Previous studies have pointed to the benefits of involving students’ everyday life experiences in lessons and in contextualizing the sciencecontent to enhance learning and positive attitudes toward school science. However, most of these investigations have been conductedas intervention studies. By contrast, the present study explored how teachers, in authentic situations and without interventions, relatedthe school science context to other contexts. We analyzed a total of 490 min of lesson introductions in Swedish Grade 9 classes. Theresults revealed that teachers employed contextualization at the intersection of science content and the everyday life context, the schoolcontext, and the language context. Furthermore, it appeared that contextualization was created in the moment, as a way of explicatingthe scientific content. Compared to intervention studies, the present study shows that occasions of contextualization are rare. It ispossible to conclude that the use of contextualization in science learning situations could be viewed as a teacher competence and mustbe explicit in teacher education and professional development to achieve the benefits of enhanced student interest and learning shownin the mentioned intervention studies. 

Many studies within educational research seek to investigate students’ dialogues for studying learning situations. One difficulty is however to approach students’ discussions in action. In this paper we discuss the possibilities of using spy glasses in order to capture both students’ talk and their actions in the science classroom. This methodological approach makes it possible to come close to all students’ actions when working in small groups or doing laboratory work. This means that the spy glasses register their discussions with each other but also what they are doing with the laboratory equipment, what they write or what they focus on in a written text. This methodological approach provides a very rich data material and many hours of recordings for one single lesson. In order to approach the comprehensive data material we suggest clear analytic foci and iterated analytic phases. The preliminary results show that spy glasses can be an important analytic tool for capturing student dialogues and studying learning situations in the classroom.

The focus point of this thesis lies on 88 pupils’ idea of what happens when we eat a sandwich, drink water or swallow a painkiller. I have analyzed how these ideas affect their knowledge regarding the physiology of the body, and regarding health issues.

The study confirms some parts of the research already carried out, principally in Europe, but it is the new and never before published research that I discuss in this summary of my licentiate's dissertation. The pupils were asked what happens in the body when you drink water. It was revealed that one group of pupils had an idea about an alternative system for fluids. These pupils drew a tube from the mouth connected directly to the kidneys. These pupils had troubles understanding the function of the kidney, and they also had more simple explanations to why, for example, humans sweat.

Regarding water’s way through the body, some pupils had difficulties showing the connection between the digestive system, the blood circulation system and the kidneys. It was somewhat easier for the pupils to transfer their knowledge about the function of the digestive system regarding a sandwich's path through the body in relation to what happens if you swallow a painkiller. In these cases it was easier for the pupils to transfer their knowledge from one context to another, as in the case with the sandwich and the painkiller, than to connect different organ systems, as in the case with the water's path through the body.

Regarding health related issues, it was revealed that a few students believed that the body stores nutrition and energy when they skip a meal. This result is interesting since they had a different view on the assimilation of food in the body than the accepted scientific explanation.

The pupils with a more advanced understanding of a painkiller’s way through the body were those who believed that pills primarily could be replaced by pain-relieving creams. This group spontaneously gave fewer alternatives to painkillers than other pupils.

Over half of the interviewed pupils believed that there is nutrition in water, but they were unable to specify what this nutrition would consist of. The rest of the pupils believed either that there was no nutrition in water, or specified different minerals and elements. There was also an idea that you have to drink water to fight off bacteria.  

When the pupils were asked where they thought their knowledge about body and health came from, they gave school as the primary source, the parents as the secondary source, and TV as the third source. Other alternatives like the Internet, newspapers etc. were less frequent.

Elever i både svensk skola och internationellt har svårt att beskriva vad som händer med vattnet från det att en person dricker vatten tills dess att personen urinerar ut vätskan.  Problematiken att beskrivningen av själva förloppet som även på en enkel makronivå kräver att personen kan förstå kopplingen mellan flera olika organsystem (minst matspjälkning-, cirkulations- och utsöndringssystemet). I ett flertal studier har det även påvisats att det finns flera olika ickevetenskapliga förklaringsmodeller som elever men även vuxna använder sig av då de skall förklara vad som händer med vattnet i kroppen. Andra studier visar att det är övergångarna mellan organsystemen som gör att förståelsen blir problematisk inte minst för att förklaringen kräver en kunskap i det icke synliga, dvs mikronivåer. Denna studie syftar till att undersöka vilka förkunskaper som studenterna på grundlärarprogrammen har om vattnets väg genom kroppen då de börjar läsa kurserna i naturvetenskap och vad de har för intentioner, dvs. vad de anser eller tror är viktigt kunskap, då de i ett senare läge skall undervisa. Empirin till denna studie är insamlad i en grupp av lärarstudenter inriktning åk f-3 och en annan grupp med inriktning åk 4-6. Informationen är insamlad via en enkät som består av en ritad figur där studenterna ritar och beskriver vad de tror händer i kroppen från det att de dricker vatten tills det att vätskan urineras ut. Därutöver finns det även på samma enkät ett antal kunskapsfrågor med flervalsalternativ samt några öppna frågor som knyter an till deras blivande profession som lärare. Analys och sammanställning av enkäten pågår i skrivande stund och kommer att redovisas på konferensen.     

