The communicative language approach (CLA) dominates pedagogical practice in second language acquisition classrooms in the US. However, this approach does not emphasize independent pronunciation instruction, leaving learners to improve pronunciation on their own. This study explored the perspectives of English language learners (ELLs) being instructed via the CLA regarding the effectiveness of the CLA in providing intelligible pronunciation skills. The intelligibility principle of language served as the theoretical foundation underlying this study guided by research questions addressing how well the CLA met ELLs' pronunciation intelligibility needs and their perspectives on receiving independent pronunciation instruction to meet these needs. Using qualitative case study methods, the research questions were addressed through an analysis of interviews of 10 community college ELL adult volunteers who received instruction using the CLA as current or former students in the intensive English program, had linguistic skill levels ranging from beginner to advanced, and were graduates of U.S. schools. A typological analysis model was followed where the data were organized by themes, patterns, and identified relationships. Participants reported wanting to improve their pronunciation and that their pronunciation had improved with the CLA instructional strategies. Although all participants desired to receive some independent instruction in pronunciation, their preferred instructional modes differed. It is recommended that ELLs' perspectives be heard and that English as a Second Language educators instruct with the CLA while also providing explicit pronunciation instruction. The results of this study indicating student satisfaction with the CLA may elicit positive social change within the ELL community by providing a voice to ELLs.

<p>This aim of this study was to highlight the major learning perspectives discernible from five adult African immigrants’ experience of learning Swedish as a second language. The focus was on the analysis of the challenges that these immigrants encountered in the learning process and the factors that supported their learning. This study revealed two dominant perspectives in adult African immigrants’ experience of learning Swedish as a second language. These perspectives which hinge on social participation and individual responsibility complement each other and are geared toward the same goals: the acquisition of the Swedish language and integration into the Swedish society.</p>

<p>Pre-school as a Meeting Place – Children’s Access-strategies and Exclusions in Play and Conversation</p><p>Abstract</p><p>The research reported in this thesis attempts to understand what happens when children interact with each other in the context of activities in a pre-school setting (here called Daggkåpan) when adults are not involved. By using ethnographically inspired methodology, in combination with conversation-analysis, this project has been analysing everyday interaction between children who are three to five years old. The aim of the project was to understand how children at Daggkåpan create relationships and how they defend and protect their interactional spaces. I have studied how children shape, maintain and interrupt relationships and interactions with one another. I have studied and analysed what kinds of access-strategies the children utilize and create and also how these children exclude one another in play activities and everyday conversations. Sociocultural and interactionistic perspectives have been used. Findings suggest that it is very important for these children to maintain interactions with peers and gain access to play groups. The children of Daggkåpan create and use several different strategies for gaining access. The results also indicate that gaining access to play groups is particularly difficult in preschool settings since young children tend to protect shared spaces and ongoing play activities from children outside the realms of these spaces and activities. Children also co-construct a number of strategies for excluding peers from their interactional spaces. Steering clear from the dominating perspective that categorizes children and focuses on the individual child, I have in contrast focused children during their interaction with one another in peer group activities. In other words I have discussed peer-relations, peer-socialization and peer-perspectives from an interactional view. Studying peer-interactions through microanalysis allows for understanding what is meaningful for children in their peer-culture in preschool.</p><p>Britt Tellgren</p>

<p>The aim of this study is to contribute to understanding of how children try to understand and interpret their own father and his (possibly) violent actions against their mother in relation to their general conceptualizations concerning fathers and violence. A general social psychological and interactionist approach is related to the children’s selves as the organizing and experiencing structures, the family as the arena for experiences and communicative interaction, and society as a structure of norms and general ideas. </p><p>The study is based on interviews with ten children, who were eight to twelve years old at the time of the interview and whose mothers had escaped from their fathers’ violence to a Women’s House. Qualitative interpretation of each child’s complex abstracted and generalized conceptualizations of fathers and violence enabled the understanding of individual themes as crucial parts of each child’s logically unified and conciliated symbolic meaning through the theoretical construct of negotiation. </p><p>The study results in the identification of three alternative theoretical approaches to meaning-conciliation. One can be described as ‘conceptual fission’ in the general conception of fathers, one as ‘conceptual fission’ in the conception of the own father and one as negotiating the extension of the opposite of violence, described as ‘goodness’. These negotiations can be understood as parts of distancing violence from either one subgroup of fathers, from the overall, essential or principle understanding of the own father within the child’s relationship with him, or from fathers altogether, including the child’s own. The children’s attempts to combine normalization of their father as an individual with resistance to his violent acts are interpreted as indicating the difficulty that the combination of the social deviancy of violence and the family context constitutes for many children. </p>

