The purpose of this study was to examine preschool teachers’ thoughts on roles within activities in the subject chemistry. The main focus has been their perceptions of their own and the children´s roles when planning and executing activities within the subject chemistry.   The method used to execute the study was semi-structured interviews, and all respondents have been certified preschool teachers. When analyzing the material I have used a constructivist perspective.   The study shows that there were several roles that the preschool teachers strived for. The different roles did not occur exclusively in one person, but seemed to be something the preschool teachers alternated between. The different roles show different levels of control in the activities from the preschool teachers. The majority of the preschool teachers aimed to be a co-researcher who inspires the children, although some control in the activities seemed to be necessary according to a majority of respondents.   Several different factors which had an effect on the conditions for the children’s roles and the preschool teacher´s possibilities to act as a co- researcher emerged in this study. Those were factors like what questions were asked around the activities, the material being used, teaching documentation, child perspective, ICT which was used to explore with the children and whether one would proceed with the children´s interests as a starting point when planning an activity. The age of the children and the children´s personal differences were also pointed out as important factors. / Syftet med min studie har varit att undersöka förskollärares tankar kring rollfördelning vid aktiviteter inom kemi i förskolan. Mitt fokus har varit hur förskollärare ser på barnens samt sin egen roll vid planerande och utförande av aktiviteter inom kemi.   Semistrukturerade intervjuer har använts som datainsamlingsmetod och samtliga respondenter har varit förskollärare. Jag har använt mig av ett konstruktivistiskt perspektiv när jag analyserat mitt material.   I studien framkom att fanns flera roller som de intervjuade förskollärarna strävar efter och att de olika rollerna inte verkade exklusivt hos en person, istället verkar rollerna vara något förskollärarna alternerade emellan. De olika rollerna visar på olika stark styrning i aktiviteterna ifrån förskolläraren men att vara en medforskare som inspirerar barnen var den roll majoriteten förskollärare strävade efter samtidigt som man såg en viss styrning i aktiviteterna som nödvändig.   Flera olika faktorer som påverkade förutsättningarna för barnens roll och förskollärarens möjlighet att verka som en medforskande pedagog framkommer i studien. Faktorer som de frågor som ställdes runt aktiviteten, det material som användes, pedagogisk dokumentation, barnsyn, IKT som användes för att utforska tillsammans med barnen, huruvida man utgick från barnens intresse vid planering vid aktiviteter. Barns ålder och barns olikheter lyftes också fram som betydande faktorer.

Yes / Involving patients and the public in all stages of research has been the focus of the SHARED study. Patient and public involvement (PPI) is an important strategic priority for the Department of Health and funders such as the National Institute for Health Research. The aim of this paper is to describe the benefits, challenges and costs involved in setting up the research study with lay members as part of the research team. The study focused on developing service user-led recommendations for people with memory loss and their carers, on discharge from acute hospital to the community. Methods: This began with a discussion of an initial research idea with a lay group of carers and people living with dementia. Once funded, approval was sought from the Research Ethics Committee and NHS Trusts to conduct the research including the active involvement of lay co-researchers. Finally, to recruit, train and pay lay co-researchers in their role. Results: The benefits of PPI have included developing ideas which are important to people living with memory loss; support for PPI received from the funders and research ethics committee, high levels of interest from volunteer groups, and lasting enthusiasm from many of the co-researchers. Organisational challenges were met in the requirement for research passports and with payment methods for the co-researchers. Training was beneficial but incurred extra costs for repeated training days. Discussion: Overall the benefits outweighed the challenges which were overcome to varying degrees. The lay co-researchers gained membership of a study group and a beneficial partnership developed with the third sector. The biggest challenge was in overcoming the differences in approach to lay co-researchers between NHS Trusts. Organisational culture has been slow to incorporate PPI and this has not yet been fully addressed. It has the potential to delay the start of projects, affect recruitment time, incur extra research costs and disadvantage PPI.