The purpose of this thesis is to study Swedish and South African students’ beliefs about the body and its functions, and how these ideas correlated with answers to associated questions. Data was obtained from several different types of surveys and interviews. All the students who participated in the studies were in grade nine. There were 88 students in the Swedish data collection and 166 in the South African data collection.

The results show that students have the ability to describe the digestive system when they describe a sandwich pathway through the body, and also the ability to link the circulatory system to the digestive system. However, students have difficulties to transfer this knowledge to a new context when they were asked to describe a painkiller’s pathway through the body. The painkiller pathway through the body had not been taught in school. But it was even more difficult for students to connect three organ systems, namely the excretory system, as was the case when they were asked to describe the pathway of water through the body. Although the excretory system is described in the textbook and the students had been taught about the same. There were also students using non-scientific ideas and drew a pipe directly from the throat to the kidney. These students found it more difficult to understand the function of the kidneys. A similar study was conducted in five South African schools where it was found, contrary to Sweden and other European studies, students describing that water is passing through the lungs on its way to the stomach, some students also said that the food would pass through the lungs before the stomach. Some of the students clarified that water and for that matter, the food, passes the lungs to purify it. A deeper analysis has been done regarding the water on five Swedish students' questionnaire and interview responses. It turned out that students' ides were either the same or changed to a less sophisticated explanation in the interview responses compared to the answer in the questionnaires when it came to the pathway of water through the body, this is different from the question of the sandwich where the interview showed similar or more sophisticated results.

Grade 9 students’ ideas of the pathway of food, water and painkiller were investigated. We found differences in pattern especially among the students with nonscientific explanations models. Concerning water: In the Swedish study does students described a tube transporting water from the mouth directly to the kidneys (~25% of the students). But in South African students who describe that water from the mouth passes through the lungs further to the stomach (~50% of the students)

Upplevelser och händelser som sker i elevernas vardag kan ibland problematiseras utifrån en naturvetenskaplig kontext. I denna studie har vi analyserat vi hur lärare,som undervisar elever i årskurs nio, använder sig av elevernas vardagserfarenheter då de undervisar, analysen bygger påKamberelis och Wehunt (2012) definition av hybrid diskurs-praxis. Analysen fokuseraspå den första inledande delen av lektionen, då läraren oftast är den främsta aktören i undervisningen. Denövergripande anledningentill att göra dessa analyser är indikationerna i PISA som visar att de svenska eleverna upplever den naturvetenskapliga undervisningen relevant men ointressant. I detta sammanhang blir det därför relevant att undersöka hur lärare talat om naturvetenskap i relation till elevernas vardagserfarenheter. Studien gjordes vid 6 olika skolor där totalt 44 lektioner spelades, dessa lektioners inledningar analyserades. 67 situationer detekterades och kategoriserades i tre övergripande grupper; Vardaglig kontext, Skolkontext och Språklig kontext. Vardagligkontext delades sedan i underkategorier ett exempel är: underkategorin, förklarande berättelser (12 situationer), har vi samlat de situationer där läraren, till synes spontant, hittar på berättelser för att kontextualisera naturvetenskapen. Noterbart är att inga längre berättelser förekom utan samtliga historier var korta kontextualiserande berättelser. Skolkontext hade inga underkategorier utan samtliga situationer referenser till andra skolämnen innebär att läraren relaterar till andra skolämnen genom att beskriva ämnesinnehållet som en del av en större enhet och skapar därmed en hybriditet mellan de olika skolämnena. Vid sex tillfällen gjordes sådana kopplingar till andra ämnen. Språkligkontext har tre underkategorier var av en är, Sammankopplar naturvetenskapliga ord med vardagsord, i denna underkategoriåterfinns främst på en av skolorna och då i ämnet kemi, när eleverna arbetade med ämnesområdet organiska syror. Genom att namnge de organiska syrorna med både vetenskapliga och vardagligt språk ger läraren eleverna möjligheter att se sambandet mellan det kemins ordval, askorbinsyra, och det ordval som görs i vardagen, C-vitamin.

Previous research has shown an increased student interest and enhanced learning when the school science content is related to other familiar contexts. This is particularly evident in intervention studies, which aim to integrate the school science content with students’ everyday life. In this article, we analyse how teachers, in authentic situations, relate science content presented in lesson introductions to other contexts such as everyday life or other school subjects. The data consists of observations of lesson introductions in grade nine, from six different schools, in all eight hours of video recordings. The results point to that teachers adopt a variety of ways in order to integrate the science content to other contexts, such as relating to students’ everyday life, to different language perspectives or to other school subjects and thereby initiate hybrid contexts. However, the results indicate that the teachers in this study initiate hybrid contexts to a low extent and seemingly ad hoc, in the moment. It is likely to believe that if students are to benefit from contextualization as a means for enhancing interest and learning, learning activities need to relate science content to other relevant contexts in a more comprehensive way. © 2021 University of Oslo, Norwegian Centre for Science Education. All rights reserved.

