This article provides a conceptual discussion of ‘ownership’ in various forms of participatory research. The discussion is grounded in our experiences from three research projects in science education. We seek to understand how and why ownership may be distributed between teachers and researchers at different stages in the research process. Looking at our projects in retrospect, we see that ownership was differently distributed at the initial stages. Then ownership distribution followed a similar pathway, as teachers gained ownership of implementation, whereas researchers reclaimed ownership of analyzing and disseminating the work. Our discussion departs from the idea that ownership relates to both ‘risks’ and ‘benefits’ as well as to both ‘rights and obligations. Thereby, we can make visible some of the circumstances that steer ownership towards the teachers or researchers. For example, we highlight that ownership distribution may be influenced by guidelines for research ethics and inequalities in terms of administrative support structures available to researchers and teachers. Based on our discussion, we suggest a number of questions to initiate and support a continuous dialogue between teachers and researchers who plan to engage in participatory research.

Att arbeta med naturvetenskap i förskolan är ett utmanande, spännande och roligt uppdrag. Alla har vi väl förundrats över barns nyfikenhet och goda observationsförmåga när de möter naturvetenskapliga fenomen. Många förskollärare berättar också att det är tacksamt att arbeta med naturvetenskap. Ämnesområdet är stort och det kan vara svårt att som förskollärare få en överblick och veta vad man ska läsa in sig på för att få idéer till relevanta uppgifter att göra tillsammans med barnen.

Den här boken handlar om de bärande idéerna i naturvetenskap och är tänkt att stödja förskolläraren i strävan att få grepp om det viktigaste innehållet. Ambitionen är att dra upp de stora linjerna snarare än att ge en heltäckande beskrivning. Exempel från vardagliga sammanhang används för att visa på bärkraften i dessa idéer.

Den nya upplagan är reviderad i enlighet med förskolans nya läroplan (Lpfö 18).

A compelling body of international research demonstrates that a positive, supportive teacher-student relationship is essential for students’ development, especially for at-risk students. In this article, the educator’s ability to build such relationships is discussed in terms of ‘relational competence’. Special educators’ relational competence is a largely unexplored topic. This article contributes by reporting on an interview study with 21 experienced special educators. The study focuses on the educators’ perceptions of their relationships and relational competence. Two research questions (RQs) are explored: (1) What is the role of social relationships in (successful) work as a special educator? and (2) How is the relational competence of special educators realised in practice? The results are presented in themes and subthemes, and are supported by significant quotes. Regarding RQ 1, the study shows that the informants perceive positive social relationships as fundamental in their work and relational competence as particularly important in their profession. The results for RQ 2 show that relational competence is realised by an accepting attitude in the ‘here and now’; by finding a personal connection to the student; and by building trusting relationships over a longer period of time. Comments on implications for special education teacher preparation are provided.

Research demonstrates that the teacher-student relationship is essential for students with special educational needs. This article investigates how pre-service special educators (n = 74) perceive teachers’ relational competence, as manifested in their relations with students exhibiting behavioral difficulties. The data comprises educators’ written analyses of teacher-student interactions simulated through digital video, both before and after being provided with explicit criteria on teachers’ relational competence. The findings reveal a change in the educators’ perceptions as they shift from a focus on teaching strategies and the learning environment toward an awareness of teacher-student interaction, and from the teacher’s management of problematic student behavior toward an acknowledgment of the communicative and socio-emotional challenges in contexts involving students with different needs.

The purpose of this study is to gain a better understanding of how physical activity can be used in school to create more favorable conditions for students' learning in mathematics. The study investigated the effect of physical activity in the long term on the students’ concentration, working memory and knowledge of mathematics via recurring short activity of physical activity. The study was conducted with 175 grade 7 students from four different schools. An initial task of seven minutes of pulse-raising exercises was introduced in five of the groups at the beginning of the mathematics lesson. The results show an improvement in the students' concentration and working memory in the intervention group compared to the control group. There was no significant difference between gender or ability, all were similarly affected by the physical activity. Students from different school environments are also affected by the physical activity in the same way.

Formative feedback has the potential to support student learning and performance. However, teachers sometimes have difficulties realizing their intentions with formative feedback when responding to students’ questions or solutions. If the actual response provided does not agree with the teacher’s intentions, the formative potential may be diminished or lost. The purpose of this study is therefore to investigate whether teachers themselves are able to identify the correspondence between their stated intentions and their actual response to students. Four teachers participated in the study by responding to the mathematical reasoning performed by twelve students in grades 4-5 (the feedback situations were recorded) and then taking part in stimulated-recall interviews. The results show that the teachers were able to identify certain instances of correspondence, and/or differences, between their intentions and how they acted in the feedback situations. The differences identified by the teachers were justified based on the teachers’ individual beliefs – for instance, the belief that some mathematical methods belong to certain grade levels and should not be taught in advance – or on concerns about how the students would react.

botSTEM is an ERASMUS+ project aiming to raise the utilisation of inquiry-based collaborative learning and robot-enhanced education. The project outputs are specifically aimed to provide in- and pre-service teachers in Childhood and Primary Education, and children aged between 4 and 8, with research-based materials and practices that use integrated Science Technology Engineering Mathematics (STEM) and robot-based approaches, including code-learning, for enhancing scientific literacy in young children. This presentation presents initial results in terms of a collection of tested educational practices summarized in a freely downloadable Toolkit, and results from a qualitative analysis of implemented activities in Swedish preschools. The preliminary analysis of the implementations indicates that robots function as motivation factors in young children’s inquiry of science and engineering design technology, in both teacher and children initiated learning situations.. Also, when compared, digital programming with a use of robots promotes discussions among teachers and children that involve more versatile robotic words then un-plugged programming does. 