This research was an attempt at a social construction of an understanding that came into being through the collaboration between the researcher and the co-researchers concerning the life and circumstances of seafarers. The purpose of this construction was to participate, together with the co-researchers, in developing a research narrative that can be beneficial to seafarers. The aim is for it to lead to their emancipation and empowerment. The title of this research indicates that this is a hermeneutical adventure. It is hermeneutical because it is about a construction of meaning and about coming to an understanding. It is an adventure because whatever meaning and understanding was constructed in the end was unknown at the beginning. New knowledge was constructed in which all who participated had a say. The development of this research narrative was guided by the ABDCE formula which uses the metaphor of research as story writing. The researcher’s epistemology was informed by the notions of social constructionism, the narrative approach based on social constructionism and postfoundationalism. Theological issues in this research had to do with postfoundationalist practical theology, with its emphasis on embeddedness, contextuality and particularity while also trying to move beyond the local. In addition to this there was also a focus on missiology and the concept of Missio Dei was emphasised. Seafaring is still a dangerous profession where the seafarers many times find themselves being powerless in situations of injustice. On ships there is a lot of diversity. Men and women from many different religions and cultures have to sail together. Occasionally this causes tension between seafarers, but mostly they are working and living together in harmony. A bigger concern than conflict is that diversity might cause social isolation. Seafarers are willing to endure a lot of hardship and especially seafarers from developing countries are making this sacrifice in order to provide a better future for their families. The relationship between seafaring and the family is an ironic one because the seafarers sail in order to provide for the family, but at the same time sailing takes them away from their loved ones. From the perspective of the researcher three general weaknesses were found as far as the ministry to seafarers is concerned: At times there is lack of a spiritual dimension to the ministry, secondly there is a need for a stronger presence among the seafarers and thirdly more emphasis should be put on involvement with fishers especially as far as justice issues are concerned. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Practical Theology / unrestricted

Human realities are formed in particular contexts, and can be understood through telling the story of experiences related with these realities. Homelessness is a reality for many in various parts of the world. The condition of homelessness involves various discourses, each of which can be dominant in different people. Dominant discourses bring with them inherent understandings which in the case of the reality of homelessness can negatively influence the daily activities and future prospects of homeless people. These dominant discourses define the experiences of the homeless people and cause them to assess themselves negatively. This study is in the field of Practical Theology, based on a social constructionist paradigm which holds that meanings are socially constructed and there is no single “Truth”. The processes of telling stories, listening to these stories and constructing new meanings make up a narrative approach to counselling, which I use in the context of interactions with homeless youth at the Street Centre run by Pretoria Community Ministries. My approach is qualitative, and the data are evolved from narrative interventions and unstructured interviews with homeless youth. As this process is a journey into the experiences and stories of these young people, empirical sampling is irrelevant. Listening to the stories of the young people from the streets filled me with enthusiasm to take this narrative journey with them through their stories. Examining the impact of economic factors in their discourses and narrations gave me new understanding of their meanings and challenged me, because many of these were unpredictable. The epistemological approach of postfoundationalism used on this journey allowed a wide range of knowledge types and interactions, which I elucidate through interdisciplinary investigation and identification of the traditions that inform the dominant discourses. The seven-movement methodology used for this work is relevant in the context of the homeless youth, because it allows me as researcher to continue the full length of the journey with the homeless youth, leading eventually to new possibilities. On the way certain themes evolved and their meanings constructed. Listening for the discourses and identifying their economic factors helped me to deconstruct these discourses, and so guide the stories into more hopeful channels. Of course, constructing alternate stories and acknowledging the importance of economic factors will not alone change the future of these young homeless people. Economic restructuring of society is needed. This possibility challenges jobless, homeless individuals not to acquiesce in the negative patterns of society, but rather to work with conviction to create new possibilities. In this project I listened to the stories of ten homeless young people, for each of which two sessions are presented in this report. These stories show that the story tellers are the real researchers, who create new alternate stories of hope in the course of this project. “God-talk” and the