Previous research studies have pointed to the benefits of involving students’ everyday life experiences for enhanced learning and positive attitudes towards school science. This study explores in what ways teachers relate other contexts to the school science context as a means to facilitate the negotiation of the presented scientific content. This means that we explore how teachers introduce other societal contexts (e.g. references to media or a narrative) and by that create hybrid contexts when introducing their science lessons. In all, 490 minutes of lesson introduction in Swedish grade nine classes were analyzed. The results reveal that the number of situations where the teachers created hybrid contexts was low, only 67 situations. However, if categorizing the situations these could be referred into five main categories, media, narratives, everyday-life experiences, linguistic references and other school subjects. The most common way to use hybrid contexts was to refer to every-day life. Only two references to actual topics in media were found indicating that the lesson introductions are far from considering the relation between science, news reporting and current novelties. However, the most striking results from this study are the absence of other contexts and hybrid contexts when introducing the science content.

A large challenge in most western schools is to enhance and stimulate students’ engagement and motivation to learn science. The lack of interest is evident in several large-scale studies where students express negative attitudes towards learning science. However, Hässler and Hoffman (2000) show that the issue of interest is more complex, as the students in their study expressed negative attitudes towards school science but appeared positive towards science in a popular and practical context. Furthermore, Cerinin et al  (2003) concluded an increased interest for science education among students when teaching also includes societal references and connections to students’ everyday lives. This means that teachers need to take into consideration also other contexts than the school science context and by that create hybrid contexts as a resource for science learning. The question is to what extent and in what ways science teachers in lower secondary school manage to involve other contexts when introducing science lessons. In this study we are therefore interested in exploring in what ways teachers employ and relate other contexts to the school science context in order to facilitate the negotiation of the science content. This means that we explore how teachers introduce other societal contexts such as for example references to media or a narrative when introducing their science lessons and by that create hybrid contexts. The notion of hybrid contexts is inspired by Kambrelis and Wehunt (2012) who describe hybrid discourses as teachers’ use of words and expressions that may belong to different discourses depending on the framing. This study instead aims to identify situations where teachers use not only words and expressions outside the science discourse but also introduce other contexts than school science and by that create hybrid contexts. © 2016 by Research Centre on Child Studies (CIEC)

It has earlier been shown on a group level that it is difficult for 9th grade students (15-16 years old) in a Swedish school to understand how water is transported in the human body. The detailed analysis of five Swedish students in the 9th and final year of compulsory school concerning their ideas about water transportation is presented here. The empirical data consists of drawings, answers to a questionnaire with both open ended and multiple-choice questions, and student interviews. The analysis shows that all the students struggle to produce explanations involving the three organ systems: digestive, blood and excretion systems and they seem to use a variety of explanatory models as basis for their reasoning. Possible ways of understanding this are discussed together with implications for future teaching

Analyses of students’ ideas about the organ system in the human body and how these relate to their thoughts about living a healthy life are presented. The study concerns 9th grade students (15/16 years) in Sweden. The empirical data consists of drawings and answers to written questions, both open and multiple-choice, and interviews with students and teachers. Comparing explanations of a well known scenario (eating a sandwich) to other that are less often discussed (taking a painkiller and drinking water) we report that it is difficult for the students to transfer knowledge of pathways in the digestive system shown in explanations of the sandwich-scenario to the other scenarios. Most difficulties are shown for explanations of the drinking of water, since these explanations require connection of three different organ systems . More than half of the interviewed students believed that there is nutritious substance in water, but most of them were unable to specify what it would be. The students with the most developed understanding of the painkiller pathway were satisfied with taking medical substances to elude pain, and were not interested in other alternatives. © 2012, European Journal of Health and Biology Education

In this paper we focus on how South African students’ ideas about the human body are constituted in their descriptions of three different scenarios involving the pathway of a sandwich, a painkiller and a glass of water through the body. In particular, we have studied the way in which the students transferred ideas between the sandwich and the painkiller compared with the students' ability to explain the water pathway. The study surveyed 161 ninth-grade students in five different schools in South Africa. Data collection methods used were: drawings, written questions (open-ended items) and interviews with selected students. The questions emerged from the three scenarios—what happens in the body when you eat a sandwich, swallow a painkiller and drink a glass of water. We report that it is difficult for the students to transfer knowledge of the digestive system horizontally from the sandwich scenario to descriptions of the painkiller and water scenarios. The integration of three organ systems (digestive, circulatory and excretory) to describe the water scenario was even more difficult for the students than the horizontal transfer from the sandwich scenario. The students also showed a diversity of non-scientific descriptions, especially concerning the water scenario. The paper discusses why a large percentage of the students (∼50%) included non-scientific ideas in their decriptions of the water scenario.

