Syftet med denna studie är att granska arméofficerares ledarskap i rollen som handledare i den svenska Försvarsmakten. Studien beskriver och karaktäriserar handledarbeteenden i handledarrollen samt vilka ledarstilar som kan observeras i dessa handledarbeteenden. Utifrån dessa beskrivningar, samt intervjupersonernas självbilder av sitt eget ledarskap, är även ett mål med studien att problematisera Försvarsmaktens föreskrivna ledarskapsmodell med stöd av ett nyinstitutionellt och kritiskt perspektiv. Empirin samlades in via observationer tillsammans med kvalitativa intervjuer vilka gjordes i direkt anslutning till observationerna.   Resultatet visar att handledarbeteenden kan karaktäriseras på tre huvudsakliga sätt: coachande handledarbeteenden, kontrollerande handledarbeteenden samt handledarbeteenden genom att vara modell. Ledarstilarna i handledarbeteendena bildar en komplex mosaik av både utvecklande och transformativa samt konventionella och transaktionella ledarstilar vilka även visar att de avsedda ledar-stilarna till stor del divergerar från de observerade ledarstilarna. Denna diskrepans mellan ledarstilsavsikter och ledarstilshandlingar diskuteras utifrån ett mikro-perspektiv och ett makroperspektiv och två förklaringsmodeller presenteras: problemet med situationens imperativ samt problemet med ledarskapsideologins glapp. En alternativ ledarstil presenteras även i form av den styrande ledarstilen.

Service-Learning is a popular teaching method that is increasingly being adopted by institutions of higher learning throughout the nation and is enthusiastically promoted as a progressive method for mediating the alleged decline in civic responsibility and ameliorating subsequent social ills. Service-learning courses are also seen as an answer to growing student disinterest by connecting students to real world experiences while simultaneously providing much needed community support in the face of receding social services in this Post-Welfare moment (Goode and Maskovsky 2001a). Anthropological insights, born out of a liberal humanistic tradition, can be employed to critically examine this popular educational and social project. Critical anthropology theories and methods help articulate disparity between the promises of service-learning and the realities of implementation. Recent calls from within the discipline challenge anthropologists to do more than simply documenting experiences of poverty and violence, but to become politically engaged by exposing how global and state processes shape and create those realities in the local realm (Hyatt and Lyon-Callo 2003). My internship as a volunteer tutor at a local recreation center provided a unique vantage for critically examining service-learning while simultaneously working to establish a politically engaged anthropology project. Ethnographizing (Lyon-Callo and Hyatt 2003:177) service-learning reveals hidden contradictions that act as substantial barriers to the goals of the generally agreeable and beneficial service-learning program. Expressing an explicitly politically engaged service-learning agenda works to ameliorate these dangers for the creation of a potentially powerful vehicle for social change.

Since the inception of the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001, schools with high populations of at-risk students who are not meeting academic standards must provide supplementary educational services (SES) to their struggling learners. This study examines the tutoring program of an urban Texas elementary school that rapidly improved its state accountability over the course of a few years. Through interviews with teachers and an analysis of their lesson plans and standardized assessment data, several themes emerged that were identified as factors leading to the school’s academic success. / text

published_or_final_version / Computer Science and Information Systems / Master / Master of Philosophy

This study explored the usefulness of peer tutoring among elementary school-aged nonnative speakers of English (NNS). In this study, the more proficient NNS of English tutored their less proficient NNS peers. I explored the usefulness of peer tutoring in the natural classroom environment of the English as a second language (ESL) students in Grades 4 to 7. The study focuses on how and to what extent the ESL students can assist each other in the academic and language learning of a science study on the human body during peer tutoring sessions. Taking an ethnographic research approach, the study employed a variety of data collection methods such as classroom observations, formal and informal interviews with the participants, tape recording peer tutoring sessions and collecting writing samples of the students' work. Eighteen ESL students, the classroom teacher and the researcher as participant observer were the participants in this study. Seven themes emerged from the data for discussion of the findings of the study. The results of this study demonstrate that with teacher scaffolding, such as modelling strategies, explicit instruction, and contextual hands-on group tasks for experiential learning and sharing, that NNS of English can and do assist their NNS peers during peer tutoring. Further to this, results indicated that the matching of tutors and tutees is complex and requires careful consideration when forming the tutoring dyads. An interesting aspect of the study revealed that discourse and "concepts" were being scaffolded at the same time and that students were able to include description and causal discourse in their writing about topics on the human body.