discussion of “God-experiences” throws light on the role of God in their lives and in their stories. The research journey charted in this report describes first the theological context and research model, and then the particular context of these young people’s lives. This is followed by descriptions of the discourses. Description of the context of the stories and interpretation of the stories themselves moves into assessment of the stories in their individual context. Interdisciplinary investigation and identification of the traditions that inform the discourses thicken our understanding of the realities experienced by these young people, and deeper interpretations arise which are applicable beyond the local context. Each petal of this flower blooms with new colours of understanding and new fragrances of possibility. The findings of this project are not the final end of this journey, but rather lights for future journeys into the experiences of homeless youth. / Thesis (PhD (Pastoral Family Therapy))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Practical Theology / PhD / unrestricted

Only men can initiate boys into men. Boys are prepared into men by men of integrity, for that reason, when a father is absent a male model has to be found. Lack of models is the number one enemy for our adolescent males in Zimbabwe today. The absence of adult role models means adolescent males are moulded by unsupervised, doubtful and inexperienced peers. In the past the bringing up of a child was a community responsibility. In the present day children are growing up as sheep without a male shepherd. The qualitative and quantitative research methods guided the process of this study. The study revealed that fathers are absent because they have migrated to other countries and that their absence has a negative impact on developing healthy adolescent males. Migration of fathers to the Diaspora could not be resisted by men because of the socioeconomic and political situation in Zimbabwe. Fathers have left the country for greener pastures. The exodus of fathers to the Diaspora has created a vacuum when it comes to mentoring and moulding of male children into adults. The study carried out with adolescent boys indicated that fathers in the Diaspora are engaged in some form of income generating activities. As a result, some of these men are able to provide material needs intended for their families back home. However, the absence of these fathers has made some children feel emotionally abandoned and betrayed, while others are disappointed by fathers who did not bid them farewell at the time they were living the country. There is another group that felt that the absence benefited them. The absence of fathers destroyed father – son relationships, generated anger, bitterness and lack of any future trust with fathers. When children are angered and bitterness resides in them, they would go against their father’s potential assistance. On the other hand, in the process of the study on the absent father, a Christian model of caring for an individual and community emerged. The church has been noted to be the only institution that would guide the society to value the job of caring for the people of God who are in needy situations. When the church cares for the adolescents it will be caring for itself as well as the body of Christ. The author considered the views from James fowler (1981) and Gerkin (1997) on the stages of faith development and the idea of seeing the church as a community of faith in order for this research to portray the community of faith as a Community of Love. This is because it is only by Christ’s love that people are forgiven by God through grace. In addition, it is through love that people are nurtured; miracles of spiritual and numerical growth are realised. Acts 2; bears witness of the power in love fellowships or communities. He states that in sharing the gospel of Christ in love fellowships each member becomes a part of Christ’s body that spreads the gospel. The love fellowships make the church to be more than a preaching or meeting point. It becomes a family where all members have the opportunity to share their experiences at fellowship and individual levels. People will not depend on one person for spiritual growth but on each other for spiritual nourishment. Gerkin was important throughout the research with his pastoral care approach of caring for an individual and the communities of a Christian story in addition to guiding the researcher to create a model for a caring community. Therefore, caring of boys whose fathers are absent requires both individual mentors and local communities to model them. The church has been found wanting by the boys in this study. Boys have indicated that the church was not aware of their pain. This shows that the church was unable to see the depressed and hear the silent voices in order to interpret their situation. This reveals that the church has some parts that need spiritual attention in order for the body of Christ to function optimally. Children will open their hearts in love fellowships in order to be healed, nurtured, sustained and guided through love. Faith will be expressed in a more mature and responsible way when all is done in love. Faith in this study is the act of love that guides individuals and communities to an expression of freedom and responsibility in trusting God’s presence in human situations. It aims at increasing love for one another and to God. For it is only through Christ’s love that healthy memories are created. Chapter one gives the background and context of the problem to the study. It reveals that the motivation to carry out the study emerged from the author’s journey with his father and interactions