Reading English literature can help learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) to develop their reading ability as well as other language skills. Reading can also have other benefits for EFL students such as learning about the target language’s culture or an English variety in written form. This present study investigates what types of literature are used in Swedish upper secondary school, the EFL teachers’ attitudes towards short stories compared to simplified novels/graded readers and their preferred assessment methods associated with literature teaching. The majority of the teachers that took part in this survey have a positive attitude towards short stories and use them in their EFL classes. The results also show that after the students have completed reading a short story, most of the teachers that participated in this survey preferred to combine examination methods such as a group discussion with a written test.The title of this paper comes from one of the informants’ comments when asked if she would rather use a short story or a graded reader in her English class. This informant had used graded readers in her English language classroom, but she and everyone that took part in this survey chose short stories over graded readers.

Adolescents with neurodevelopmental disabilities (NDD) tend to face great challenges in school which can affect their school wellbeing. This paper investigates the relations between school wellbeing and NDD. The purpose of the study was to examine if NDD, class climate, bullying, mental health, and mental health problems predicted school wellbeing and if there were differences between upper secondary students with and without self-rated NDD. The data of this study was retrieved from wave four of the longitudinal multidisciplinary research programme LoRDIA. Study participants were 288 adolescents in year two of upper secondary school, where 61 had self-related NDD and 227 did not. First a Mann-Whitney U-test tested the differences between the groups. Then a multiple regression analysis was conducted to test the predictors’ influence on school wellbeing. Lastly, a correlation test was conducted to see if any predictor was masked by the difference in group size. The results showed that NDD, class climate and bullying are predictors to school wellbeing, where NDD is the strongest predictor. There was also a difference between the groups concerning psychiatric problems where the group with NDD reported more problems, although this still not being a predictor to school wellbeing for this group. In conclusion, class climate and bullying are predictors to school wellbeing for both students with and without self-related NDD which suggests that schools should work for a positive social climate in school. Secondly, the group of students with NDD experience lower levels of school wellbeing but this could not be explained by any of the variables used in this study which calls for further investigations as to what the causes are.

This study examined the possible causes of language anxiety among three upper secondary school students Sweden. In addition, the study explored the strategies used by said students’ English teachers to decrease language anxiety in their students. The data was collected by using semi-structured interviews and analyzed through content analysis. The analysis showed that the main causes of language anxiety were four significant factors: communication apprehension, test anxiety, fear of negative evaluation, and classroom environment. In particular, the study showed that all the students felt more anxious when they were uncomfortable with their surroundings and when they felt under pressure to perform. Negative evaluation from other students affected their confidence level, which was another crucial cause of anxiety. All the students expressed that the teacher's approach had a significant effect on their anxiety level, and all the teachers claimed to adapt their English-speaking activities to each student’s needs. A general conclusion is that the students’ anxiety varies depending on the English-speaking activity and their teacher’s approach, which was acknowledged by the teacher.

Skolan har som uppgift att förmedla såväl kunskaper som värden till eleverna, bland annat gällande deras inställning till miljöfrågor, men huruvida läroplanens efterfrågade värderingar förmedlas i ämnesundervisningen tål att studeras vidare. Den här studien breddar tidigare forsknings kvantitativa metodologier med en fenomenologisk ansats, och undersöker genom intervjuer med fem elever och deras lärare om, och i så fall hur, biologiundervisningen på gymnasiet bidrar till elevernas värderingar kring miljöfrågor. Elevernas resonemang visar på svagt biocentriska värderingar, och hur individuellt ansvar står i fokus för att möta ett akut miljöhot, och för att skydda ett allomfattande ekosystem. Undervisningen påverkar eleverna genom ämneskunskaper, som breddar värderingarnas horisontella struktur. Frågan om skolan förändrar värderingar kvarstår. Utifrån elevernas resonemang lyckas skolan generellt sett i sitt värderingsuppdrag, om än som en sekundär agent, och värderingsförmedlingen är i stort osynlig, d.v.s. något närvarande men som inte riktigt framkommer innan den synliggörs genom aktivt letande. Studien visar på vikten av undervisningsinslag utanför klassrummet samt en varierad ämnesdidaktik för att underlätta värdeförmedling i undervisningen. / The upper secondary school, as well as the compulsory school, should not only give students knowledge, but attitudes as well, for example regarding environmental issues. Whether or not the attitudes regarding environmental issues present in the upper secondary schools’ curriculum are distributed through the student’s education is studied in this thesis, with special focus on education in biology. Previous research have primarily studied attitudes from a quantitative methodological approach, this thesis widen the approach by adopting a phenomenological approach, with semi-structured qualitative interviews with five students and their teacher, with the aim of researching if, and if so, how, upper secondary school education in biology affect the students attitudes regarding environmental issues. The results shows that the students have, generally speaking, weak biocentric values, and that individual responsibility and agency is central in dealing with an acute environmental threat, and protecting an all-encompassing eco-system. The education affects the student’s attitudes by adding subject-specific knowledge, which broadens the horizontal attitude structure. Though, the question whether or not the education changes any values remain. Following from the student’s reasonings, the school is successful in distributing the asked-for values, though as a secondary agent, and that the distribution of values is somewhat invisible: present, but only when actively looked for. The study also acknowledges the importance of education that goes outside the classroom’s walls, and that a varied education facilitates the distribution of values.

