<p>Being a skilled reader makes it easier to learn a new language. It is important to teach students how the knowledge and use of reading strategies can facilitate learning. This study was made in a Swedish fourth grade class with eighteen participant pupils. They were asked to translate two texts from English into Swedish: one was a poem with nonsense words, and the other a prose text. The texts were taken from <em>Through the Looking Glass</em> by Lewis Carroll and <em>The Garbage King</em> by Elizabeth Laird. After this an interview was made with all of the pupils in pairs, where they were asked about their reading strategies normally and in this situation. The results found were that the reading strategies used were: <em>likeness with their native language</em>, <em>previous vocabulary knowledge of the L2</em>, <em>syntactic knowledge</em>,<em> </em>and<em> guessing the meaning through the context</em>. The result confirms previous research in that the pupils who liked reading and did so in their spare time, did better when it came to making syntactically correct translations.</p>

<p>The purpose of this essay is to investigate what different ways there are to teach English grammar at upper secondary level and what guidance experienced teachers have to offer. This is done by studying different theorists’ ideas on language acquisition as well as what researchers’ opinions are on how to teach grammar. I have also interviewed seven experienced teachers who work at upper secondary level.</p><p>The results of this investigation show that explicit grammar teaching has decreased over the years and been replaced by implicit grammar teaching and communication exercises. Grammar teaching has become integrated with activities focusing on meaning and is taught more through examples than by using grammatical terminology. Since students frequently come into contact with English they are not thought to need grammar rules as much, since they learn the language in a native-like way almost. However, they repeatedly make some mistakes. Each teacher had different methods for dealing with these mistakes, but they seemed to be keeping in mind the students’ needs and the curriculum.</p><p>In this study, I will highlight some methods for teaching grammar, factors that can influence learning and provide information on some existing theories about how students learn their second language.</p>

<p>Sammandrag</p><p>Med detta arbete vill jag titta på de största skillnaderna mellan en kommunal-, en Montessori- och en Waldorfskola med inriktning på deras engelskundervisning. Detta för att få inspiration till olika sätt att undervisa elever i problem på, i framförallt engelska. För att kunna se de största skillnaderna och likheterna mellan den kommunala skolan, Montessoriskolan och Waldorfskolan började jag med att studera vad som finns skrivit om dem i litteraturen.</p><p>Efter att ha gjort detta valde jag att ta kontakt med en skola av varje sort. Jag besökte de tre skolorna under två dagar vardera under tre veckors tid. Under de två dagarna satt jag med i klassrummet och tittade på hur undervisningen såg ut. Besöket avslutade jag med att intervjua den lärare vars klassrum jag besökte. Intervjufrågorna jag ställde till lärarna var formulerade utifrån den litteratur jag studerat.</p><p>Jag kom fram till att det inte bara finns skillnader utan även likheter mellan skolorna, framförallt mellan den kommunala skolan och Montessoriskolan. Detta både i litteraturen och i resultatet. En av de största skillnaderna mellan de olika pedagogikerna och skolorna var utöver hur de lägger upp elevernas skoldagar, hur de använder sig av de nationella proven. Den kommunala skolan gör de nationella proven i årskurs fem, medan Montessoriskolan gör femmans nationella prov i både fyran, femman och sexan, och Waldorfskolan inte gör dem över huvud taget mer än i årskurs nio. Både Montessoriskolan och Waldorfskolan anser att de kräver mer av sina elever än vad som görs i de nationella målen. Men alla tre skolorna följer målen, även om Waldorfskolorna har sin egen läroplan.</p> / <p>Abstract</p><p>In this study I have looked at some of the differences between a municipal-, a Montessori- and a Waldorf school, with focus on their English teaching. This is because I wanted to find ways to teach English to pupils with various types of learning difficulties. To be able to see the main differences and similarities between a municipal school, a Montessori school and a Waldorf school I began with literature studies.</p><p>When I had finished the literature studies I contacted three schools that applied the different pedagogies. I visited the three schools during two days each through a three-week period. During these two days I was in the classroom when the pupils were there and followed the teachers’ teaching. I ended the visits with an interview with the teacher whose classroom I visited.</p><p>I came to the conclusion that there are both differences and similarities between the three schools. The two schools that are most similar are the municipal school and the Montessori school both in the literature and in the result from the observations and interviews. Two of the main differences between the schools are how they plan the school days for the pupils, in which order they have the lessons, and how they use the national tests. The municipal school uses the national test in fifth grade, the Montessori school uses it in the years four, five and six and the Waldorf school only use it in year nine. The Montessori school and Waldorf school believe that they require more from their pupils that the national goals. All the three schools aim at those goals, but the Waldorf schools have their own curriculum.</p>

