| 1. |
- Sundström Sjödin, Elin, 1972-
(författare)
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Where is the critical in literacy? : Tracing performances of literature reading, readers and non-readers in educational practice
- 2019
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- In many instances in society, educational and other, literature reading is emphasised as something that develops persons in positive ways. The present thesis explores this claim in relation to literature reading in educational practices. By tracing how values and critical aspects of reading are enacted, the purpose is both to problematize taken-for-granted truth claims about literature reading and to develop an understanding of the elements involved when reading, readers and critical aspects of reading are created. The studies focus on different educational practices; a teacher’s narrative about grading, information brochures about reading to children and the policy and practice of a reading project at special residential homes for detained youth in Sweden. In these practices, the thesis explores where and when the critical takes place, in what constellations and with what consequences. The thesis draws on critical literacy, where reading is regarded as taking action and having self-empowering potential. However, with help of a pragmatic and material semiotic approach, the investigations steps away from what is taken for granted about reading and about what critical means, and instead reading, readers and the critical are analysed as transactional effects.The studies show how students can be placed at risk by rationales for reading literature that construct and establish them as lacking of culture or as literacy inadequate. The thesis further shows that the critical in literacy can be ambivalent as well as multiple, and it can be enacted by both human, discursive and material actors.
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| 2. |
- Hort, Sofia, 1984-
(författare)
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Skrivprocesser på högskolan : Text, plats och materialitet i uppsatsskrivandet
- 2020
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The purpose of this study is to explore how students in a higher education context handle the writing of their final essay. Applying a sociomaterial approach, the study offers comprehensive case studies of students’ writing processes. The thesis attempts to show how student writers handle writing challenges through different technologies and at different places. It does so by implementing the Mobile Technologies Process Logs (MTPL)-method, wherein participating students take an active role to create and gather data on their own writing processes.The results show that some students’ textual work could be described in terms of being comprehensive, and hence handled through varied writing technologies at various writing places. These students write a lot of texts to move the writing process forward. Other writers take a more product-oriented view in their writing, and hence write through fewer technologies, at a few places, and with a wish to finish their final text product directly. Many of the students make explicit how they process the literature through writing texts. The knowledge production, the analysis, which is central to academic writing, seems however more implicit and difficult for the students to handle, specifically if having a product oriented view on writing. The results also show how students mobilize different textual actions to meet challenges that writing an (digital) essay implies. This work is clearly emplaced ,at diverse or at more homogenous writing places.It is significant to make textual strategies as well as the functions of writing technologies and place visible to all students. It seems vital at times where higher education, as well as the students entering this institution, are put in front of a raft of (new) challenges. At the same time as the idea of the bad student writer is prevailing, higher education institutions seem not to teach how an academic writing process could be managed in successful ways. This thesis contributes to this field of inquiry with results on how students’ writing processes can be characterized.
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| 3. |
- Larsson, Christina, 1956-
(författare)
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Att lära genom improvisation : en didaktisk studie i grundskolans musikundervisning
- 2019
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- In the growing field of research on improvisation, it is argued that improvisation should be at the core of music education, and in many curricula improvisation is in fact emphasized. However, in general music education, as well as research, improvisation is still overlooked. There seem to be a discursive gap between ‘everyday’ and artistic perceptions of improvisation and the way it is perceived didactically. Improvisation is also a creative music activity form and as such it cannot have prescribed outcomes. Yet, the current goal- and result driven schooling system focuses on achieving prescribed knowledge requirements. This situation constitutes an educational paradox. Through a systematic literature review, interviews with teachers and a practice-based study, this thesis explores the conditions and the role of improvisation in general music education. The theoretical perspective is based on Dewey’s pragmatist philosophy, and his concepts of aesthetic experience and transaction. Results show that improvisation is conceptualised in a continuum between structure and freedom and that teachers’ didactical approaches to improvisation can be oriented towards the process, the subject or Bildung. However, teachers’ perceptions of improvisation as related to jazz and blues sometimes present a hindrance. Combining a practical epistemology analysis with Dewey´s concept of the esthetic event (Dewey´s spelling) provides new insights into the process and content of aesthetic meaning-making. Improvising pupils who have an aesthetic experience can develop expressivity, agency and responsivity (EAR) as well as aspects of embodied, cognitive and ethical knowledge. The transactional perspective and 5 concepts developed here provide new insights in how to understand improvisation in education: as ethically co-creative action, co-learning action, explorative action, a space for imagination and emotional engagement and finally a room for subjectification. This implies a negotiated role for the teacher as co-player. A practical aesthetic analysis (PESA) is suggested which emphasises the specific nature of the aesthetic experience.