with young people as a youth pastor. Therefore the socio-economic and political situation in Zimbabwe created an environment for the study to be carried out. In addition, absences of mothers at church prompted him to consider carrying out a study on the: Absent fathers due to migrant work: Its traumatic impact on adolescent males in Zimbabwe. Many women went to collect money from their husbands who are in the Diaspora each month end . Chapters twodemonstrates how a qualitative and quantitative method of carrying of the research is helpful. Listening to stories of the adolescent males enriched the research process. Chapter three dealt with the stages of human development coined by Erik Erikson with the intention to give the reader an understanding regarding the worth of adolescence stage. Chapter four explains father and fatherhood, the role of a father and impact of absence towards the up bringing of adolescent male children. Adolescent males develop their masculinity from their fathers for this reason every child should have a male model in order for him to be a man. In chapter five the researcher engaged in dialogue with adolescent males. Chapter six gave the concluding thoughts and recommendations to the study. The church has been identified as central in guiding children at individual and group levels in this era. The church should be a component of the extended family that is unique but related to the family units without competing with it. Every son needs a biological father from whom he learns how to manage weakness and strengths in his life and act in response to the challenges of the global village. Therefore, a father ought to be a male person in Zimbabwe who fears God and loves his sons not an angel out of this planet. Finally every adolescent child needs Christian males to guide him for it is through Christ’s love that healthy male memories are created. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2011. / Practical Theology / Unrestricted

For many decades, violence that is perpetuated by parents and loved ones against children in the name of physical child discipline or corporal punishment, has been a major concern for various governments and church leaders among most nations of the world. This does not only take into account hitting or beating a child with a stick, belt, slapping, or choking, but also spanking; especially when it is aggressive or excessive (Bradshaw 2009; Straus 1994; Kanyandago in Waruta & Kinoti 2005, Wolfe 1991; Carl 1985). A very prominent and highly respected religious figure, here in South Africa, Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, made the following notable assertion to show his support towards the elimination of the practice of corporal punishment in the home: I support the Global Initiative to eliminate all corporal punishment at home, at school, in institutions and community. … Progress towards abolishing corporal punishment is being made, but millions of the world’s children still suffer from humiliating acts of violence and these violations …can have serious lifelong effects. Violence begets violence and we shall reap whirlwind. Children can be disciplined without violence that instills fear and misery, and I look forward to church communities working with other organizations to… make progress towards ending all forms of violence against children. If we really want a peaceful and compassionate world, we need to build communities of trust where all children are respected, where home and school are safe places to be and where discipline is taught by example” (http://www.rapcan.org.za/wgpd/documents: Waterhouse 2012. Retrieved 23th February 2013). However, in spite of the various voices and movements against corporal punishment of children; especially the aggressive form of this practice (as will be analyzed later on in this study), the practice is still a common phenomenon in many African countries, including South Africa. Furthermore, as some research studies have shown, a literalistic view of certain texts of Scriptures in the OT (which are mostly from the Book of Proverbs) do not only seem to influence the widespread of corporal punishment of children, but also the abuse of this form of physical discipline (e.g., Prov. 13:24; 22:15; 23:13-14, 22:15) (Bradshaw 2009; Capps 1995; Straus 1994; Greven 1991). This assumption seems plausible, seeing that as Tripp T & Tripp M (2008:138) rightly allude to, as Christians, “God’s Word is our rule for faith and practice.” The authors, also expressed that, “the Biblical laws and standards sound oppressive and strict in our lawless, arrogant, twenty-first century culture.” However, it is important to also acknowledge that we, as Christians, can be wrong in our interpretation and application of certain Scriptures; thereby, leading to flawed practices (Pohlmann 2007; Pollard 1997). As Pollard (1997:91) has rightly observed, “Clearly, both personal experience and church history teach us that we can be wrong. It is vital, then, that we have a genuine humility as Christians. We must recognize our fallibility, and constantly reassess what we believe.” In other words, there are many well-meaning Christian parents who have put their children in harm’s way by frequently administering spanking to them in ways that are, evidently, excessive or aggressive: while claiming that they are obeying scriptural injunction on child discipline, and are also doing it for the moral and ethical good of their children (Bradshaw 2009; Greven 1991). The researcher, himself, was brought up in a Christian home; where the use and abuse of both high violence (e.g., beating a child with belt, stick, etc) and low violence (e.g., forcefully beating a child with bear hand) methods of