Anorexia Nervosa is a psychiatric illness with peak onset in ages 14-17. Most cases recover within a few years, but the illness can have a fatal outcome or long duration. Multifactor causes of anorexia nervosa include genetics, personality, family, and socio-cultural factors. This study measures mortality, recovery from anorexia nervosa, and psychosocial outcome of patients with adolescent onset anorexia nervosa that were treated in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry in northern Sweden from 1980 to 1985. In addition, this study assesses the predictive value of background variables and studies perfectionism in relation to recovery. Finally, this study looks at how patients understand the causes of their anorexia nervosa and how they view their recovery process. Follow ups were made 8 and 16 years after initial assessment at CAP. Quantitative and qualitative methods were used. These included a semistructured interview, DSM diagnostics of eating disorders (including GAF), and the self-assessment questionnaires EDI and SCL-90. The interview also contained questions about causes and recovery. Recovery increased from 68% to 85% from first to second follow-up and the mortality rate was 1%. Somatic problems and paediatric inpatient care during the first treatment period could predict long-term outcome of eating disorders. Most former patients had a satisfying family and work situation. At both follow-ups, individuals with long-term recovery had a lower level of perfectionism than those that recovered later. On individual levels, eating disorder symptoms and psychiatric symptoms decreased during recovery, whereas the levels of perfectionism stayed the same. Causes were attributed to self, family, and socio-cultural stressors outside of the family. The most common self-reported causes were high own demands and perfectionism. All recovered subjects could remember and describe a special turning point when the recovery started and 62% saw themselves as an active agent in the recovery process. Supportive friends, treatment, activities, family of origin, boyfriend, husband, and children were also helpful in the recovery process. Compared to other outcome studies, the results were good. In spite of the good outcome, some individuals had a long duration of illness and were not yet fully recovered after 16 years of follow-up. Predictors of non-recovery were related to initial somatic problems. Levels of perfectionism were associated to recovery and patients with initial high levels of perfectionism may need more complex treatment strategies. Results from the study also implied that one should stimulate the patients’ social contacts and their sense of self-efficacy in their recovery- process.

This aim of this study was to highlight the major learning perspectives discernible from five adult African immigrants’ experience of learning Swedish as a second language. The focus was on the analysis of the challenges that these immigrants encountered in the learning process and the factors that supported their learning. This study revealed two dominant perspectives in adult African immigrants’ experience of learning Swedish as a second language. These perspectives which hinge on social participation and individual responsibility complement each other and are geared toward the same goals: the acquisition of the Swedish language and integration into the Swedish society.

The aim of this paper is to shed some light on to what extent the process of making reality of Inclusion, as stated in International Declarations and in Government policies, has reached the actual educational activities in the school system. My chosen method is a case study, in which I have combined a survey with interviews in order to retrieve enough data for my analysis. I have also studied a number of policy documents and relevant literature. My analysis concludes, for the school that I have chosen to study, that there is still a lot to be done before inclusion becomes a reality. There are many obstacles to overcome, for instance; a constant struggle to obtain enough resources and to reach relevant levels of competence within the personnel. My study indicates that the current municipality states educational policies, regarding inclusion, that rest on the principal that there will be additional resources available in the classroom. However there is little chance that the school will have the means to apply such extra resources without additional financial and educational support from the municipality. Another worrying fact that appears through my study is that the system for student admission, as stated by the munici­pality, lets new pupils, often with special educational needs, continuously and directly in to the school. This system makes it difficult for the school management to produce endurable plans and achieve a balance in resources that align with the given financial frame. The study also shows the importance of how the interpretation of the concept of inclusion is being made. In the case of the studied school the interpretation has lead to a massive workload on the regular classroom teachers, who have been given an extensive responsibility for the teaching and documentation of every student. This responsibility does not match the capability, which has lead to the up building of an extensive non-inclusive activity, just to be able to keep up and to be able to “survive”.