In both Sweden and South Africa, the science curriculum for the secondary level emphasizes learning about the functioning of the human body. Both curricula also emphasize the importance of living a healthy life. In this paper the focus is on how students’ ideas about the human body are constituted in explanations of three different scenarios, and in what way the students are transferring explanations between these scenarios. The study surveyed 161 9th grade students in five different schools in South Africa, and discusses the results in perspective of a previous study involving 88 students in Sweden. In both countries issues about body and health are discussed in several different subjects in school. The same data collection methods were used in both countries: drawings, written questions (open-ended and multiple-choice items), and interviews with selected students. The questions emerge from three scenarios: what happens in the body when you eat an open sandwich, drink water, and swallow a painkiller. We report that it is difficult for the students to horizontally transfer knowledge of the digestive system to other less well-known scenarios. In comparing the use of three systems in the painkiller-scenario to the horizontal transfer between the sandwich- and the painkiller-scenarios we see that the difference is much less pronounced in South African results compared to the Swedish study. There are more similarities than differences between the results of this South Africa study and results obtained in Europe, but there are also differences especially with regard to non-scientific ideas about the human body.

In both Sweden and South Africa, the science curriculum for the secondary level emphasizes learning about the functioning of the human body. Both curricula also emphasize the importance of living a healthy life. In this paper the focus is on how students’ ideas about the human body are constituted in explanations of three different scenarios, and in what way the students are transferring explanations between these scenarios. The study surveyed 161 9th grade students in five different schools in South Africa, and discusses the results in perspective of a previous study involving 88 students in Sweden. In both countries issues about body and health are discussed in several different subjects in school. The same data collection methods were used in both countries: drawings, written questions (open-ended and multiple-choice items), and interviews with selected students. The questions emerge from three scenarios: what happens in the body when you eat an open sandwich, drink water, and swallow a painkiller. We report that it is difficult for the students to horizontally transfer knowledge of the digestive system to other less well-known scenarios. In comparing the use of three systems in the painkiller-scenario to the horizontal transfer between the sandwichand the painkiller-scenarios we see that the difference is much less pronounced in South African results compared to the Swedish study. There are more similarities than differences between the results of this South Africa study and results obtained in Europe, but there are also differences especially with regard to non-scientific ideas about the human body.

In 2017, a regional cooperation project was initiated with four municipalities and Halmstad University, called From Great to Excellence (FGTE), that aimed at reducing the gap between children/pupils capacity and performance. The project is planned to run for five years, and participants are persons active in schools and preschools at different levels within the school practice. Within the FGTE project, the participants perform different development projects in cooperation across the municipal boundaries, where they act as critical friends for each other in order to drive each project forward. Parallel with these activities, follow-up research on the project is conducted that focuses on different parts of the collaborative process. In this study we have concentrated on the participants' work with their respective research processes. The overall aim is to investigate the way in which research questions- and the ability to answer these - are developed by the participants through collaborative projects across municipal boundaries. The question we ask is "How does a (research-) question change through a collaborative process?" School development projects are carried out both at national and international level (e. g. Sales, Moliner & Amat, 2017; Adolfsson & Håkansson, 2015). In this study, the focus is both on regional cooperation and more specifically on the research questions of the participating groups.

Theoretical framework

The theoretical framework in this study is situated within the socio-cultural field, since much of the focus is around the collaboration between the participants. Conversation is an arena for developing knowledge and by supporting and challenging each other's pronounced thoughts, prerequisites for development of knowledge are given (Vygotsky, 1978).

Methodological design

The empirical material for the present study consists partly of the work material from a workshop where the participants' research questions were processed, partly by the participants' final products at the end of their development projects, which was a project report and a poster per project group. The material has mainly been analyzed based on a content analysis perspective (Danielsson, 2017; Denzin & Lincoln, 2003).

Expected conclusions/findings

The analysis is not yet complete, but preliminary results show that the research questions in the projects are not fully answered by the participants. On the other hand, the research questions seems to become more sharp when people from other municipalities are involved in working with the them. It also appears to be problematic to relate to overall, relatively abstract questions, and to make them tangible to their own school practice.                     

Relevance to Nordic educational research

Through this study, we want to highlight the potential for improvement work in preschool and school practice which lies in developing school activities through a regional cooperation project. This, we mean, are of utmost relevance to Swedish/Nordic as well as international research fields within education.

References

Adolfsson, C-H., & Håkansson, J.  (2015). Lärande skolor och förskolor i Kalmar kommun - Forskning och lokalt skolutvecklingsarbete i samspel. Rapport. Linnéuniversitet

Danielsson, E. (2017). Vetenskaplig teori och metod: från idé till examination inom omvårdnad. Henricson, M. (red.) (Andra upplagan). Lund: Studentlitteratur AB.

Denzin,  N.  K.,  &  Lincoln,  Y.  S.  (Eds.).  (2003).  Collecting  and interpreting  qualitative  materials (2nd  ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE

Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. M. Cole, Ed.Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Sales, A., Moliner, L., & Amat, A. F. (2017). Collaborative professional development for distributed teacher leadership towards school change. School Leadership & Management Formerly School Organisation. VOL. 37, NO. 3, 254–266

Research topic/aim: The focus of this study is how professional research questions work as information between different levels across the school organization. The different questions aim to develop the children and students’ knowledge through the teachers and headmaster’s capacity building in a collaboration project. These questions are processed in a hierarchy from the regional overarching question, the municipalities’ to interpret the overarching question to a professional research questions and finally the schools create concrete professional research questions. At the school level are the final question processed and researched.  