Lövgren, Marlene (2021). Det där relationella är ju så viktigt. Specialpedagogprogrammet, Institutionen för skolutveckling och ledarskap, Lärande och samhälle, Malmö universitet, 90 hp. Syfte och frågeställningar  I detta arbete är avsikten att belysa hur lärare uppfattar och uttrycker relationskompetens i yrkesrollen och hur detta uppfattas av elever. Arbete fokuserar på vilka relationella aspekter som hjälper elever och frågeställningarna är. • Hur upplever lärare detta?• Vad anser eleverna? Teori  Arbetet utgår från begreppet relationell pedagogik och de teorier om människan som subjekt som dessa bygger på. Metod  Studien är inspirerad av grundad teori och två olika undersökningsmetoder har använts. Enkäter till både elever och lärare samt efterföljande intervjuer. I arbetet pågick analys och inhämtande av data samtidigt eftersom intervjuerna grundade sig på enkätsvaren. Resultat  Resultatet tyder på att skolan behöver arbeta vidare med fördjupad förståelse av det komplexa begreppet relationskompetens. Lärarna behöver fördjupad kunskap både när det gäller hur yrkesprofessionell relationskompetens utvecklas och hur det praktiska relationella arbetet med elever kan utvecklas. Lärarna behöver även fördjupad kunskap om varför det relationella mötet är viktigt för ett framgångsrikt lärande Specialpedagogiska implikationer  Inom specialpedagogiken har de relationella aspekternas vikt för lärandeprocessen varit välkända länge. Därför är det lämpligt att använda sig av skolans specialpedagog i den kompetensutveckling som lärarna är i behov av.

Denna uppsats ämnar undersöka svenska gymnasieelevers attityder till litteratur i svenskämnet på gymnasiet samt hur elever tycker att litteraturundervisningen bör gå till. Resultatet visar att eleverna har en positiv attityd till litteratur och litteraturläsning generellt men att den läsning som sker i skolan uppfattas som tråkig och ett måste. Vidare visar resultatet en oenighet när det kommer till litteraturundervisningen. Vissa anser att eleverna borde ha större frihet när det kommer till vad som ska läsas och andra anser att läraren bör styra innehållet i litteraturundervisningen.

The study aims to investigate how teachers’ intentions with written feedback and students’ perceptions of it correlate. In total, three teachers and nine students from different study programs in an upper secondary school in Sweden participated in this study. The data was collected through semi-structured interviews and was analyzed using qualitative content analysis. It emerged in the analysis that the teachers’ intentions and students’ perceptions correlated to some extent. However, there was a clear difference with regard to how the teachers intended the students to use the written feedback and how the students actually used it. The teachers wanted the students to use it to improve the development of their learning, whereas the students saw it as an evaluation of their results and rarely used it. If the teachers want to make sure that the students work with the feedback, they need to make it a planned activity.

Syftet med följande undersökning är att ge ett kunskapsbidrag om flerspråkiga elevers upplevelse av sin språkliga identitetsutveckling i samspel med skolans svenskundervisning. För att uppnå syftet har följande frågor besvarats: (1) Hur upplever flerspråkiga elever att deras språkande uppfattas inom ramen för svenskundervisningen? och (2) Hur upplever flerspråkiga elever att deras språkliga identitet påverkas av svenskundervisningens förhållningssätt till språkande? Undersökningen har en positionsteoretisk utgångspunkt. Metoden som använts är kvalitativa semistrukturerade intervjuer. Resultatet visar att de flerspråkiga eleverna upplever en enspråksnorm i skolan och att detta har påverkat deras syn på sitt eget språkande och sin egen språkliga identitet. / The aim of the following study is to make a knowledge contribution regarding multilingual students’ experience of their linguistic identity development in interaction with Swedish language teaching in school. To reach this aim the following questions have been answered (1) How do multilingual students experience that their languaging is perceived within the Swedish language teaching? And (2) How do multilingual students experience that their linguistic identity is affected by the approach to languaging in the Swedish language teaching? The theoretical framework in this essay is positioning theory. The method used in this essay is qualitative semi-structured interviews. The result shows that the multilingual students experience a monolingual norm in school and that this has affected how they perceive their own languaging and linguistic identity.

