In this paper, I discuss how using two different data collection methods affect the outcomes of research related to parents’ views on mathematics education. The methods were online surveys and photo-elicitation interviews. The impact of these methods on the outcomes of the study is described using Bruner’s narrative construction. Although the data collection methods enabled parents to describe, share and discuss their children’s engagement in mathematics activities at home and in early childhood institutions, the contexts in which the narratives were produced gave different insights into individual and societal views. Reflections on how the methods provide a foundation for discussions about how data collection can affect what can be said about parents’ knowledge, experiences and views. This has implications for future research on parents’ views about mathematics education for young children.

Over the last 20 years systematic quality work has become the main tool for developing Swedish schools (Håkansson & Adolfson, 2022). According to the Education Act (2010:800), quality work – at the local educational authority level as well as in the schools themselves – should be conducted in a systematic and continuous way, with respect to planning, follow-up, analyses, and actions taken to develop education. By continuous assessments and evaluations, the goal of the systematic quality work is to identify and address issues that need improvement for students to achieve the educational goals (Swedish National Agency for Education, 2012a). A review of the literature reveals the problematic aspects of evaluation practices and quality management, such as the risk to focus on what is measurable rather than what is desirable as well as the diverse definitions of quality (Lundström, 2015). However, what the local quality systems consist of, how they have been designed, and what practices and perceptions of quality they entail is less understood.

Previous research has primarily focused on individual schools’ quality work (Håkansson, 2013; Jarl, et al., 2017) , while less attention has been paid to the way the local educational authorities conduct systematic quality work. Thus, the aim of this study is to fill this knowledge gap by investigating how the ideas of systematic quality work in the Swedish Education Act's requirements are interpreted, translated, and materialized at the local education authority level.

The following research questions will guide our study:

1. How do local educational authorities interpret and translate the systematic quality work regulations and requirements in the Education Act?

2. How do these interpretations och translations materialize in the local quality work practices?

Theoretically we approach the phenomena of systematic quality management within the Swedish school sector from an organizing (Czarniawska, 2014) and practice-oriented perspective (Gherardi, 2019; Nicolini, 2009; 2012). These theoretical perspectives provide us a framework to analyse how the institutionalized ideas (as mental images that are well spread within the society) of systematic quality management - through authorities, policies, regulations, and quality models - are translated and materialized (Czarniawska & Joerges, 1996) into the local quality work organization and practices. The latter refers to the practices of doing and saying something related to the ideas of systematic quality management in different social contexts and time (Gherardi, 2019; Nicolini, 2009; 2012). Although the national guidelines involve the entire school system, these are interpreted, translated, and materialized by actors operating in a local context, which means that quality is understood in different ways and that the systematic quality work is conducted in different ways. An organizational perspective also includes aspects related to the tensions that arise when different interests and logics collide (for example between political, administrative, and professional interests and logics; see Czarniawska, 2014).

Methodology, Methods, Research Instruments or Sources UsedIn this project five Swedish municipalities have participated in a study of what systematic quality work means at a local education authority level and what practices materialize from the national regulations. At the heart of the study is the recognition that quality systems are locally designed to meet the national requirements, thereby allowing diverse interpretations and translations to occur.

The local education authorities can be understood as mediators, partly between state and municipal control, partly between needs and agendas at different levels in the chain of command. This understanding also characterizes the design of the study. The empirical data has been collected through three complementary methods: document studies, observations, and interviews. The document studies consist of analysing different central documents, e.g., quality reports, provided by the local education authorities covering the past two years. We have also observed meetings related to the systematic quality work (so called “quality-dialogues”). Besides the local education authorities, the key actors in these meetings were the principals, assistant principals, and teacher representatives of the school being followed up. 

The interviews were conducted with key persons in five different local Swedish education authorities individually by the authors. The duration of the interviews was approximately one hour, and they were conducted either face-to-face, via Zoom, or telephone. The interviews were based on an interview guide including questions about the participants’ role, their experiences, and activities in relation to the systematic quality work, the expected and actual effects, as well as challenges and potential for improvement of systematic quality work. The interviews were recorded with informed consent and were later transcribed verbatim.

All the research material described above is now gathered and will be analysed during the Spring 2023. As a tool for data analyses, we will apply Bacchi´s (2012) method “What is the problem represented to be?”.