physical child discipline were the order of the day (or a frequent occurrence). Furthermore, his well-meaning father often seemed to find justification for his actions based on scriptural grounds. Incidentally, the researcher noticed that this form of child discipline also seems to be widely used by many parents in his local church and many other Christian parents, whom he has come in contact with. And many of these parents seem not to be aware of the immediate and long term negative effects that aggressive corporeal punishment has on their children. The widespread of this phenomenon (corporeal punishment of children) and the traumatic impact it has on children, has led the researcher to do this research study in his local church context (a Pentecostal church), and to develop/propose a biblically sound or balanced model of pastoral care that can help pastors in rendering effective care, to those faced with this problem situation within the church. The theoretical frame work of this research study is based on Pollard’s model of positive deconstruction, as well as some contributions from Straus’ book Beating the Devil out of Them; Corporal Punishment in American Families. The purpose for choosing Pollard’s model of positive deconstruction was to help the researcher in: 1) Identifying the underlying worldview. 2) Analyzing the worldview. 3) Affirming the elements of truth in it (as every world view has some truth in it that needs to be recognizes and affirmed, which makes the process positive and 4) discovering the error in the worldview. These are the four elements in the process of positive deconstruction, as proposed by Pollard. Straus explores the phenomenon of corporal punishment and the traumatic effects of this method of child discipline both in term of its immediate and long term harm (later in life or in adulthood) psychological harm to children. The research methodology that was employed by the researcher in carrying out this research study is qualitative. Consequently, questionnaires were given out to 50 parents in the researcher’s church to fill. Also, one-on-one interviews were arranged with four parents, two children, and also with two pastoral caregivers in the church, on the issues of corporal punishment and child abuse within the Christian home. / Dissertation (MA Theol)--University of Pretoria, 2013. / gm2014 / Practical Theology / unrestricted

In the past two decades the Swedish compulsory school for students aged 7 to 16 has undergone major processes of reform and change. On a structural level these have ushered in a new era with a fundamentally changed assignment for the schools and its teachers. In this thesis, however, it is assumed that the teachers as individual actors and as groups have agency to accomplish change and alter structures. The thesis has been written within a several years’ inter­active research project with teachers from three compulsory schools. Based on data created in the project on how new and changing groups and working groups within teachers’ work lead to an extended assignment, the study focuses teachers’ negotiation of professional identities regarding the entire work situation. Etienne Wenger’s (1998) social theory on identity, entitled “Communities of Practice”, is used to deepen the understanding of the data. In the framework of an interactive research project the overall aim of the thesis is to describe and analyze how teachers negotiate professional identities in compulsory school. The aim is also to describe and analyze teachers’ learning and development of knowledge in the project. The central research question is: How and about what do teachers negotiate professional identities in different communities of practice? By using the interactive research approach the goal has been to develop a democratic dialogue and learning processes together with the participating teachers. One ambition is to enhance the knowledge of teachers as co-researchers within research projects and as teacher-researchers at work in school. The fora of the interactive project were informal talks, dialogues for learning, individual interviews and focus groups. The results of the study show that teachers negotiate professional identities in a flexible expanding multimembership of communities of practice. As brokers of information and knowledge between and within communities of practice at school, and from various identity positions, the teachers negotiate overlapping identities. Memberships in communities for adults only are growing in relation to teachers’ work regarding the entire work situation. The study’s main conclusion is that teachers in the new era negotiate identities within a web of tensions between fragmentation and coherence of the complexity of the work in its entirety through the multimembership in communities of practice. The thesis proposes that an awareness of complexity is fundamental, and that such an understanding can be enhanced by the teachers by developing themselves as brokers and by their reification of boundary objects within a complex multi­membership. Analysis of data shows that teachers in the interactive project have had the opportunity to further develop competences to negotiate identities as teacher-researchers at work in school. Data from the project are moreover analyzed within the context of globalized and diversified structural changes such as decentralization, economic transformations, cultural standardization, the individua­­­­lized knowledge society and the reflective society. A conclusion is that teachers seem to operate within an increasing globalization of the teaching profession and towards identities as globalized teachers. / Lärare i en ny tid: Om kunskapsbildning mellan lärare och forskare