Den här boken täcker tio övergripande naturvetenskapliga teman inom ämnena kemi, fysik, ekologi, mikrobiologi, geovetenskap och teknik. Innehållet har oftast sin utgångspunkt i vardagsfenomen som barnen själva uppmärksammar. I varje kapitel får man följa barns upplevelser av, frågor om och förståelser för olika naturvetenskapliga fenomen. Genom undersökningar och aktiviteter som är beskrivna i boken utvecklar barnen sina resonemang och får ökade insikter och ett vidgat perspektiv. Boken innehåller inte bara barnens kommentarer utan en dialog mellan barn och pedagog. Genom produktiva frågor och resonemang kopplade till aktiviteter hjälper pedagogen barnen att utveckla en ökad förståelse för naturvetenskap. Dialogen innehåller också lärarens barnanpassade förklaringar för att illustrera hur man på ett enkelt sätt kan göra avancerade naturvetenskapliga fenomen begripliga för barn. 

This paper describes analysis of teaching instances that are part of an in-service preschool teachers programme about chemistry and physics in preschool. The aim is to develop knowledge about the communication established between teacher and children in relation to an object of learning, specifically the role of intersubjective communication in relation to an object of learning. A set of science activities with a specified object of learning was developed in groups of teachers and researchers. A qualitative analysis of the communication in relation to the chosen object of learning was performed. The focus of the analysis was excerpts representing differences in intersubjectivity related to the object of learning and what can be said to characterise the communication between teachers and children in these situations. The results show that intersubjectivity can occur in different ways with different consequences for children’s opportunities to experience the intended object of learning. In connection to this, the importance of teachers having a mutual simultaneity in the communication with children about a specific content is highlighted. The teachers have to create links between the child’s perspective and the object of learning. Intermediary objects of learning are discussed as supporting elements in the conquest of new knowledge.

The overall aim of the present study is to study model-based teaching and collaborative inquiry learning of chemical processes and physical phenomena in preschool, with a specific focus on the verbal communication established between teachers and children (4-5 years old). According to variation theory, learning is always directed at a specific content, called the object of learning. This study aims at highlighting what ‘threatens’ the teacher’s and preschool children’s intersubjectivity during the teaching of chemistry and physics content, and at discussing possible ways to continue the teaching of an object of learning, once sufficient intersubjectivity in a teaching/learning situation has been lost. The result shows the need for the teacher to divide and split a larger object of learning, such as e.g. water purification, into smaller learning steps ‘on the way’ in order to hinder breaks in intersubjectivity that otherwise may arise. We introduce the notion of ‘overarching object of learning’ and ‘intermediary object of learning’, and the intermediary objects of learning identified in this study are categorized as belonging to three different themes: the role of words, the role of theoretical models and science concepts and the role of analogies and abstractions. The teacher’s awareness of intermediary objects of learning as critical aspects for children’s individual learning is crucial for the teaching of everyday science in a preschool setting.

Avsikten med denna rapport är att presentera ett treårigt samverkansprojekt mellan forskare vid Högskolan Kristianstad och ledning med personal på samtliga förskolor i ett skolområde. Projektet rör undervisning av naturvetenskap med särskilt fokus på kemi och fysik i förskolan.

Ett skolområde i en medelstor skånsk kommun initierade ett samarbete med forskare vid Högskolan Kristianstad kring undervisning om naturvetenskap i förskolan, speciellt kopplat till det läroplanen benämner som enkla kemiska processer och fysikaliska fenomen. Projektet syftade till att studera modellbaserad undervisning och lärande i förskolan om kemiska processer och fysikaliska fenomen relaterat till hållbarhet i samhällsfrågor och barns vardagsliv. Traditionellt har arbete med naturvetenskap i förskolan handlat om naturen, om växter och djur och om miljörelaterade frågor. I samband med att den reviderade läroplanen trädde i kraft 2011 vidgades emellertid kunskapsområdet till att också omfatta kemiska processer och fysikaliska fenomen (Skolverket, 2010). Att undervisa om kemi och fysik i ett förskoleperspektiv kan av många förskollärare upplevas som svårt och behovet av kompetensutvecklingsinsatser har visat sig vara stort (Skolinspektionen, 2018). Utvärderingar visade att så var också fallet i det aktuella skolområdet.

1 juli 2019 trädde ännu en reviderad läroplan i kraft i vilken användning av digital teknik lyfts fram som ett nytt målområde att sträva mot (Skolverket, 2018). Mot den bakgrunden och i takt med projektets genomförande har kunskap som rör såväl innehåll som lärandeprocesser och undervisningsstrategier implementerats med och utan stöd av modern informationsteknik.