Conclusions, Expected Outcomes or FindingsEqual education for all is includes three fundamental aspects: equal access to education, equal quality of education and the compensatory nature of education (Swedish National Agency for Education, 2012b). All students should receive an equivalent education, regardless of the area they live in, the socio-economic conditions they come from, or their functional variations. But study after study shows that Swedish students' schooling is not equal, and that who you are and where you live play a decisive role in the quality of the education you receive. Many of the last decade's school policy reforms and targeted initiatives have had as their overarching goal to address this lack of equality, so far with few concrete results. In order to break this trend, there has been an increasing focus on the local educational authorities’ responsibility for the individual school's shortcomings, quality, and development. Furthermore, lack of equality is a problem within rather than between different local educational authorities. Although there is paucity of research, the limited results show that schools are often isolated with their problems and that there is a lack of supportive structures and a functional systematic quality work (Jarl, et al., 2017; Swedish Schools Inspectorate, 2021).

The paper will present results from the ongoing study, results that we believe will have relevance both in the Swedish, Nordic and in a wider European context. Through our investigation we will contribute knowledge regarding how the National Educational Act's requirements for systematic quality work are interpreted, translated, and materialized at the local level, and how this in turn shapes, promotes or hinders the quality work of individual schools.

The article discusses how ideas of reading enjoyment affect the practical and pedagogical practice through a project to promote reading at four Swedish preschools. Based on interviews and observations collected over a three-year period we highlight three areas where ideas about reading enjoyment are visualized in the teaching of literatur: literature, play, and learnig thorugh reading enjoyment. The stdy shows that access to literature alone does not necessarily lead to children's voluntary reading unless preschool teachers also take an active initiative. Likewise, play can be a pleasurable way to start reading if the adults provide some guidane. The study also notices a discrepancy between preschool teachers' ideas of reading enjoyment and learning, which may result in the option out of voluntary reading unless it is explicitly supported in the policy docuemnts. Measures in the form of pedagocial education, and goals concerning literary didactics therein are proposed. 

Det råder delade meningar om digitaliseringen och AI:s allt större utrymme iskolan. Inte sällan leder det till en tämligen polariserad debatt där mänskligavärden ställs mot ekonomiska. I föreliggande artikel problematiseras detta utrymme med utgångspunkt i specialpedagogik, kopplat till tre övergripande teman:digitalisering, AI och maskininlärning och lärarrollen. De frågor som artikeln merspecifikt kretsar kring är: Vilka problem finns det med externa aktörer och enökad digitalisering inom det specialpedagogiska fältet? Vad händer med denspecialpedagogiska professionen i en skola som alltmer präglas av AI? Det är enexplorativ studie som tar sin utgångspunkt i ett Foucault-inspirerat angreppssättför att analysera de konsekvenser som AIed har inom utbildningsområdet.Materialet består av intervjuer, tidningsartiklar, inslag från SvT och företagenshemsidor och rapporter. Resultaten pekar mot att EdTech-industrin får konsekvenser för lärarrollen, inte minst i samband med den specialpedagogiskaprofessionen. I många avseenden är det oklart vem – skolan, forskningen ellerföretagen – som styr vad som händer på såväl policynivå som i det individuellaklassrummet och för den enskilda individen. Det väcker i sin tur en rad frågorkring AI och etik.

This presentation highlights the methodological part of a doctoral project which intends to study cultural conceptions of the student among educators within teacher training for early childhood education (TTECE). The presentation aims to discuss the insider and outsider position occupied by the researcher in critical ethnographic research in order to contribute to the discussion about critical theory and critically oriented studies in a Nordic context. When and why does it become a challenge to be an insider? Where, when and how are boundaries set up between the researcher and the research subjects? When does such boundaries become limiting and when do they provide opportunities? What does being an active part of the empirical production in critical ethnography (CE) imply for the research? 

CE is a theory-informed methodological approach which, in this doctoral project, departs from a pragmatic and critical perspective in which higher education is, or should be, understood as a practice built upon deliberative democracy and communicative action as important prerequisites for creating good education for all (Habermas, 1996;Englund, 2008). The fundamental purpose of CE is to question what becomes normalized within a field of study and to consider, or suggest alternatives to, what appears given or natural in such a field (Thomas, 1993;Madison, 2012). The critical approach of CE provides the researcher with a possibility to take an active part in the field, to influence it in certain directions and to question culturally accepted norms within it. Simultaneously, the informants are continuously invited to participate in and contribute to the creation and interpretation of the empirical material. 

The empirical material was collected during a five-month long fieldwork at a Swedish university that provides TTECE. Data was gathered through participant observations of formal and informal every-day collegial work, semi-structured conversations and group-sessions. The empirical material consists of fieldnotes, transcripts from recorded conversations, documents and webpages. 