Uppsatsen avser att undersöka hur läroböcker förbereder ungdomar för de samhällsutmaningar som finns. Med samhällsutmaningar menas den ökade mängd information och informationsflöde som finns i samhället. Det ska undersökas genom att studera hur läroböcker i samhällskunskap på gymnasienivå framställer kritiskt tänkande. Den forskning som finns sedan tidigare är begränsad och den som finns visar att det finns skillnader i läroböckerna, men inte hur skillnaderna tar sig uttryck i praktiken. Denna uppsats ska därför undersöka kritiskt tänkande i läroböcker med utgångspunkt i att fylla den kunskapsluckan. För att göra det har tre forskningsfrågor formulerats och som ska besvaras. För att besvara de formulerade forskningsfrågorna har en kvalitativ innehållsanalys valts som metod. Den analysen kommer att genomföras på fyra läroböcker, utvalda enligt ett målstyrt urval. Analysen av böckerna kommer att ske genom att först koda materialet till små koder. Därefter kommer koderna att sättas samman till olika teman som besvarar forskningsfrågorna. Resultatet av analysen visar att läroböckerna framställer kritisk tänkande som dolt lärande. Det innebär att läroböckerna inte framställer kritiskt tänkande explicit, utan att det sker som en konsekvens av andra delar i läroböckerna. Ett annat resultat är att de typer av uppgifter som läroböckerna erbjuder eleverna är kunskaper i kritiskt tänkande. Det vill säga att eleverna får träna på att jämföra, granska och utvärdera, även om det inte är uttalat kritiskt tänkande. Kunskaper om kritiskt tänkande är en andra typ av innehåll som framkommer eftersom eleverna lär sig om behovet av att källkritiskt granska och varför det behövs i dagens samhälle. En tredje typ av innehåll är praktiska uppgifter. Eleverna ges möjlighet att kontinuerligt öva på detta i med praktiska inslag. Praktiska inslag som förekommer är debatter, uppgifter och diskussioner som alla innehåller inslag som utvecklar kritiskt tänkande. Det sista resultat som framkom i analysen var angående skillnaderna mellan studieförberedande och yrkesförberedande program angående kritiskt tänkande var att studieförberedande är mer fördjupande i uppgifterna. Läroböckerna efterfrågar mer analytiska frågor och diskussioner, medan böckerna för yrkesförberedande elever var grundläggande och efterfrågade mer vad och vem, istället för analytiska frågor. / The study aims to investigate how textbooks prepare young people for the societal challenges that exist. Here, societal challenges are meant by increased amount of information and information flow that exists in society. It should be investigated by studying how textbooks in civics, directed at pupils in upper secondary school, present critical thinking. The research that already exists is limited and the existing one shows that there are differences in the textbooks, but not how the differences are expressed in practice. This essay will therefore examine critical thinking in textbooks based on filling that knowledge gap. To do this, three research questions have been formulated and answered. To answer the formulated research questions, a qualitative content analysis has been chosen as the method. That analysis will be made on four textbooks, selected according to a goal-oriented sample. The analysis of the books will be done by first coding the material into small codes. The codes will then be put together into different themes that answer the research questions. The results of the analysis show that the textbooks present critical thinking as hidden learning. This means that the textbooks do not present critical thinking explicitly, but that it takes place as a consequence of other parts of the textbooks. Another result is that the content that the textbooks offer students is knowledge in critical thinking. That is, students are given opportunities to practice comparing, reviewing and evaluating, even if it is not explicitly critical thinking. Knowledge of critical thinking is a second type of content that emerges as students learn about the need to critically review sources and why it is needed in today's society. A third type of content is practical tasks, the pupils are given the opportunity to continuously practice this in practical tasks. Practical elements that occur are debates, tasks and discussions, all of which contain elements that develop critical thinking. The last result that emerged in the analysis was about the differences between study preparation and vocational preparation programs regarding critical thinking. The analysis showed that study preparation is more in- depth in the tasks. The textbooks call for more analytical questions and discussions, while the books for vocational students were more basic requesting questions asking for what and who instead of analytical questions.

This thesis investigates how teachers in political science course A, all from municipal upper secondary schools work with planning their lessons. Due to nationwide regulations and goals set by the The Swedish National Agency for Education, the teachers have to plan their lessons basing on these regulations. However it is not defined how to concretely implement these regulations when planning for the lessons, which may lead to the fact that the teachers’ own interpretations of the regulations cannot be fully avoided in the process of planning for the lessons. The investigation consists of five interviews made with teachers in political science, all from municipal upper secondary schools. The teachers who have taken part in this report come from two different municipal upper secondary schools. The result in this report partly shows that although the basic reference topics set by The Swedish National Agency for Education is the same for each teacher in political science, the planning of the lessons structure can be very different. For example, when the five teachers plan how to make the pupils understand the concept of "democracy", they all planned their lessons having the regulations and goals in mind, but they all have a unique approach in how to prepare for their lessons and explain the concept of "democracy" for their pupils.