<p>This corpus-based study of the use of expressions of future in English has two aims: to examine how certain expressions of future are used in Present-day English, and to explore how electronic corpora can be exploited for linguistic study. </p><p>The expressions focused on in this thesis are five auxiliary or semi-auxiliary verb phrases frequently discussed in studies of future reference in English: <i>will</i>, <i>’ll</i>, <i>shall</i>, <i>going to</i> and <i>gonna</i>. The study examines the patterned ways in which the expressions are used in association with various linguistic and non-linguistic (or extra-linguistic) factors. The linguistic factors investigated are co-occurrence with particular words and co-occurrence with items of particular grammatical classes. The non-linguistic factors examined are medium (written vs. spoken), text category, speaker characteristics (age, sex, social class, etc.), region and time. The data for the study are exclusively drawn from computer-readable corpora of Present-day English. Corpus analyses are performed with automatic and interactive methods, and exploit both quantitative and qualitative analytical techniques.</p><p>The study finds that the use of these expressions of future varies with a number of factors. Differences between spoken and written language are particularly prominent and usage also varies between different types of text, both within spoken and written corpora. Variation between groups of speakers is also attested. Although the linguistic co-occurrence patterns are similar to some degree, there are nonetheless differences in the collocational patterns in which the expressions are used. </p><p>Methodological issues related to corpus-based studies in general are discussed in the light of the insights gained from this study of expressions of future.</p>

When J. R. R. Tolkien’s trilogy The Lord of the Rings was published in Swedish 1959-1961, the translation by Åke Ohlmarks was considered by most critics to be excellent. According to Ohlmarks, even J. R. R. Tolkien himself and his son Christopher were very pleased with it, which Ohlmarks was told by Christopher when he met him in 1975. This is, however, contradicted in the authorised biography of Tolkien by Carpenter (1978), in which Tolkien is said to have been most negative towards the way Ohlmarks handled the text. Before the biography was published, Christopher Tolkien and Ohlmarks had become bitter enemies, which might explain the re-evaluation. The schism has been described by Ohlmarks in his book Tolkiens arv (1978). But ever since The Lord of the Rings came out in paperback in 1971 there has been a discussion about the translation quality also in Sweden. When I first read the books in English I had the Swedish translation beside me. I soon discovered that Ohlmarks had taken great liberties with the text. I noticed that the descriptions were often more detailed in the Swedish translation than in the original and it was this fact that first roused my interest. Therefore, I decided to try to make a translation quality assessment of a part of the text, using a model by Juliane House.

This essay explores the living conditions of the main characters Kambili in Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Tambudzai in Nervous Conditions by Tsitsi Dangarembga and their struggle to achieve personal freedom. It aims to show that colonial stereotypes are challenged through the girl´s struggles. It starts with a short exposé over post-colonial theory, here a methodological viewpoint, which is important to consider Kambili and Tambudzai from. It furthermore considers how their extensive family circumstances have impact on these two young protagonists, and finally examines how they employ formal and informal education as a tool to make changes in their lives and become inspirational young African women.

The aim of this essay was to analyze bilingual children in conversation. The essay examinesunder what syntactic circumstances bilingual Spanish / Swedish speaking children codeswitch.The data for this essay is based on recordings of two of the author’s familymembers. The focus is on how bilingual children code-switch, if it is more likely forbilingual children to code-switch when the syntax of two languages are in alignment and ifthere is a dominant language. The collections of recordings are based on real conversationsbetween two bilingual children. The two participants in the study are Spanish and Swedishspeakers; they were born and raised in Sweden with Hispanic parents. The children havebeen exposed to both Spanish and Swedish at home. To be able to obtain the data the authoronly took the most important parts from the transcripts; both audio and video recordingswere made to capture spontaneous conversations between the two brothers. The results showthat the two participants code-switch most frequently at points when the syntax of the twolanguages is in alignment.

