Approximately five percent of the Swedish population suffer from dyslexia. Therefore, this degree project aims to gain an insight into what pedagogical support in Swedish and English teaching can be offered to dyslexic pupils. Firstly, this paper provides an overview of theories and literature on dyslexia in L1 and L2. The researchers’ findings show that dyslectic difficulties in the L1 is most likely to affect – either by limiting or enhancing – the pupils’ abilities to learn a L2. Strategies (spelling, comparing sounds and letters) that pupils learned when they started to read and write in their L1 and the differences in orthographic systems between L1 and L2 influence their reading and writing in L2. This study is also based on interviews of four K-3 teachers in the south of Sweden. The major conclusions of this study are that (i) dyslectic difficulties extend across languages, (ii) variation of the teachers’ knowledge of dyslexia might depend on the length of their professional teaching experience and their willingness and interest to learn more about dyslexia, (iii) K-3 teachers are dependent on special education teachers’ advice on how to support dyslexic pupils, and (iv) K-3 teachers use digital resources and audiobooks to train the reading and writing in L1, but not in L2 since English in K-3 mostly focuses in training pupils’ speaking skills.

This empirical degree project explores the use of Swedish in foreign language learning such as English and the subsequent consequences. For this study, we explored the positions of researchers regarding the topic and investigated how, when and why three teachers in Sweden used the Swedish language during English teaching. The study provides an overview of theories and literature regarding the use of first language during foreign language teaching. Some findings suggest that the first language should not be excluded in second language acquisition but incorporated with limited use. However, it could be problematic to incorporate the Swedish language for the students with different origins. In that scenario, the students would be forced to acquire a foreign language through their second or third language. The study also connects these findings and research to the theoretical background of the socio-cultural views in the classrooms and the zone of proximal development. The method used for this study was a qualitative data collection in the form of semi-structured interviews with three primary teachers. The results show that these teachers reported using the Swedish language with variations thus the common reason for usage of Swedish during English learning would be for instructing purposes. Moreover, research suggests that maximising the target language during foreign language learning would expose the students to utilize the target language and that if the teacher would overuse Swedish during foreign language teaching the students would not sense the need to practise the language. The study also investigates when and how the teachers believe their students are exposed to the English language. The participants agreed upon that the exposure of the English language occurs on daily basis for the students moreover, participants would also agree that most of the exposure would be extramural. Our major conclusion is that incorporating the Swedish language in English learning should be considered with care. Some research suggests that the first language may provide enough scaffolding for the students however, the teachers may find several variations of providing the scaffolding for the students without the incorporation of the Swedish language.

Corrective feedback (CF) is regarded as a controversial topic when it comes to writing in the L2 classroom. Some researchers have found it to be both meaningless and harmful, while others have researched the effects of different types of CF and found it to be good for language development in several ways. This made us interested in conducting a study focusing on what attitudes grade 3-5 (age 9-11) teachers have concerning CF, and if they themselves use it for their L2 students’ writing. The study was conducted through five semi-structured interviews with teachers working in Lund, Sweden. The aim of the study was to investigate compulsory school teachers’ experiences of and thoughts on CF as a teaching method for improving young L2 learners’ writing. The results revealed that the teachers believe CF to be an irreplaceable part of language learning but that it should be adapted to each individual’s needs. Although all interviewed teachers acknowledged CF’s potential harm on learners’ motivation and willingness to write, no one believed that it could be left out completely.