Projektet kan delas upp i två delar. Del I är den kompetensutvecklingssatsning som ovan kort beskrivits och del II är ett forskningsprojekt med fokus på fysik- och kemiundervisningens genomförande i barngrupp samt på projektets övergripande genomförande.

Det övergripande syftet med projektet är att, tillsammans med arbetslag och rektorer i förskolan utveckla kunskap om FyKe-undervisning i förskolan, med respektive utan stöd av digitala verktyg, samt att 8longitudinellt följa utvecklingen hos deltagande arbetslag och rektorer under ett flerårigt kompetensutvecklingsprojekt.

Flera delstudier har genomförts i projektet. Tre artiklar har hittills publicerats i vetenskapliga tidskrifter, ytterligare studier har genomförts med fokus på rektorers och arbetslags upplevelser relaterat till projektets innehåll och genomförande och delvis relaterat till digital teknik. Rapporten avslutas med några sammanfattande punkter med relation till projektets utfall.

Genom ett flerårigt projekt studeras modellbaserad undervisning och lärande i förskolor av kemiska reaktioner och fysikaliska fenomen relaterat till hållbarhet i samhällsfrågor. Forskare arbetar tillsammans med ledning och personal vid förskolor i ett skolområde. Undervisning och lärandeprocesser med och utan stöd av modern informationsteknik implementeras och analyseras. Projektet syftar till att utveckla en teoretisk ram för analys av olika erfarenheter under kemi- och fysikunder­visning i förskolan med fokus på lärarens förhållningssätt och barns agerande. I samverkan utvecklas nuvarande kunskap om hur ny digital teknik kan användas för att stödja samarbete och lärande om kemiska processer och fysikaliska fenomen relaterade till barns vardag och dagens samhälle. 

This paper describes an analysis of teaching instances that were part of an in-service preschool teachers programme. The overall aim of the project was – together with teachers – to study model-based teaching and collaborative inquiry learning of chemical processes and physical phenomena in preschool, in relation to an object of learning. Central was the teaching of science in preschool, with particular focus on use of digital tools and the verbal communication as well as obstacles ‘threatening’ the intersubjectivity between teachers and children during learning situations in preschool. Our results show the need for the teacher to address what we call ‘intermediary objects of learning’ and the role of chosen wording andabstract models are emphasised. In addition, the paper highlights different communication categories used by teachers and children during science activities. How the communication varies with e.g. children’s age during teaching will be discussed at the conference.

With science and digitalisation emphasised further in the new Swedish preschool curriculum, there is a need to clarify teachers’ role in educating children in and about these areas. With research pointing out the importance of a conscious language use in STEM teaching, we here focus on words used by teachers and children during inquiry-based STEM activities in five different preschools. Bers’ powerful ideas about early childhood computational thinking (Bers 2018. Coding as a Playground. New York: Routledge.) were used for analysis and results highlight how digital programming and use of robots can promote a more versatile use of robotic words, compared to analogue, ‘unplugged’, programming without robots. Furthermore, it is also found that use of precise decontextualised language by the teacher seems to stimulate children’s use of words related to STEM and the object of learning. The findings add to the discussion about how teachers can scaffold children’s learning by inquiry teaching of STEM supported by robotics.

This article describes outcomes from the Erasmus+ project botSTEM, involving a theoretical framework for Science, Technology, Engineering & Technology (STEM) and robotics and teaching activities for preschool teachers and teachers educating children four-eight years old. Spanish and Swedish preschool teachers’ self-efficacy and views of teaching STEM and robotics are presented, using a mixed methodology based on a questionnaire and focus group interviews. The three-year long project has improved the preschool teachers’ self-efficacy in STEM and robotics teaching, as described in a questionnaire answered by the preschool teachers after the project. Possibilities in STEM and robotics teaching experienced by them include an increase in children’s agency, knowledge and interest, and the obstacles are mainly structural or technical. Robotics teaching also supports children with special needs when interacting with peers. The results from the botSTEM project point to the benefit of supported long-term professional development for STEM and robotics teaching in preschools.

This article addresses physics teachers’ views about physics teaching in upper-secondary school. Their views have been investigated nationwide through a web-based questionnaire. The questionnaire has been developed based on several published instruments and is part of an ongoing project on the role of mathematics in physics teaching at upper-secondary school. The selected part of the results from the analysis of the questionnaire reported on here cross-correlate physics teachers’ views about aims of physics teaching with their view of physics classroom activities, and perceived hindrances in the teaching of physics. 379 teachers responded to the questionnaire (45% response rate). The result indicates that teachers with a high agreement with a Fundamental Physics curriculum emphasis regarded mathematics as a problem for physics teaching, whereas teachers with high agreement with the curriculum emphases Physics, Technology and Societyor Knowledge Development in Physics did not do so. This means that teachers with a main focus on fundamental theories and concepts believe that mathematics is a problem to a higher extent than teachers with main focus on the role of physics in society and applied aspects or physics knowledge development do.  Consequences for teaching and further research are discussed. 