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| 4. |
- Schoultz, Magnus, 1989-
(författare)
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Seniorers lärande : Intrinsikala värden som hälsoresurs
- 2023
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis focuses on older adults’ participation in non-formal education where learning does not lead to qualifications for a vocational career. In recent decades learning has been discussed in relation to older adults, where concepts like lifelong learning have been put forward as instruments for facing challenges such as demographic changes and ageing. Research demonstrates that intrinsic aspects of learning, such as the joy of learning, are important for older adults’ participation in education. However, research seldom considers intrinsic values of education as a point of departure. Against this background, the aim of the thesis is to develop a deeper understanding of older adults’ experiences of intrinsic values in organised educational activities and their significance for older adults’ health.The thesis consists of three articles. One article is a review focusing on how the research field has explained the relation between learning and health for older adults. The other two articles focus specifically on the educational practice. One of the articles explores older adults’ experiences of intrinsic values, while the other looks at the teachers’ didactical principles for organising education for older adults. To fulfil the purpose of the thesis and facilitate an in-depth understanding, a synthesis is created based on the three articles, didactic theory, John Dewey’s theory of values and his conceptualisation of experience and Aron Antonovsky’s salutogenic perspective on health. By synthesising the results from the articles and the theories new theoretical explanations emerge as to how older adults’ learning can contribute to their health. With support from the concepts intrinsic values, interaction, continuity, health resources and sense of coherence, the synthesis emphasises that older adults’ experiences of intrinsic values in education can be understood as health resources that contribute to their sense of coherence.
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| 5. |
- Sjödin, Karin, 1972-
(författare)
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Friluftsliv och naturmöten i utbildningspraktik
- 2024
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The overall interest of this thesis is to contribute with knowledge about meaning making processes in educational encounters with nature in different educational practices. The exploration consists of four studies based on a pragmatic perspective on meaning making inspired by the works of John Dewey and Ludwig Wittgenstein. A discourse analytical approach is also used in the first study to analyse the curriculum documents. The result confirms that encounters with nature have a clear position in the curriculum documents, and friluftsliv is a prioritised content in PETE. It is further confirmed that the field of outdoor education is a field of conflicting meanings that pose significant educational challenges. Indeterminate situations occur and may influence students’ possibilities to transform the educational content in PETE to a school context. Another conclusion from the results is that instrumental meanings and a sportification of friluftsliv often get precedence over more emotional based meanings connected to nature. The results also show empirical examples where encounters with nature enable participants to create moral relations towards nature. This potential is highlighted in previous research as one of the most important in order to (re)connect our relation towards nature and in extension better conditions to deal with environmental questions.
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| 6. |
- Tryggvason, Ásgeir, 1983-
(författare)
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Om det politiska i samhällskunskap : Agonism, populism och didaktik
- 2018
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Democratic education can be seen as being constituted by a political dimension in two senses. In one sense, democratic education is political because it has a politically formulated goal to educate citizens. In another sense, the practice of democratic education is in itself political, in that it constitutes a space in which students encounter different visions of and opinions about what society should be like. In the intersection of these two meanings of “the political” we find the teacher. How can teachers navigate and approach “the political” in their classrooms? Which conceptions of conflicts, emotions and identities are useful when approaching the political as an educational problem?This thesis formulates an agonistic perspective on the political in social science education. In four articles, the thesis explores agonism and populism in relation to social science education. In focus are questions about the role that emotions, conflicts and identities should play in democratic education. Three of the four articles are theoretical investigations into the problems and potentialities of agonism and populism. The fourth article is empirically based on interviews with social science teachers and classroom observations. By synthesizing the results from these four articles, an agonistic perspective on the political in social science education is formulated. The agonistic perspective consists of four concepts: political emotions, hegemony, political presence and simplification. With these concepts, the agonistic perspective provides a theoretically informed starting point for teachers to reflect on and approach “the political” in social science education.