This research paper aims to investigate if the incorporation of students’ extramural English (EE) activities, such as watching movies or playing computer games, into the English classroom affect their motivation. This research was inspired by The School Inspectorate’s (Skolinspektionen, 2011) conclusion that too many Swedish students find English lessons un-motivating as well as boring. Partly to blame for this problem is the lack of perceived authenticity in the English classroom when compared to the activities that the students are engaged in outside of school (EE). Since this gap between school English and out-of-school English is creating un-motivated students in the classroom, this paper aims to describe learner motivation towards the English language, and whether incorporating students EE activities can increase their motivation. This is done with the support of different theories of motivation as well as the current globalized landscape, with English being considered a global language. One teacher and 25 of her students were interviewed to hear their thoughts on whether the incorporation of extramural English activities into the classroom would increase motivation. The study came to the conclusion that students wanted to learn English in order to become participants in the globalized world. Also, both teacher and students wanted to incorporate extramural English activities into the classroom and stated that this would increase their motivation in school. However, they also explained that it had to be incorporated, or ‘schoolified’, in a way that increased the students’ knowledge and proficiency, and was in line with the curriculum and its knowledge requirements.

The question whether peer feedback can contribute to language development in an English second language (L2) classroom in a Swedish context is investigated through the use of a research synthesis. The syllabus for English 5-7, the document detailing the skills that should be developed and the content of English L2 upper secondary education in Sweden, suggests that peer feedback is an important feature in English L2 learning. Results of the current study indicated that peer feedback could have beneficial effects for pupils’ writing and language development. These results were supported by sociocultural theory. Furthermore, some of the issues regarding peer feedback, for instance that pupils mistrust their peers’ ability to give comments, could be circumvented through training pupils to give and incorporate peer feedback. Despite the fact that results indicated that peer feedback could be a valuable learning tool, results cannot with any certainty be generalized to a Swedish upper secondary context due to the fact that the primary research was conducted mostly at a small scale of approximately twenty to forty pupils, that all research was at university level, and that most of the research pertained to Asian pupils.

This degree project’s purpose is to gain some insight into what advantages and disadvantages on teaching and learning a TL exist in multilingual classrooms, as well as what impact these outcomes might have on teachers’ pedagogical choices. The paper provides an overview of theories relating to language learning and third language learning, as well as the research. Researchers contend that teachers should maximize the TL use in the classroom, however there currently exists a dispute about whether the L1 should be used as a resource in the TL classroom or not. The study is conducted through interviews with four active English teachers, in the south of Sweden. The major conclusions of this paper are that L3 learners can have an advantage when learning a TL, and that the presence of L3 learners can have a positive effect on the motivation of the L2 learner classmates with regard to learning the TL. A discrepancy exists between how research and the national curriculum encourage teachers to teach and how they actually do in their pedagogical practice. The paper identifies a possible explanation for this discrepancy, as well as possible implications of it.

This study investigated tertiary second language learners’ attitudes toward storytelling as a classroom activity. Instruction and practice in storytelling were given to 26 international undergraduates for ten weeks. Questionnaires were administered before and after the treatment to assess learners’ interest in storytelling and beliefs about its effectiveness as a learning task. The results of the pre-treatment questionnaire showed that while participants’ interest in storytelling was very low, their expectations of its effectiveness were relatively high. Asian or low proficient participants indicated higher interest than Europeans or high proficient learners. The results of the post-treatment questionnaire showed that participants’ attitudes changed only slightly. The results suggest that initial interest and expectations might play an important role in maximizing the effectiveness of storytelling for adult second language learners.

The order of acquisition of various aspects of word knowledge is underexplored. Thus, this study examined learner performance with a number of aspects of word knowledge in an attempt to see whether they form an implicational scale in terms of an accuracy order. A total of 283 English as a Second Language students were tested on their knowledge of five aspects of word knowledge. Implicational scaling analysis was utilized to determine whether the components were scalable. The findings formed a scalable accuracy order. The accuracy order of the aspects of word knowledge examined in this study from easier to more difficult include: knowledge of the written form based on the spoken form, knowledge of the spoken form based on the written form, knowledge of the written form based on the meaning, knowledge of the spoken form based on the meaning, knowledge of spelling based on the spoken form. These findings suggest a number of implications for vocabulary acquisition as well as vocabulary teaching and learning.