This article focuses on the need for increased attention to content issues and working methods for science teaching in Early Childhood Education (ECE). Science education research emphasises the importance of not only focusing on specific phenomena, but also on the Nature of Science (NOS). NOS teaching deals with questions about what science is, how scientific knowledge is developed and in what ways humans are involved in these processes. An inclusion of such issues is important if common stereotypical images of science and scientists are to be challenged. Previous research has suggested that NOS can be taught through book talks connected to trade books. However, there is a lack of empirical studies at the ECE level supporting this suggestion. Thus, this article reports from the first part of a project in which researchers and teachers explored book talks as a possibility to introduce NOS in early years science (children between 1 and 5 years old). Data consists of book talks (N=48) around two picture trade books led by five preschool teachers preceded by a teacher-researcher workshop on NOS and NOS teaching. The results show that discussions on a variety of NOS issues is possible in an ECE context. These results are discussed in relation to previous literature on both NOS teaching and science in the early years.

We report from a project performed in collaboration between researchers and early childhood education (ECE) teachers. The idea of the project was to introduce ‘nature of science’ (NOS) in the ECE setting through using book-talks connected to trade books (narratives as well as expository books). Much research on NOS teaching has been done, but very scarcely targeting the youngest children. The empirical data in this project consists of audio recordings of book-talks (N=152) with children aged 2-6 led by five teachers, audio recordings of focus groups and workshops (N=9) with the teachers, documentation of children’s drawings as well as of artefacts used by the preschool teachers. The results show that discussions about a variety of NOS issues are possible in an ECE context. It also shows that attention can be directed towards NOS during book talks regardless of genre or if the books contain explicit NOS references or not. However, book-talks connected to books without explicit NOS references require that the teacher finds other ways to direct attention towards NOS.  The teachers involved in this project managed to do this with only a short introduction to NOS. This shows that book-talks has great potential as an approach to introducing NOS to the youngest children. The results further showed that the teachers experienced that the NOS book-talks had spin off-effects such as increased curiosity, new questions, and engagement in investigations among the children. These results point to the potential for NOS teaching to contribute to empowerment and agency for the children, and positions NOS as an important part of science in ECE that values democracy and social justice as central. Building on the results, we present a didactical model that can support teachers when introducing NOS to young children. 

The research field of science education has gathered questions about what science is, how scientific knowledge is developed and in what ways humans are involved in these processes under the umbrella concept ‘nature of science’ (NOS). Previous research has suggested that teaching ought to focus much more on these issues, but so far the focus has been on older children and students, while there is a lack of research on NOS teaching for the youngest children (up to six years). In this conceptual article,we suggest that NOS should be taught from the outset, and thus be part of science teaching in the early years. We put forward arguments as to why this early introduction coupled to the overall values and aims of democracy and social justice is important, and elaborate on the kind of NOS issues that could be included in science teaching aimed at the youngest children.

A physics lecture and a mathematics lecture, by the same teacher and partly the same students, were studied at upper secondary school. Both lectures covered ordinary differential equations. The main aim of the present paper was to investigate the teacher’s different and similar ways to handle related mathematical content in the two school subjects. The findings show a structural use of mathematics with an analytical approach in mathematics and an applied approach in relation to formulas in physics. This study is part of a larger study about mathematics in physics education funded by the Swedish research council.

Tänk dig att eleverna fått i uppgift att lösa ett matematiskt problem. När du ”rättar” elevernas lösningar kontrollerar du att svaret är korrekt. Men som matematiklärare kan man även göra en bedömning av andra aspekter än enbart vad som är korrekt. Man kan till exempel se om eleven valt en lösningsmetod som är lämplig för det aktuella problemet, om lösningen är lätt att följa, om beräkningarna är rimliga och om eleven använder matematiska termer och symboler på ett adekvat sätt. Att på detta sätt göra en bedömning av flera olika aspekter av elevens lösning, innebär att man gör en analytisk bedömning. Motsatsen, det vill säga att man gör en övergripande bedömning, utan att beakta enskilda aspekter var för sig, kallas för holistisk bedömning.

Det blossade nyligen upp en märklig debatt på sociala medier, där man ville dödförklara den formativa bedömningen, baserat på ett inlägg på Skolverkets hemsida. Vissa uttryckte sin glädje över att äntligen slippa den plåga som formativ bedömning inneburit, andra bekymrades över att den tid och kraft som lagts ner på formativ bedömning nu var bortkastad. Men kan man verkligen dödförklara ett forskningsområde utifrån en enda kritisk text? Diskussionen väcker många frågor kring både förståelsen av forskning och av formativ bedömning.

Bedömning kan ses som en integrerad del av lärarnas yrkeskunnande, medan betygsättning kan betraktas som en extern pålaga.

In Sweden, grades are used for selection to upper-secondary school and higher education, even though agreement in teachers’ grading is low and the selection therefore potentially unfair. Furthermore, measures taken to increase the agreement have not been successful. This study has explored how to increase agreement in teachers’grading by comparing analytic and holistic grading. Teachers (n = 74) have been randomly assigned to two different conditions (i.e. analytic or holistic grading) in either English as a foreign language (EFL) or mathematics. Findings suggest that analytic grading is preferable to holistic grading in terms of agreement among teachers. The effect was stronger and statistically significant in EFL, but could be observed in mathematics as well. However, teachers in the holistic conditions provided more references tocriteria in their justifications, whereas teachers in the analytic conditions to a much larger extent made references to grade levels without specifying criteria.