Research on tutoring has shown that the student's interaction with the tutor determines the learning outcomes. In human tutoring, the responsibility of the interaction is shared between the tutor and the student. In the case of a computer coach such as the McGill Statistics Tutor, the control of the interaction is put entirely in the hands of the learners. Learners' ability to interact with the system productively therefore represents a critical aspect affecting the learning outcomes. This ability of help seeking (Nelson-LeGall, 1981) has not been well researched from a cognitive science point of view in the context of computer-supported learning (Aleven et al., 2003). The aims of the present work were to elaborate and test a cognitive model of help seeking and to examine the prevalence of help seeking in a problem-based computer-supported learning situation, as well as individual differences and the effect of the progression in a sequence of tasks with respect to help seeking. / Participants were 18 graduate students from a faculty of Education of a Canadian university. The seven-hour experiment involved working in pairs to solve a very challenging statistics problem for which students did not have sufficient background. A computer coach based on human tutoring, the McGill Statistics Tutor, was available to provide help with every aspect of the task. / Data consisted of two complementary sources. The main source was the dialogue between the participants as they worked on the statistics problem using the computer coach. The students' use of the computer coach and solutions to the tasks were also integrated into the database. / Data analysis consisted of statistical analyses using log-linear models. Conditional probability graphs were also constructed from the data. / The results were consistent with the help seeking model. Individual differences were found in terms of emphasis on certain help seeking activities. Effects of the progression in the sequence of tasks were also found. The quality of the solutions students elaborated corresponded to specific profiles of help seeking. The structure of help seeking episodes was established and corresponded to the model. These results have implications for the design of computer coaches and instructional situations.

Buddy Reading, a literacy event that pairs two students as they share the reading of a book, was investigated from cultural, textual and social stances. Using a sample of 10 pairs of students from grades one and three, this study explored 1) the influences of school culture and classroom conventions that effected Buddy Reading, 2) the interaction between Grade 1 early readers as they read with more proficient Grade 3 buddies, and 3) student and teacher perceptions of Buddy Reading. Data collection involved four phases and included classroom observation, video recording students as they read together, photographic interviews of students and standard interviews of teachers. Findings indicated that student and teacher perceptions paralleled classroom practice, with the exception of students' perception of the type of decoding skills used. Although half of the proficient readers reported that they encouraged their younger partners to 'sound out words', they usually corrected oral reading errors by 'telling' or 'pronouncing' the word for their buddy. Students did not use scaffolding dialogue as they read with their buddies, and it was concluded that Buddy Reading could not be used as an alternative for reading practice with an adult. Social interaction between students was observed and discussed. School culture, tradition and rituals had a significant effect on the organization of the Buddy Reading Program and classroom practice.

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In this study, an innovative 'peer tutoring' programme at a high school in KwaZuluNatal was examined. The aim of the study was to explore the limits and possibilities of this approach to enhancing learning at the school from the perspective of teachers, tutors and tutees. 30 learners who were tutees in the programme, 10 tutors, and 5 educators were interviewed through semi-structured interviews into order to examine how they were experiencing the programme. In addition, the researcher conducted non-participant observations of selected peer tutoring sessions at the school. The findings revealed that overall peer tutoring has positive benefits for learners and has the potential to enhance learning and teaching at the school. Some of the benefits that emerged are: increased motivation; enhanced self-concept; reduced inhibition; learning in a supportive, enabling environment; increased communication and dialogue; development of learner autonomy and independence. The study revealed there are areas in the programme that need to be systematically monitored, for example, peer interactions to ensure that they are not at a purely concrete knowledge telling level. Training has to ensure that deep level thinking and problem solving occurs. The active involvement of teachers is necessary at all levels, in particular to monitor discipline. The findings also suggest that the success of a peer-tutoring programme may be linked to the culture and ethos of the school as a whole. A school that upholds the principles of inclusivity, values of caring and affirming others, collaboration, and an ethos of working together may be an environment in which a peer-tutoring programme will flourish. The whole school community needs to build this kind of an ethos and culture - teachers, learners, parents, school management. / Thesis (M.Ed.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2005.