Theoretical framework: The project is based on how to steer an organist through professional research question. Leadership is important and a challenge in a changing process in an organization (eg. Kotter, 1995). Moreover, a good communication between the participants are important if it shall be a development in the organization (eg. Harris & Jones 2015; Leithwood et al. 2017). 

The empirical data in this study are analyzed thought two theoretical frameworks in the border between the socio-cultural and the socio- constructivism. Within the socio-cultural field, since much of the focus is around participant in the school collaboration (Hornscheidt & Landqvist 2014, Vygotsky, 1978). However, the percipients must construct their understanding through interactions with the outside world (Ausubel, 1968; Leach & Scott, 2003; Piaget, 1964), when they interpret the question from the regional and municipality level. 

Methodology/research design: Empirical data was the focus of the meeting with the region and municipality. The participants’ final reports and final posters were collected at school level.  Some of the data from meetings where schools collaborated with their critical friends were recorded and transcribed. All the questions on the tree (regional, municipal, school) different level were analyzed, and the issues in questions from the hierarchically high to the low levels were considered. This paper is an analysis from the first year of a 5-year project. It provides a longitudinal study of a project with yearly reports. Some results from year two will be presented at the conference 

Findings: Findings demonstrate ambitious questions without clear definitions and focus on outcomes. Discussions between the various groups involved in the research demonstrates the need for precise clarifications and definitions in expression and communication. The result is that the question from the municipality steering committees focuses on an inventory of situation in the various municipality schools. Another point of view is that the perspective of the students’ perspectives is missing in the questions in most of the groups. The schools and preschool level are also more focused on their own practice, than the question that were given from the hierarchy above them. 

Relevance to Nordic educational research: The aim in the study is to develop the knowledge among the teachers so that they can support every child and student to even more develop their capacity to perform in the school, from good to better. The overall aim is to develop the schools through collaboration between municipality’s schools in the region.

This paper is based on an interest in increasing the understanding of trends regarding Swedish students ́ knowledge in science by exploring the relation between results of large-scale studies (PISA and TIMSS) and how science teaching and learning are constituted in different school environments. Previous large scale studies point to an explicit downward trend in Swedish students ́ performances in science over the last decade. Our analyses indicate that a reinforced knowledge segregation of Swedish schools and declining results among low- and mid-ranged performers explains a main part of the trend. In this paper we analyze how this trend could be related to and visible in different activities in a science classroom perspective in Sweden today. This means to analyze the use of language and science classroom discourse, in theoretical and practical parts of the classroom activities. In addition, it involves exploring different school areas which have either a large proportions of high achievers or low performers or areas that experienced a substantial improvement or decline during this period. The purpose is to analyze the empirical material which comprises examples of teaching and learning sequences, in a selection of these different schools areas. Our expectations are to increase the understanding of how national trends from large-scale studies are constituted and become explicit, distinguish success and decline factors and identify suggestions of practical action programs for science teaching.

Research topic/aim

In 2017, a regional cooperation project was initiated with four municipalities and Halmstad University, called From Great to Excellence (FGTE). The project is planned to run for five years, and participants are persons active in schools and preschools at different levels within the school practice. Within the FGTE project, the participants perform different development projects in cooperation across the municipal boundaries, where they act as critical friends for each other in order to drive each project forward (see e.g. Sales, Moliner, & Amat, 2017). In this study we have focus on the utilization of knowledge acquired in groups in participants own school context. The question we ask is “How is transfer of knowledge from group work to own practice perceived by participants participating in a course about research methodology?  

Theoretical framework

The theoretical framework in this study is situated within the socio-cultural field, since much of the focus is around the collaboration between the participants. Conversation is an arena for developing knowledge and by supporting and challenging each other's pronounced thoughts, prerequisites for development of knowledge are given (Vygotsky, 1978).

Methodological design

The empirical material for the present study consists of a questionnaire disseminated to the participants after they had completed the course. A total number of 57 questionnaires were collected which counts for about 65-70 percent of the total number of participants. The questionnaires were analyzed with SPSS factor analysis to detect underlying variables.

Expected conclusions/findings

Preliminary results show that, while expecting quite the opposite, by using factor analysis, a strong negative relation between, on one hand, the variable “the usage of research methodology has developed in the group”, and on the other hand, the variables “I have increased my ability to use new analytical concepts in my practise and  “I have increased knowledge in evaluating my own practice”. Meaning that the participants do not feel they, themselves, have learned more about the use of scientific methods relating to their own practice. While the group is progressing, their own learning has been put back.

Relevance to Nordic educational research

Through this study, we want to highlight the potential for improvement work in preschool and school practice which lies in developing school activities through a regional cooperation project. This, we mean, are of utmost relevance to Swedish/Nordic as well as international research fields within education.

References

Danielsson, E. (2017). Vetenskaplig teori och metod: från idé till examination inom omvårdnad. Henricson, M. (red.) (Andra upplagan). Lund: Studentlitteratur AB.

Tryfos, P. (1996). Sampling methods for applied research: text and cases. New York: Wiley.

Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. M. Cole, Ed.Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Sales, A., Moliner, L., & Amat, A. F. (2017). Collaborative professional development for distributed teacher leadership towards school change. School Leadership & Management Formerly School Organisation. VOL. 37, NO. 3, 254–266

Digital media and adolescents is an emotive issue of pedagogy and Youth Studies. However, there is a lack of empirical studies on the impacts of imaginaries of pupils respectively the way how they visualize being in a technology enhanced classroom and research on the ethical dilemma connected to it (cp. Livingstone 2009). We investigate such impacts in terms of the effects of gazes, creating pedagogically desirable or undesirable relations.

The ideal of a childhood and youth free from the influences of digital media is still alive, though it is deeply thwarted by reality, as adolescents are surrounded by media right from the birth and they extensively use it in many different ways. (Cp. http://www.soi2014.se/) As a rather short-circuited consequence they are widely regarded as “competent” users of, and even as pioneers in using digital media. (Cp. Carlsson 2010, Livingstone & Bovill 2001, et al.) This “competence” is extensively used in school by using PCs as a source of information and for ICT-enhanced learning (evaluation of the Swedish campaign “one PC per pupil” see: Fleischer 2013).

At the same time, the fast technological development of new digital means and applications leads to a successively reduced control of the contacts of the kids with digital media. There is thus a rather fragile pedagogical frame of the indication of emancipative potentials of digital media. (Cp. Ofcom 2012) This is a problem as there is some evidence that the inventiveness and creativity of the use of digital media by young people is rather restricted; we meet a strong merchandised way of consuming media applications (Livingstone 2009). Furthermore, adolescents easily expose or unmask a person or themselves e.g. in terms of cyberbullying. Beside the competent, routinized and creative use of digital media, there is thus a certain amount of misuse or uncontrolled use of it.

In cooperation with the project “Global Perspectives on Learning and Development with Digital Video Editing Media” (see: digitmed.wordpress.com), our qualitative empirical analyses focus the course and interchange of the gazes of pupils in school creating “visual cultures”, in which social in- and exclusions take place and narratives and learning unfold. These “visual cultures” get a digital dimension by being edited as a film. Theoretically, we stick to the growing interest for the “gaze” in digital contexts (Vlieghe 2011, Friesen et al. 2009 et al.) translating the consciously as well as unconsciously experienced field of tension real “gazes” generate (cp. Sartre 2003, Lacan 1981, Foucault 1999) to virtual contexts.

In her “camera-ethnographic” approach Mohn (2006) examines possible interactional patterns, interdependencies and entanglements etc. of the gazes within video-graphical social research. 

Methods and Aims

The Seeing Glasses are spectacles with an inbuilt digital, video and audio recording camera. It is a new way of collecting data within Youth Studies about the contexts on which the wearers of the glasses set their gazes, as well as about reciprocating gazes. During one week pupils of a 9^th grade wear the Seeing Glasses during the school lessons (in Sweden). Then, the pupils edit the film material in order to create films about `our life at school´. A stationary camera and participating observations document the classroom context.

In our studies we will analyze the course of attention of the youngsters, captured by the Seeing Glasses and investigate their visualizations of eye contacts in editing the film material, recorded by the stationery camera and by participating observation in terms of the mis-én-scenes, and on the educational work connected to it. By doing this, the analytical tools of Camera Ethnography will be used, put at stake and further developed.

Research indicates, that despite increased access and improved technical arte­facts, few teachers have integrated ICT in the curriculum in a way that leads to significant changes in classroom practice. This paper reports on a project where 19 preservice teachers were provided with a reflective tool (T-CoRe) in order to systematically encourage reflection on why and how to use digital technologies in their science teaching. The project aimed to capture and understand aspects of preservice teachers TPACK while planning for teaching particular science topic. The results indicate that working with the T-CoRe has the potential of helping preservice teachers conceptualise their TPACK and make explicit the different dimensions of, and links between, knowledge of content, teaching, and learning about a topic through the use of digital technologies.

In the wake of a Swedish negative trend in international school measurements (for example PISA; OECD, 2013) during a ten-year period (2006-2015), many Swedish municipalities felt the urge to make substantial changes to improve the outcomes of student success. Consequently, several development projects throughout the country were implemented. One such initiative was “From Great to Excellent” (here further referred to as FGTE); a three-year long collaboration project carried out between four Swedish municipalities and a small Swedish university. The main purpose with FGTE was to reduce the gap between the student’s potential (what they could achieve) and their actual school achievement. This overall purpose referred to all forms of schooling (pre-school, primary school, (upper) secondary school and adult education), which face the similar kind of challenge in students’ ability to reach their optimal capacity and goal fulfillment in learning, hence the project participants came from three school levels: pre-school, primary school and (upper) secondary school and adult education. Furthermore, the project's organization consisted of a steering group (with people in leading positions from the participating municipalities), an operational process group (with school representatives from the participating municipalities), and a research group (consisting of three researchers from a small Swedish university). In order to enable progression and create conditions for change, the project participants consisted of different kinds of functions within the schools, such as school leaders, policymakers, and practitioners, so not just teachers.