In Sweden, where this study is situated, grades are high stakes for students. Grades are the only criteria used for selecting students as they leave compulsory school and apply for upper-secondary school. When students apply for higher education, selection is also made based on the “Swedish Scholastic Aptitude Test”, but a minimum of one third of the seats (often more) are based on grades. Given that it is the individual teacher who synthesizes students’ performances into a grade, and that the reliability of teachers’ grades has been questioned (e.g., Swedish National Agency of Education (SNAE), 2019), this is a problematic situation which can potentially have a significant influence on the lives of thousands of students each year. Measures have been taken to increase the agreement in teachers’ grading, most recently by legally requiring that teachers in primary and secondary education take results from national tests “into consideration” when grading. This relatively loose strategy of taking test results “into consideration” has not yet yielded any observable change in teachers’ grades, however, and there is still a large discrepancy between teacher-assigned grades and test results for most subjects (SNAE, 2019)1. For example, the proportion of students whose grades correspond to their test results varies between 61-73 percent in the various subjects. Furthermore, it is more common that the teacher-assigned grades are higher than the test results, as compared to the other way around (with the exception of English as a foreign language, EFL). There are also gender differences, where girls to a slightly higher degree than boys receive grades that are higher in comparison with their test results. There are also large variations between schools. The question in focus here is how this difference between teacher-assigned grades and test results originate and why it persists, which is investigated from a teacher perspective.

I detta kapitel lyfter vi två problematiska sidor av dagens målrelateradebetygssystem, som kan ha negativa och långtgående konsekvenser för ett stort antal elever, men även för samhället i stort. Dessa sidor av betygssystemet handlar dels om betygens likvärdighet och urvalsfunktion, dels om betygsskalan och betygssteget F (dvs. betyget för icke godkänt resultat). Ett utbildningssystem med höga krav på behörighet (betyg) och som dessutom har ett icke godkänt betygssteg (F), riskerar att leda till att elever stängs ute från vidare utbildning såsom gymnasieskolan – trots att denna i dag är informellt obligatorisk och nödvändig för att komma vidare inom utbildningssystemet eller för att få arbete. Frågan är när i utbildningssystemet en formell urvalsfunktion behövs och vilka möjligheter till fortsatt utbildning vi erbjuder elever som får icke godkända betyg.

Projektet bygger på en idé om att diskutera forskning och forskare genom att använda boksamtal kopplade till både fakta-böcker och sagoböcker med ett naturvetenskapligt innehåll. Data samlades in genom ljudinspelningar av boksamtal (N=152) i barngrupper (ålder 2-6 år). Boksamtalen leddes av 5 förskollärare som också deltog i fokusgrupper och workshops, vilka också lujdinspelades (N=9). Resultaten från projektet visar på möjligheter för rika diskussioner om vetenskapliga metoder och redskap samt mänskliga och sociala aspekter av naturvetenskap. Resultaten visar också att den sortens samtal var möjliga att föra oberoende av bok-typ, men om boken inte hade några explicita hänvisningar till forskning och forskare behövde läraren hitta andra sätt att rikta barnens uppmärksamhet mot den sorters diskussioner. Vidare visade resultaten att förskollärarna upplevde att boksamtalen gav spin-off-effekter på barnens nyfikenhet, att barnen ställde nya frågor och att de fick ett ökat intresse för egna undersökningar. Resultaten pekar därför på att diskussioner om forskning och forskare har potentialen att bidra till barns egenmakt och agens, vilket i sin tur är viktigt i en verksamhet som byggs upp kring demokrati och rättvisa. Med utgångspunkt i resultaten presenterar vi en didaktiska modell som kan vägleda förskollärare när de introducerar den här sortens diskussioner i sina barngrupper.    

Background: At our dental education, the examination failure rate amongst students has increased, resulting in subsequent involuntary dropouts. One of the main problems seems to be that the students struggle with taking the necessary responsibility for their learning, as required by the problem‐based learning (PBL) methodology.

Aim: To describe the background to, and the transition process from, pure PBL to case‐based teaching and learning (CBT) with flipped classroom seminars at the dental programme at [anonymised for peer review].

Methods: In this position paper, we describe our observed problems with the PBL methodology, as implemented at this faculty, and the potential benefits of a change towards CBT. The current implementation of CBT is presented, along with educational research supporting the choice of activities.

Results: Tentative findings are that the flipped classroom seminars and the clearer instructions appear to be successful with higher levels of activity, engagement and attendance amongst the students, and the students have evaluated the seminars as very good learning activities.

Conclusion: Tentative findings suggest that the current implementation of CBT may be a fruitful way of teaching in dental education today. Most of the teaching staff have been reawakened to teaching, and as a result, the content of the courses are being reviewed and improved. The students appreciate that what is expected of them has been made clearer and that there is a variety of learning activities.

