied by examining the relationship between students' reasoning and their beliefs. An analytical framework (Lithner, 2008) has been used to categorise and analyse reasoning used in solving tasks and required to solve tasks. Results support previous research in that teaching and mathematics textbooks are not necessarily in harmony with reform-oriented mathematics teaching. And that students indicated beliefs of insecurity, personal- and subject expectations as well as intrinsic- and extrinsic motivation connects to not using mathematical reasoning when solving non-routine tasks. Most commonly students used other strategies than mathematical reasoning when solving textbook tasks. One common way to solve tasks was to be guided, in particular by another student. The results also showed that the students primarily worked with the simpler tasks in the textbook. These simpler tasks required mathematical reasoning more rarely than the more difficult tasks. The results also showed a negative relationship between a belief of insecurity and the use of mathematical reasoning. Furthermore, the results show that the distributions of tasks that require mathematical reasoning are relatively similar in the examined textbooks across five continents. Based on the results it is argued for a teaching based on sociomathematical norms that leads to an inquiry based teaching and textbooks that are more in harmony with a reform-oriented mathematics education. / Elever kan bara lära sig de det de får möjlighet att lära sig. Detta innebär till exempel att elever inte utvecklar sin resonemangs- och problemlösningsförmåga i någon större utsträckning om inte deras undervisning fokuserar på just dessa förmågor. Forskning, nationellt och internationellt visar att det finns en överbetoning på utantillinlärning och på procedurer. Detta verkar ske på bekostnad av en konceptuell förståelse, trots att det under 20 års tid pekats på behovet av en reforminriktad matematikundervisning. Matematisk förståelse kan delas in i procedurell- och konceptuell förståelse där en konceptuell förståelse kan kopplas till en reforminriktad matematikundervisning. Genom att utveckla förmågan att resonera matematiskt utvecklas också den konceptuella förståelsen. Denna avhandling, som inbegriper tre studier (med empiri från gymnasiet år ett och matematikläroböcker från tolv länder) behandlar elevers möjlighet att lära sig att resonera matematiskt. Dessa möjligheter har studerats utifrån att undersöka vilka möjligheter läroboken ger att lära sig matematiska resonemang, dels via en läroboksanalys och dels genom att studera elevers arbete med läroboksuppgifter i klassrumsmiljö. Elevers möjligheter att lära sig att resonera matematiskt har också studerats genom att undersöka relationen mellan elevers matematiska resonemang och deras uppfattningar om matematik. Ett analytiskt ramverk (Lithner, 2008) har används för att kategorisera och analysera resonemang som använts för att lösa uppgifter och som behövs för att lösa en uppgift. Resultaten från studierna har givit stöd åt tidigare forskning vad gäller att undervisning och läroböckerna inte nödvändigtvis harmonierar med en reforminriktad matematikundervisning. Och att elever har uppfattningar om matematik som bygger på osäkerhet, förväntan på ämnet och sin egen förmåga samt motivation och att dessa uppfattningar delvis kan kopplas till att eleverna inte använder matematiska resonemang för att försöka lösa icke-rutinuppgifter. Det vanligaste sättet att lösa läroboksuppgifter var att välja andra strategier än att använda sig av matematiska resonemang. Ett vanligt sätt att lösa uppgifter var att låta sig guidas, av främst en annan elev. Eleverna arbetade framförallt med de enklare uppgifterna i läroböckerna. Bland dessa enklare uppgifter var det mer sällsynt med uppgifter som krävde matematiska resonemang för att lösas relativt de svårare uppgifterna. Resultaten visade även att det fanns en negativ relation mellan en uppfattning av osäkerhet hos elever och ett användande av matematiska resonemang. Resultaten visade vidare att fördelningen av uppgifter som krävde matematiska resonemang var relativt lika i alla undersökta läroböcker från fem världsdelar. Utifrån resultaten argumenteras för en förändrad undervisning mot en undersökande undervisning och läroböcker som är mer i harmoni med en reforminriktad matematikundervisning.