The purpose of this study was to investigate teachers&rsquo / ways of using mathematics textbooks while planning the lesson and during the lesson, to document teachers&rsquo / views about elementary students&rsquo / usage of mathematics textbook during the classroom time and for their homework and teachers&rsquo / views about mathematics textbooks&rsquo / characteristics. A case study was conducted in a private elementary school with more class hours for mathematics and six mathematics teachers teaching 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th grade mathematics in this school participated. Data were collected in the spring semester of 2010-2011 academic year through an interview protocol with 16 main questions addressing teachers&rsquo / mathematics textbook usage and students&rsquo / mathematics textbook usage developed for this study by the researcher through the findings and discussions in the literature. Data analysis was conducted through qualitative methods. The findings of this study showed that participant teachers expressed both positive and negative views about characteristics of textbook and usage of textbook. All of them stated that the textbook was their main tool for lesson preparations and teaching. They followed the curriculum from textbook and decided what to do, how to do, and when to do. Participants underlined that textbook was an effective helper but it needed improvement in many aspects. The findings also showed that teachers viewed that students did not use their textbook efficiently. All of the teachers expressed that students did not prefer to study from textbook if there were not any assignment or homework. Teachers specified that students could improve studying habits from textbook if teachers could direct them efficiently. The findings of this study might be useful to prepare more effective lessons for teachers, to give ideas to teachers for guiding their students for effective textbook usage, and to increase the quality of textbooks.

I den här uppsatsen analyseras tre vanligt förekommande läroböcker i religionskunskap utifrån ett postkolonialt perspektiv i jakt på koloniala maktdiskurser. Passager där hinduism och hinduer målas upp som ”våran” motsats belyses och analyseras. Även delar innehållande etnocentrism i allmänhet och eurocentrism i synnerhet samt exotiserande beskrivningar lyfts upp i ljuset och diskuteras. I ett försök att koppla samman det teoretiska med det praktiska utfördes intervjuer med aktivt undervisande lärare. Det huvudsakliga målet med denna intervjustudie var att se hur stor risken är när ”förorenade” läroböcker används. Intervjustudien syftade således till att få en bild av i hur stor utsträckning läroböcker används i klassrumsmiljön och i planeringsprocessen av lektioner och hur ofta nya läroböcker köps in. Studiernas resultat är milt positiva. Även om ”gamla” koloniala tankar hittades i läroböckerna så verkar det som om den koloniala diskursen är försvagad i lärobokssammanhang, då de nyare läroböckerna hade färre koloniala spår än den äldsta som innehöll många. En annan del av studiernas resultat som kan ses som positivt är att lärares attityder kring läroboksanvändning verkar ha ändrats. Detta betyder att även om en lärobok innehåller koloniala diskurser så betyder det nödvändigtvis inte att de följer med in i elevens kunskaper. Detta är på grund av att läroboken numer ses som en informationskälla i mängden jämfört med dess tidigare roll som ”sanningsförmedlaren med stort S”. / In this paper three commonly used school textbooks for religion studies are analyzed using post-colonial theory in search for colonial power discourses. Passages where Hindu religion is described as “our” opposite are highlighted. Also occurrences of ethnocentrism in general and eurocentrism in particular as well as exoticism are brought to the light and discussed. In an effort to connect the theoretical with the practical an interview study is made with active teachers. The main goal is to see how big the risk, with using “tainted” textbooks, is. In the interview study questions about how large role textbooks plays in their classrooms and lesson planning and how often they bought new textbooks were asked. The results of the studies are mildly positive. Even though traces of old colonial thoughts were found in the school textbooks it seems as though the colonial discourse within the the textbooks sphere is weakened, since the newest of the textbooks analyzed did not have many colonial traces compared to the oldest one which had plenty. Another positive result of the studies is that teachers' attitudes towards textbook usage seems to have changed. This means that even though your textbook might have a colonial discourse there is no guarantee that it will stick on your students. Since textbooks now is seen as merely another source of information compared to its earlier status as The Source of Information.

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