<p>Diss. Stockholm : Handelshögskolan, 1996</p>

The purpose of this study was to describe the experiences of Joe Duquette High School students through listening to their stories. My approach to listening developed out of the context of the school's Aboriginal philosophy. The thesis analyzes and describes what constitutes a meaningful education within the cultural framework of Good and Right Relations from the perspective of Joe Duquette High School students.<p> The Joe Duquette High School environment is a holistic one where the Sacred Circle philosophy and the good and right relations framework serves as a guide to the pedagogy of the school.<p> The methodology used in this thesis was shaped by the cultural philosophy of Joe Duquette High School and guided by student emphasis and meaning. A number of methodologies were drawn upon in order to approach the multiple contexts of the Joe Duquette High School cultural complex.<p> The central themes identified by students through their narratives serve as an organizational framework for the findings. My interpretation of what the students said is presented through my own personal narrative. I used my own story to develop more fully those ideas/concepts/ideals expressed by the students.<p>The main contribution of this study is highlighting the Joe Duquette High School experience through the students' perspectives and the method used to tell their story came out of the cultural context of the school.

Säg är det möjligt att motverka traditionella könsmönster,trots strukturer som formar oss så att vi omedvetet styrs att väljautbildningar som leder till könstraditionella yrkesval? Att få kunskaper om ochge redskap för ett praktikorienterat jämställdhetsarbete i studie- ochyrkesvägledning är syftet med denna aktionsforskningsstudie. De vägledare som deltar har intresseför och kunskap om genusvetenskapliga perspektiv och kan ses som goda exempel. Vägledarnadeltar genom två intervjutillfällen och en månads fokusering på uppdraget attmotverka traditionella könsmönster. De använder olika metoder och berättar ompositiva, neutrala, obekväma, häftiga och negativa reaktioner från sökande. Resultatetbeskriver hur vägledarna ser på sitt uppdrag och hur de omsätter sina kunskaperi pedagogisk praktik och hur de bemöter och tolkar reaktioner som de får frånsökande. Under arbetets gång ökar den självinsikt som följer av att förstå hursvårt det är att inte göra kön. Metodutvecklinghar betydelse för att omvandla förhållningssätt till aktiv handling, men detavgörande är attityden till uppdraget. Slutsatser som dras är att uppdraget attmotverka traditionella könsmönster kan innebära att upptäcka dessa könsmönsteri vardagen, att vägra kategorisera utifrån kön och att inse att vi med hjälp avförändrade förväntningar tillsammans kan ändra det som ses som normalt. / Say is it possible to counteract traditional gender patterns, even if structures shape us so that we unconsciously are guided to choose courses that lead to gender-traditional career choices? To learn about and provide tools for a practice-oriented work with gender equality in educational and vocational guidance is the purpose of this action research. The counselors involved have an interest in and knowledge of gender perspectives and can be seen as good examples. They participate through two interview sessions and a monthly focus on the mission to counteract traditional gender patterns. They use different methods and reports of positive, neutral, awkward, violent and negative reactions from applicants. The results describe how counselors view their mission and how they apply their knowledge in pedagogical practice. It also shows how they respond to and interpret the reactions they receive from applicants. In the process they increase their self-awareness resulting from the understanding of how hard it is not to construct the gender stereotypes. Method development is important to transform attitudes to positive action, but what matters is the attitude towards the mission. Conclusions drawn are that the mission to counteract traditional gender patterns may mean to detect these gender patterns in everyday life, refuse to categorize on the basis of gender and realize that if we are changing expectations, together we can change what is seen as normal.