The aim of this study is to investigate teachers' ways of working with participation in English inprimary school and to contribute knowledge about which strategies teachers use to encouragestudents to participate. In order to explore the participants’ descriptions, a qualitative approachis used on semi-structured interviews with eight English teachers who teach in different primaryschools. National and international research was used in the background section in order toprovide a context to the present study. The results have been analysed with the help of atheoretical framework combining a sociocultural perspective, a differentiation perspective, andlanguage learning theories. From language learning theories, I use the following three concepts:“Condition-Oriented Ideas”, “Condition-Oriented Ideas” and “Top- Down Language-FocusedReasons”.The results of this study show that relations between teachers and students, students’motivation, materials that are customized to each student, and to have democratic in Englishlessons are very important to make students participate in the English lesson and communicatein English. There are some strategies to help teachers build a good relationship with students, toencourage them, and to make materials that are customized to each student. The results showthat teachers have to listen to students very carefully, and have to spend time with them to showthem that they care about them. Furthermore, teachers have to make activities that increasestudents’ motivation, and teachers have to know the level of each student because that makesteachers able to customize materials adapted to each student’s knowledge level. Each student isspecial in knowledge, experiences, and feelings.The conclusion of this study is that teachers have to find strategies to build good relationswith students. Teachers also have to find strategies to encourage students and to customizeteaching materials for the English lessons. The benefits of student participation are several,including a positive atmosphere in the English classes. In addition, the students achieve betterresults in English language

Lexical inferencing is considered a listening strategy that is commonly employed by advanced EFL (English as a Foreign Language) listeners and a factor that contributes to successful listening comprehension. However, investigations of the factors that influence inferencing success in listening as well as how much each factor contributes to success are scant, as more studies have been conducted exploring lexical inferencing in reading. In addition, even though idiomatic expressions such as smell a rat, jump the gun, and go cold turkey are ubiquitous in the English language, especially in oral communication, and they are considered crucial in both first language (L1) and second language (L2) acquisition, little is known about the effectiveness of inferencing strategies where idiomatic expressions are concerned.Three goals motivated the current study. The first goal was to investigate whether inferencing is an effective strategy in the case where the target item is an idiomatic expression. The second goal was to investigate how four person-level factors, familiarity, listening proficiency, listening vocabulary size and working memory, two sentence-level factors, lexical density and sentence length, and two lexical-level factors, L1–L2 congruency and semantic transparency, influence the inferencing success of English idiomatic expressions in listening. The third goal, related to the second goal, was to determine which of the two lexical component factors, L1–L2 congruency and semantic transparency, is more important to inferencing success. A mixed methods design, the explanatory sequential design (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2018), was employed in this study. Quantitative data were collected from 89 EFL Japanese university students using a Listening Vocabulary Levels Test, a Listening Span Test, and an Idiom Inferencing Elicitation Task. The collected data were examined using mixed-effects logistic regression. Twelve participants were invited to participate in follow-up interviews based on their response patterns on the Idiom Inferencing Elicitation Task. The quantitative results indicated that familiarity, listening comprehension skills, working memory, and L1–L2 congruency were significant factors influencing inferencing success and the qualitative results supported these findings. In addition, the qualitative analyses suggested that depth of vocabulary is another potentially important factor. Furthermore, listening comprehension moderated the L1–L2 congruency effect. The finding that semantic transparency is not an influential factor in successful inferencing of unfamiliar idiomatic expressions provides evidence that the semantic transparency of known idiomatic expressions formed after learners acquire the meaning of the expression is a different construct from the perceived semantic transparency of unfamiliar idiomatic expressions. In addition, even though the sentence-level factors were not statistically significant in successful idiom inferencing in this study, further studies are required in order to see if this result holds true when the characteristics of the listening tasks differ from those of the task used in this study. It is hoped that the findings provide insights into how to help Japanese university EFL learners improve their listening skills, especially in tasks that include unfamiliar idiomatic expressions. / Teaching & Learning