Hur upplever lärarna sin beredskap och kompetens i förhållande till styrdokumentens revidering och hur visar sig deras beredskap i undervisningen? Det är målet att undersöka i en förstudie i årskurs 7 på ett högstadium med en 1:1-satsning (Chromebooks) sedan hösten 2017. Studien är en förberedelse inför ett praktikutvecklande forskningsprojekt med syfte att utveckla undervisning och bedömning av digitala, multimodala texter.

Datamaterialet består av en inledande enkätundersökning, kollegiala samtal kring Skolverkets modul ”Leda och lära i tekniktäta klassrum”, samt fältanteckningar från en veckas deltagande observation i undervisningen. Enkätundersökningen visar att mer än 60 % av lärarna upplever sina kunskaper om förändringarna i styrdokumenten och 3 av digitaliseringsaspekterna utifrån Skolverkets definition som tillräckliga eller goda, men att mer än 60 % rankar sina kunskaper om den fjärde digitaliseringsaspekten (”kunna lösa problem och omsätta idéer i handling på ett kreativt sätt med användning av digital teknik") som sparsamma eller otillräckliga. Enkätsvaren visar också att skrift, tal och pappersburna medier dominerar undervisning och elevernas arbete, de praktiskt-estetiska ämnena undantagna.

En initial analys av de kollegiala samtalen visar, utifrån de kategorier som Tallvid (2015) identifierar som hinder i digitaliseringsarbetet, att det mest återkommande och dominerande sättet att tala om digitaliseringen och undervisningen kan kopplas till den upplevda otillräckligheten när det gäller infrastruktur och bristande kompetensutveckling. Klassrumsobservationerna visar både på skillnader i användningsfrekvens och hur användning av teknologin motiveras. Tillämpningen av Technology Acceptance Model (Davies, 1989) i analysen tydliggör hur lärarnas individuella uppfattningar om nyttan påverkar såväl frekvens som syftet med användningen i undervisningen. Identifierade syften rör sig bland annat om teknikövning, upprätthållande av disciplin men också om undervisningsutveckling.

Våren 2017 beslutade den svenska regeringen om nya skrivningar av Läroplanerna för grundskolan och gymnasiet för att anpassa dem i linje med de nationella IT-strategier som   tagits fram (SKOLFS 2017:11; SKOLFS 2017:16). Jag undersöker skrivningarna   för svenskämnet genom ämnes- och kursplaner i dess olika delar syfte, centralt innehåll och kunskapskrav. Övergripande frågeställning: Vilket/vilka förhållningssätt till digitalisering av den svenska skolan framkommer i de nya skrivningarna av styrdokumenten? Jag är intresserad av hur valet av begrepp förhåller sig till olika diskurser. Ses det digitala huvudsakligen som verktyg – eller kan skrivningarna tolkas som ett begynnande new mind set (Lankshear & Knobel, 2008)? Jag undersöker också hur de nya skrivningarna relaterar till de genomgripande förändringar av kommunikation och utbildning som beskrivs av Bezemer och Kress (2016) i deras sociosemiotiska multimodala ramverk och till de förändringar avseende agens, påtaglighet, multimodalitet och tillgodogörande som beskrivs i multiliteracies-pedagogiken (Cope & Kalantzis 2010; Kalantzis & Cope, 2012). Ännu preliminära resultat tyder på motstridiga diskurser och också på skillnader mellan grundskola och   gymnasium. Resultaten relateras till en diskussion om meningsskapande på  generell – specifik nivå (Tønnessen, 2011; även Bezemer & Kress 2016) och berör också lärares möjligheter att bedöma elevers digitala multimodala meningsskapande då de nya skrivningarna inte har inneburit förändringar i kunskapskraven.

I presentationen diskuteras också några lärares förståelse för de förändrade skrivningarna. Två fokusgruppssamtal (ett på vardera grundskola och gymnasium) analyseras med hjälp av tematisk innehållsanalys (Boyatzis, 1998) och identifierade teman relateras i en kvalitativ jämförelse till analysen av förändringarna i styrdokumenten. Undersökningens resultat förväntas bidra till förståelse för de utmaningar som undervisningen ställs inför i   implementeringen av de nya skrivningarna.

Referenser

Bezemer, J. & Kress, G. (2016). Multimodality,   learning and communication: a social semiotic frame. London: Routledge.

Boyatzis, R. E. (1998). Transforming qualitative information: thematic analysis and code   development. London: Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.

Cope, B. & Kalantzis, M. (2010). New media, new   learning. I Cole, D. R. & Pullen, D. L (red.). Multiliteracies in Motion. Abingdon & New York: Routledge.

Kalantzis, M. & Cope, B. (2012). Literacies. Port Melbourne, Vic:   Cambridge University Press.

Lankshear, C. & Knobel,   M. (red.) (2008). Digital literacies: concepts, policies and   practices. New York: Peter Lang.

SKOLFS 2017:11. Förordning om ändring   i förordningen (SKOLFS 2010:37) om läroplan för grundskolan, förskoleklassen   och fritidshemmet.

SKOLFS 2017:16. Förordning om ändring   i förordningen (SKOLFS 2011:144) om läroplan för gymnasieskolan.

Tønnessen,   E. S (2011). Multimodal   textkompetense og dataspill. I Ellvin, M,   Skar, G & Tengberg, M (red.), Svenskämnet i förändring […], 2011, Svensklärarserien 234.