Although various approaches to psychotherapy have been applied to The Remains of the Day in the aforementioned analyses, none have linked it to Role Theory, as defined in the context of Psychodrama. However if the abnormal importance that Stevens attributes to becoming a perfect butler is taken into account, The Remains of the Day is practically saturated with textual evidence of how social role imbalance is the source of Stevens’ dilemmas both in the narrated and the narrating time. Although whether it was Ishiguro’s intention to create this effect is unclear, the setting of the novel in a world that is transitioning from the war eras to modernity moreover fits in all too well with the sociological aspects of Role Theory. In brief, it has been proposed that changes in society that render certain social roles obsolete put pressure on the individuals that hold these roles to either adapt or renew themselves in pace with societal developments. Stevens, being a butler, would have felt such strain acutely, being that the decline of the great British houses over the aforementioned period led to a sharp decline in domestic service professions at the time. (Lee, 1988)Drawing upon both the Psycho-dramatic and the Sociologic aspects of Role Theory, this paper aims first of all to propose that Ishiguro’s main character in The Remains of the Day suffers from an over-developed occupational role, which has eliminated or at the very least marginalized his other social roles. Secondly it will argue that the latter’s’ reflections that are brought about over the course of the plot are a consequence of role strain, which as a palpable yet indirect plot element forces him realize that his occupational role is slowly but steadily becoming a thing of the past. In facing such a fate, he is in turn forced to confront how his extreme commitment to his job has left the rest of his life empty, for which he begins to look back at and reconsider the roles that he could have had but neglected in life. On top of outlining this approach to rationalizing the events of the novel, the paper will theorize upon that in choosing to tell such a story, Ishiguro is promoting a view of the world as a place in constant motion, in which, like the post-modernist perspective, there are no set or universal values that withstand the test of time. Juxtaposed against the satirical undertones of the novel, as well as against the time period in which it is set, this statement will in turn be interpreted as critique against the destructive qualities of conventions in society.

This essay was underpinned by the premise that boys and girls receive an equal education in EFL (English as a Foreign Language) in Swedish schools. The purpose with this essay was to examine whether there are any differences between boys and girls when it comes to understanding grammatical structures and listening comprehension in English in a county in central Sweden. The investigation focused on tests that were carried out after every section of teaching in the various areas. A descriptive method was used which consisted of quantitative approaches; i.e. content analysis of questionnaires answered by 60 pupils in the ages of 10-11. A following analysis was thereafter conducted with reference to the theories by Vygotskij, Piaget and Skinner that are used in the investigation. The results showed that the girls had slightly better results in all of the tests in grammatical structures except one, and in all of the listening comprehension questionnaires, which indicates a better understanding of these parts in EFL learning. It remains to be established why these differences have occurred as the number of pupils in the study cannot be considered valid as representations of Swedish pupils in general. The conclusion of the result however, was that educators in EFL need to increase their knowledge concerning differences in learning between boys and girls. They also need to consider whether the EFL lessons being delivered in classrooms are equally beneficial to both sexes.

<p>This essay was underpinned by the premise that the proverb plays an important role in language teaching as a part of gaining cultural knowledge, metaphorical understanding and communicative competence. The purpose with this essay was to examine whether proverbs are a part of the EFL (English as Foreign Language) teaching in the county of Jönköping, Sweden. The investigation focused on the occurrence of proverbs in eleven textbooks for the English A- and B-courses, and on the attitudes toward using prov-erbs in the teaching among nineteen teachers at seven upper secondary schools. Descriptive methods were used, which combined quantitative and qualitative approaches, i.e. content analysis and close read-ing of the textbooks and a questionnaire answered by the teachers.</p><p>The result showed that proverbs are a small part of the EFL teaching regarding both the textbooks and the use in the classroom by the teachers. Proverbs are mainly used as bases for discussions in the text-books, and by the teachers as expressions to explain, to discuss the meaning and to compare to the Swedish equivalents. There is a positive attitude toward using proverbs and the result showed awareness among the teachers regarding proverbs as a part of the language and the culture as well as for communi-cation. The conclusion of the result was that the knowledge has to increase among educators and text-book authors about how proverbs can be used as effective devices and tools, not only as common ex-pressions, in every area of language teaching.</p>