Research points to the beneficial aspects of school-to-school collaboration in school improvement (Ainscow et al., 2006; Sammons et al., 2007; Cox-Petersen, 2011; Muijs et al., 2011; Muijs, 2015; Hargreaves & O’Connor, 2017). For example, according to Hargreaves and O’Connor, (2017) there is evidence that collaborative relationships benefit schools and Cox-Petersen (2011) indicate that there are great many benefits of creating partnerships among schools, businesses, universities, families, and other community groups, as well as many examples of professional partnerships to enhance the education of. Partnerships in education in the FGTE project emphasize the collaboration between schools, rather than on businesses, families, and other community groups (social contracts).  

This presentation is drawn from our chapter; Coming to Terms with Feedback from Critical Friends: Reflections of Risks in a Swedish Regional Collaboration Project, in a forthcoming book by Springer about risks in partnership. In our chapter we discuss the difficulties that arise when professionals from separate school organizations and from different hierarchical levels within these organizations come together in joint collaborative development work, guided by two questions: 1). What distinguishes the partnerships in the FGTE project between the four municipalities regarding their individual research questions? and 2). What type of risks present themselves in the FGTE project, in regard to the four municipalities as well as to the small university? The aim of this presentation is to recaptualise and summarize the primary results of the collaboration that developed within the FGTE project, to shed some light on what partnerships in education could mean in terms of obstacles and opportunities and its potential implications for school improvement.

The study at hand was conducted within a regional collaboration project named “From Great to Excellent” (FGTE), carried out between four Swedish municipalities and a small Swedish university. The FGTE project, highly influenced by a prior Canadian project of the same name, was a school development project grounded in an analytical approach involving all school levels. The basic idea in FGTE was that organisations learn from each other and make each other better, and where research is added, quality follows. Initially, each municipality had their own development focus and between them, they agreed on a number of priority professional research areas. Within the project, the participants were divided into groups where some served as so called “hosts” and some served as so called “critical friends”. During the FGTE project, the critical friends and the hosts worked together to solve different development projects at different school levels. Simultaneously, the participants were undertaking a course in analytical competence arranged by the university with the purpose of enhancing joint competence. The questions addressed here are closely connected to the notion of risk in partnerships in education. Firstly, there were four different municipalities operating on three school levels, each with individual research and/or development focus for their respective school level. Secondly, the participants from the municipalities undertook a university course in analytical competence. Critical questions to express were: What distinguishes the partnerships in the FGTE project between the four municipalities regarding their individual development projects? What type of risks present themselves in the FGTE project, in regard to the four municipalities as well as to the small university? In this chapter, we will critically examine how these development projects unfold in the groups within the duration of the FGTE project. Results show that difficulties arise when professionals from different organizations and different hierarchical levels within these organizations come together in joint collaboration work. In addition, results also showed that the individual development projects that the different schools worked on within the project, shifted in focus during the project.

This study investigated students’ meaning-making of polymeric concepts during modelling and discuss students’ creation of visible representations in chemistry. The analysis combines a phenomenographic and social semiotic approach and leads to the finding and description of 21 different meaning-making processes. We refer to meaning-making as the outcome of translative communication through representations, discerned by students, where the collective meaning of created representations that build on each other constitutes the meaning as a whole. The study took place in three Swedish upper secondary chemistry classes. Data were collected from eight groups of 3–4 students (n = 30). Video, audio recordings and photos taken during modelling were analysed to investigate students’ meaning-making during the modelling process. The results show translative changes between and within semiotic resources, indicating meaning for students’ learning of polymeric concepts. Additionally, the representations produced during modelling were essential resources connecting the submicro and macro levels by creating a ‘bridge’ between levels. The results show that the modelling activities practised by all groups were multimodal. The study acknowledges that teachers can use the social semiotic lens as a tool to evaluate students’ modelling in addition to the importance of translative processes during modelling. © 2023 The Royal Society of Chemistry.

Recent years changes have taken place in European and Swedish schools. The classroom situation has in many schools changed from single-lingual to multilingual. A larger number of students in Sweden are in the beginning of speaking Swedish but who participate in the same teaching as native speakers. The science disciplines, primarily chemistry, are experienced as difficult by many students because chemistry is abstract and contain many subject-specific concepts. It is a great challenge for teachers to offer teaching adapted to all students regardless of first language.

This study intends to investigate how a student-active approach to representations and models in chemistry might be a way to develop the scientific language of second language learners. Active student approach to  properties of polymers is a concrete way to visualize and discuss chemical bonding, often perceived abstract otherwise. The study is conducted in a multilingual class, with eight different first languages represented, in upper secondary school in Sweden. The teacher and majority of the students speak Swedish as their first language. Since several languages are represented students cannot use code switching or translanguaging when learning chemistry, to the same extent as in bilingual contexts. In this study, learning is approached as a sociocultural activity focusing on how scientific language develop through interaction with others. Data is collected from classroom practices using audio and video recordings and followed up with semi-structured interviews. Language is analysed from the perspective of adequate scientific language and correct use and understanding of subject-specific concepts using a thematic coding approach. To increase validity intra-rater reliability are used. As the amount of research on how second-language learners use subject specific language while working with models and representations in chemistry is limited, this study might provide useful information about new strategies to improve scientific language of second language learners.