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| 7. |
- Andersson, Karin, 1972-
(författare)
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Naturmöten i pedagogiska verksamheter
- 2020
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Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The general public´s everyday encounters with nature have radically changed during the 20th century in industrial countries. Our relation towards nature in relation to environmental challenges is an important educational question, and this thesis investigates encounters with nature in educational practice. More specifically the aims are to investigate (i) how encounters with nature has been legitimated in the national curricula of Swedish school, and (ii) meaning making processes within pedagogical encounters with nature. In relation to the first aim a discourse analytical reading of the national curricula in Sweden is conducted. The results show that a scientific perspective of encounters with nature has been dominating during the last hundred years in the national curricula. In recent years, it is also more instrumental encounters that are expressed in the curricula, while students’ personal experiences and feelings are not focused in current curricula. Paper II and III examine moral meaning making in three different educational practices – Outdoor Education Centres, All-Weather Outdoor Schools and the Radical Outdoor movement. A multidisciplinary method is used in paper II, LEDmodel (Landscape, Ethical and Didactical). Paper III is based on the ethical tendency and language-game analyses. The results from these studies show that the educational purpose have an impact on moral processes in relation to nature. When the purpose is related to scientific knowledge there is often an instrumental relation towards nature in contrast to encounters that are more open. Open encounters instead seem to create relations that are built on a sense of responsibility and empathy. The results show that relations are created in different ways where some are more personal and built on emotion when other emotions are more based on stated rules or norms.
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| 8. |
- Mårdh, Andreas, 1987-
(författare)
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Om historieämnets politiska dimension : diskursiva logiker i didaktisk praktik
- 2019
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Today, history education is often a contested issue over which political frontiers are drawn between adversaries advocating fundamentally different visions of what constitutes a desirable curriculum and, by extension, a desirable society. At present, this dimension is in need of increased attention, considering that populist rhetoric has gained a foothold in mainstream politics and that history, as a school subject, continues to serve the purpose of constituting “the people”, often in national and ethnic terms. Against this background, the aim of this thesis is to comprehensively grasp the political dimension of history education by conducting methodological, empirical and theoretical investigations.The thesis draws on the pragmatist philosophy of democratic education as well as on post-structuralist theories of history, antagonism and populism. Methodologically, the thesis make use of the logics of critical explanation framework (LCE) to empirically explore how history classroom practices as well as contemporary right-wing populist discourse operate.The results show that the LCE methodology constitutes a viable analytical vocabulary for generating knowledge of the political dimension of history education. Furthermore, the thesis offers empirical knowledge about how and why practices of history education are interchangeably politicised and rendered stable by teachers, students and members of the public. Theoretically, populism, as a discursive logic, is criticised and then reconceptualised into an educative mode by which history teaching practices can be enacted. Collectively, the results provide a comprehensive understanding of the political dimension of history education.
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| 9. |
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| 10. |
- Erixon, Eva-Lena, 1968-
(författare)
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Matematiklärares kompetensutveckling online : policy, diskurs och meningsskapande
- 2017
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Different forms of professional development online are becoming increasingly common for teachers and the aim of the thesis is to contribute knowledge about online professional development for mathematics teachers and the relationship between professional development, educational policy, and mathematics teaching practice. In the thesis, professional development refers to organized professional development in terms of university courses.The thesis consists of four studies, each of which has been presented in the form of an article. The four studies together explore transnational and national policy discourses, meaning-making activities that can be distinguished in online professional development, discourses pertaining to mathematics teaching in the classroom and in the subsequent seminar discussions in the course, and teachers’ experience of professional development online. The different arenas have been explored using the concept of discourse with reference to Fairclough, Gee, and Sfard. The term ”discourse” refers primarily to communication and language in use.The result of the studies indicates that the participants have not been offered enough opportunities to reflect on how or whether the use of several concepts and everyday life connections really deepened the students’ understanding of the mathematical content. Moreover, the analysis of the interviews with the participants shows that it was difficult for them to deepen their reflections in the synchronous communication online. There is a lack of reciprocal participation and reflection in the conversation and it is hard for the participants to get an idea of how the others respond to their messages. When a participant has completed his or her message the next speaker continues with a new message and as a result, the communication often takes a new direction instead of allowing in-depth reflection.
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