The 2017 revisions of the Swedish curriculum, mandatory from July 2018, were made to enhance digital competence in teaching and learning in fours aspects, respectively dealing with effects on society, use of digital tools, critical awareness and responsibility and problem solving. This abstract report on an ongoing study of the implementation of the revised curricula in an upper secondary school, focusing the teachers in Swedish as L1 and L2. The material contains of audio recordings and field notes from observations of professional development work on the revisions in curricula and syllabi, on assessment of students digital presentations and of teachers’ planning and teaching. The interest is to contribute to the understanding of how digitalization is perceived and used by teachers in Swedish as L1 and l2 by examining, what vocabulary they use, what issues and aspects of digitalization they address in their discussions and planning of teaching. Using critical discourse analysis o examine the data preliminary results expose the teachers’ talk as to a large extent focusing themes as technical aspects as opposite to subject content. The presentation suggest how the result can be discussed as examples of teachers’ different attitudes towards the revised curricula using theory from New Literacy studies (Lankshear and Knobel, 2011) and the concept of multiliteracies (Kalantzis & Cope, 2012).

The results are also discussed in relation to teachers professional agency understood in an ecological way, drawing on Biesta and Tedder (2007). The area of digitalization in curriculum is perceived as something profoundly new in teachers’ professional knowledge base (Cochran-Smith & Fries, 2005) thus, in the material from the beginning of a professional development program, perceived as challenging and threatening to L1 and L2 teacher agency.

During the last decade, digital competence has become a core concept in policy making and in debates over the future of education since the role that schools may take in developing competences needed for citizenship in digitalized societies is debated globally. Currently, digital competence is used as a foundational concept in the re-formulation of curricula in Sweden (Regeringskansliet, U2015/04666/S). The curricular changes point in different directions, emphasizing the introduction of coding as well as critical, ethical and creative uses of technology.  This presentation explores how digital competence is conceptualized in recent changes in the curriculum for Swedish compulsory and upper secondary school. Based on a thematic content analysis of the changes in the curricula, aimed at supporting students’ digital competence, four themes have been identified; use of digital tools and media, programming, critical awareness and responsibility. The distribution of the thematic changes differs among the subjects but the most dominating theme concerns the tool-oriented use of digital tools and media. This strong dominance of operational perspective tends to narrow the conceptualization compared to international definitions and frameworks of digital competence.  Alterations in curricula and syllabi in the subject of Swedish are of particular interest in this presentation. Moreover, differences between the curricula for compulsory school and upper secondary school will be explored. Furthermore, the shift in concepts that appears to be taken place at the moment, where competence replaces the concept of literacy is discussed. Literacy refers to meaning making and the understanding of texts and has been expanded to include digital and multimodal texts (i.e. Street, 1998). Competence on the other hand tends to refer to wider issues of the digitalization of society and education. What does this shift in concepts mean for language subjects and how do the recent changes in curricula relate to the concepts of digital literacy and digital competence. 

Two parallel ongoing studies in lower and upper secondary school, aiming to explore and develop teachers’ professional competence regarding teaching and assessment of digital, multimodal meaning-making, are presented and discussed in this presentation. The goal of the projects is to develop models for teaching and assessment practices linked to digital, multimodal meaning-making.

 In a practice-close design-based approach, teachers and researchers meet regularly in workshops with the aim to illuminate established meaning-making practices and teachers’ understanding, teaching and assessment of multimodal texts. The predominance of the verbal mode in education (Godhe, 2013; Öman & Sofkova Hashemi, 2015) is  being challenged by digital multimodal texts and the presence of multiple semiotic systems in the representation of meaning needs to be recognized. Moreover, teaching and assessing multimodality requires an understanding of semiotic specialization (Kress & van Leeuwen, 1996/2006; Serafini, 2012; Bezemer & Kress, 2016).  In the workshops, teachers and researchers try out different models that explicitly focus on multimodal meaning-making (e.g. Bearne, 2009). Multimodal and digital aspects of meaning-making are addressed in relation to teaching goals and curricula, in order to develop a common knowledge as well as concepts and a metalanguage needed to be able to describe contemporary meaning-making. In-between workshops the teachers try out the models in their classrooms and in the following workshop the models are refined based on their classroom experience.

 The presentation discusses preliminary findings from the studies focusing on the aspects of multimodal teaching and assessment that appears to be most problematic. The contribution of a common metalanguage for teachers’ understanding and competence in teaching and assessing multimodal meaning-making is also highlighted. Moreover, to what extent and how the models that have been tried out were helpful in developing the teaching and assessment practices in the classrooms will be discussed.