This study investigated how modeling in chemistry affect second language learners’ descriptions of polymeric concepts. The aim was to investigate how chemistry discussions mediated by representations, contribute to second language students’ development in the language of chemistry. The study took place in three multilingual upper secondary classes. Participating students were (n = 16) second language learners and (n = 14) first language learners. There were in total eight different first languages represented. Data comprised polymeric concept descriptions, audio recordings, and photos taken during modeling. The concept descriptions were analyzed by an inductive content analysis which was then used for a deductive analysis of the modeling-activity. The results show that 65% of second language learners concept descriptions showed an increased clarity, and 45% showed increased use of chemical concepts after the modeling-activity. This study highlights how students in a multilingual context develop their language of chemistry by discussing chemistry scaffolded by representations. The results show that second language learners in a multilingual context benefited from the modeling-activity. As such, the study acknowledges that modeling contexts can be used in teacher education, both in-service and pre-service, to highlight the importance of the role of representations when teaching in the multilingual context.

De senaste åren har förändringar skett i svenska skolor. Klassrumssituationen har på många skolor förändrats från en- eller tvåspråkig till flerspråkig. Ett större antal elever i Sverige har begränsad kunskap i svenska men deltar i samma undervisning och på samma villkor, som elever som har svenska som förstaspråk. De naturvetenskapliga disciplinerna, främst kemi upplevs av många elever som svåra då kemi är abstrakt och innehåller många ämnesspecifika begrepp. Detta innebär en stor utmaning för lärare att erbjuda undervisning anpassad till alla elever oavsett modersmål. 

Denna studie har för avsikt att undersöka den naturvetenskapliga begrepps- och språkutvecklingen hos elever som har svenska som andraspråk och som deltar i ett modellbaserat lärande i det flerspråkiga sammanhanget. Studien har genomförts i tre olika klasser, i totalt åtta flerspråkiga grupper med 3-4 deltagande elever per grupp och undervisningen har handlat om polymerer och polymerers egenskaper. I studien finns åtta olika förstaspråk representerade. Undervisande lärare och majoriteten av eleverna har svenska som förstaspråk. I studien ses lärande som en sociokulturell aktivitet med fokus på hur naturvetenskapligt språk utvecklas genom interaktion med andra. Vid datainsamlingen användes olika metoder. För att undersöka elevernas förståelse för relevanta ämnesspecifika begrepp svarade eleverna på en begreppsenkät före, under och efter klassrumsaktiviteterna. Ytterligare data samlades in från elevdiskussionerna med hjälp av ljud- och videoinspelningar. Enkätsvaren och gruppdiskussionerna har analyserats utifrån elevernas begreppsförståelse, begreppsanvändning samt naturvetenskaplig språkutveckling. Studiens preliminära resultat visar på att majoriteten av deltagande elever som har svenska som andraspråk uppvisar en progression i begreppsförståelse, begreppsanvändning samt naturvetenskapligt språk inom undersökt ämnesområde, vid en modellbaserad undervisning. 

Då forskning kring huruvida elever, i det flerspråkiga sammanhanget, utvecklar sitt naturvetenskapliga språk vid modellbaserad undervisning är begränsad, kan denna studie ge användbar information huruvida modellbaserat lärande i kemi kan vara ett undervisningssätt för att förbättra naturvetenskaplig begrepps- samt språkutveckling hos elever med svenska som andraspråk.

This study focuses on if and how second language learners' explanations of polymeric concepts and scientific language in chemistry develop through Modelling Based Teaching in a multilingual context. The study is conducted in three multilingual classes, with eight different first languages represented, in an upper secondary school in Sweden. In the theoretical framework of Modelling-based Teaching in science education, MBT, along with this study, models are understood as epistemic artefacts, related to many of the scientific practices in which chemistry argumentation is an essential part of the activity (J. K. Gilbert & Justi, 2016). Previous studies have shown that conducting a more student-active approach in chemistry teaching leads to the development of students' use of scientific language (Abir & Dori, 2013; Ehdwall & Wickman, 2018).

 In addition to MBT enabling a student-communicative approach to chemistry, MBT is also multimodal. Students' explanatory models can be expressed in many ways. When students fail to verbally express their thoughts about a scientific phenomenon, they can use non-verbal representations such as drawings, concrete models, or gestures to support their argumentation (Gilbert & Justi, 2016). Studies show that nonverbal representations, in modelling, are common when students attempt to express their ideas more clearly, by substituting or explaining specific scientific vocabulary (Mendonça & Justi, 2013). These aspects justify the use of MBT in a multilingual teaching situation. Concerning students who are not taught in their first language and who have not yet developed their second language or scientific language corresponding to the level of the teaching, non-verbal argumentation can be of great help to understand processes, contexts, and concepts and to develop a scientific language. The result indicates that students with Swedish as a second language in a multilingual context benefit from the MBT-activity in developing explanations of concepts and scientific language.