For this presentation, we have compiled seven studies from primary to higher education. Thepurpose is to illuminate affordances the digital and multimodal text landscape impose onteachers and students. The Swedish curriculum (revised 2017) aims to strengthen students’digital competences towards understanding effects on society, using and understanding digitaltools and media, applying a critical and responsible approach and solving problems andapplying ideas creatively. This recent curricular revision puts emphasis on work withinteractive texts, texts created in collaboration with others, texts where words, images andsound interact, democracy and public opinion in social media, responsible use of language indigital media, understanding how information can be controlled by underlying algorithms,distinguishing between sources of information and interests behind them, boundary betweenfreedom of expression and social media violations, impact of digitalization on labor market,attitudes and values. Obviously, the technology brings new opportunities to the classroomfostering responsible and equitable access to information and knowledge and with thatrequirements to develop MIL skills to understand information and multimodal texts andnavigate safely in an increasingly complex society. As future citizens, students need to be ableto design texts, read to find and evaluate multimodal information. Consequently, students needinstructions and strategies to develop MIL and relevant digital text competences. How doteachers and students meet these expectations and requirements on MIL?A crucial feature, which has been shown in several studies including ours, displays that bothteachers and students need to develop knowledge of and a language for the phenomena that arecurrently outside what is traditionally covered by the school subjects. Further, teachers needtools attuned to new grading and assessment criteria, in order to support students in evaluatingand interpreting information and designing multimodal texts. Students, in turn, need strategiesand instructions on how to evaluate and interpret information to avoid superficial, misguidedor mechanical processing of information. They need to develop a broad understanding of visual,auditory and other modal representations and develop strategies for navigating and interpretingmultimodal text design. We have also found that teachers, regardless of grade or subject,experience difficulties to relate students’ digital text competences to the knowledgerequirements in curricula that to a large extent emphasize verbal language (i.e. speech andwriting). This may explain some of our results showing that other ways of expressing meaning(i.e. images and sound) tend to be overlooked or downplayed in assessment of students’ texts.Without teachers valuing non-verbal language, students will not access and engage incontemporary media and texts which implies lack of opportunities to develop MIL needed asfuture, critical and engaging citizens. We contend that the competence to design digital texts isthe other side of the coin of evaluating and reading information. We want especially highlightthe value of understanding the multimodal aspects of digital texts for teachers’ and students’critical access, use, and participation in the flow of information as a means to realize rights tofreedom of information and expression.

This paper reports on model-based teaching and collaborative inquiry learning of chemical processes and physical phenomena related to socio-scientific issues (SSI) in Swedish preschools (ages 1-5 years). A special focus is children's learning related to intended and enacted objects of learning, and the research discusses teaching and learning processes with and without scaffolding by contemporary information technologies. A developed theoretical framework for analysis of different referential meanings experienced during work with chemistry and physics in preschool will be presented at the conference. Results describe in detail how reasoning and questioning during modelbased teaching and collaborative inquiry learning engage children and preschool teachers. The role of tablet computers, in supporting collaborative learning of chemical processes and physical phenomena related to children's everyday life will be discussed.

This paper describes an analysis of teaching instances that are part of an in-service preschool teachers programme. The overall aim of the project is – together with teachers – to study model-based teaching and collaborative inquiry learning of chemical processes and physical phenomena in preschool. Our interest is directed towards the teaching of science in preschool, with particular focus on use of digital tools and the verbal communication and intersubjectivity established, or not established, between teachers and children during learning situations in preschool. Teaching activities were jointly developed by work teams in preschools and researchers. A qualitative analysis of video recordings of enacted teaching activities has been performed. The focus was excerpts representing qualitative differences in intersubjectivity related to the object of learning, and what characterised the communication in these situations – the roles of teacher, children and scaffolding digital technology. The focus of this report will be teaching activities developed  with air resistance as the object of learning. The result indicates the importance of intermediary objects of learning and place them on the science teaching agenda indicating that they can constitute a supporting element in the conquest of new knowledge. Further, children’s understanding of abstractions and physics concepts when designing a digital movie about investigated phenomena is discussed. The three-year professional development (PD) programme is ongoing and analysis of several instances during the first and second years will be discussed at the conference.

This paper describes an analysis of teaching instances that are part of an in-service preschool teachers programme. The overall aim of the project is – together with teachers – to study model-based teaching and collaborative inquiry learning of chemical processes and physical phenomena in preschool. Our interest is directed towards the teaching of science in preschool, with particular focus on use of digital tools and the verbal communication and intersubjectivity established, or not established, between teachers and children during learning situations in preschool. A phenomenographic analysis of the enacted object of learning was performed. The focus is excerpts representing qualitative differences in intersubjectivity related to the object of learning and what characterised the communication in these situations – the roles of teacher and children. From our results we state that mutual simultaneity may be seen as a variation of intersubjectivity. The result also places the intermediary object of learning on the science teaching agenda and shows that it can constitute a supporting element in the conquest of new knowledge. Further, children’s understanding of abstractions and concepts when designing a digital movie about science phenomena are discussed. The three-year professional development (PD) programme is ongoing and analysis of several instances during the first years will be discussed at the conference

This paper reports on model-based teaching and collaborative inquiry learning of chemical processes and physical phenomena related to socio-scientific issues (SSI) in Swedish preschools (1-5 years). A special focus is children's learning related to intended and enacted teaching, and the research contrasts teaching and learning processes with and without scaffolding by tablets. A developed theoretical framework for analysis of different referential meanings experienced during work with chemistry and physics in preschool will be presented. Results describe in detail how reasoning and questioning during teaching engage children and preschool teachers. The role of tablets in collaborative physics learning will be discussed.