Being an insider turned out to be an advantage in relation to understanding the circumstances of educators’ sayings and doings, to access the field of study and to gain trust from the informants. At the same time, to assume the role as an outsider can be preferred in some situations due to e.g. the degree of commitment at the field. Being open and transparent with my interpretations of the empirical material has enabled me to have discussions with the informants in a way which have given the informants opportunities to provide more nuanced interpretations. In some sense, seemingly insignificant situations puts the insider/outsider position into play and affects the investigation and its results. To balance the insider/outsider position requires a continuous pursuit of reflexivity through every part of the research process.

Englund, T. (2008) The university as an encounter for deliberative communication, Creating cultural citizenship and professional responsibility. Utbildning & Demokrati, 17(2), 97-114

Habermas, J.(1996). Kommunikativt handlande: texter om språk, rationalitet och samhälle. (2. uppl.) Göteborg: Daidalos.

Madison, D.(2012). Critical ethnography- method, ethics, and performance. SAGE

Thomas, J.(1993). Doing critical ethnography. Newbury Park: Sage.

Avhopp från doktorandstudier är ett problem för universitet över hela världen och bör undvikas av flera skäl. Avhopp innebär personliga svårigheter och nederlag för doktoranden, handledare, examinator, institutionen, fakulteten och universitetet. Utöver oro och tidsförlust medför avhoppen kostnader och flera parter har därför intresse av ett framgångsrikt slutförande av doktorandstudierna. Tidigare forskning har pekat på att den främsta orsaken till avhopp är en dåligt fungerande relation mellan doktorand och handledare, och därför fokuserar vår studie speciellt på ickefungerande handledningsrelationer.  

Det är dock fortfarande oklart vad som orsakar ickefungerande handledningsrelationer, problem och konflikter. Doktorander hoppar ofta av sin utbildning utan att ge en förklaring (Sverdlik et al., 2018). För att summera problemet och kunskapsluckan så vet vi fortfarande inte vad som orsakar avhopp, dåliga relationer och konflikter mellan doktorander och handledare. Vi menar att handledare, behöver ökad förståelse för de bakomliggande orsakerna till avhopp och hur handledare kan bidra till en ömsesidig, pålitlig och robust handledningsrelation.

Syftet med studien är att klargöra orsaker till varför doktorander hoppar av sina forskarstudier. I syftet ingår att undersöka relationen mellan doktorand och handledare och ringa in vad som kan göras för att begränsa risken för avhopp. Syftet omfattar att lyfta fram vad som kännetecknar en solid och stödjande handledningsrelation enligt intervjupersonerna. I studien kartläggs både doktoranders och handledares perspektiv. Följande forskningsfrågor kommer att fokuseras:

RQ 1: vilka är orsakerna till att doktorander hoppar av?

RQ 2: vilka problem i doktorand- och handledarrelationen kan leda till avhopp?

RQ3: hur kan risken för avhopp begränsas?

RQ 4: vad kännetecknar en solid och stödjande handledningsrelation?

Data kommer att insamlas genom, en webbenkät till doktorander som hoppat av och handledare vid flera lärosäten. Uppföljande intervjuer på Zoom och/eller ansikte mot ansikte, med doktorander och handledare kommer också att genomföras.

Enkäterna kommer att vara webbaserade vari personuppgifter kommer att insamlas kring: kön, ålder, år för avhopp, antal terminer i doktorsutbildningen innan avhopp, antal handledare, ämne och avhandlingens inriktning. Avhoppare samt huvudhandledare (huvudhandledaren kommer i första hand kontaktas, om huvudhandledaren är omöjlig att få kontakt med, så kommer övriga handledare att kontaktas) kommer att erbjudas möjlighet att besvara enkätfrågor om: orsaker till avhopp från doktorsutbildningen; vilka specifika problem i förhållandet mellan doktorand och handledare som kan leda till avhopp; hur kan risken för avhopp begränsas samt vad som kännetecknar en solid och stödjande handledningsrelation?  

En innehållsanalys kommer att göras för att identifiera eventuella mönster och dra slutsatser i enkätsvaren från doktorander och huvudhandledare/handledare. Vilka generella orsaker till avhopp anges? Vilka problem i relationen mellan doktorander och handledare redovisas i enkätsvaren? Vilka åtgärder föreslår enkätrespondenterna för att begränsa risken för avhopp? Vad anges i enkätsvaren som kännetecken för en solid och stödjande handledningsrelation?

Det huvudsakliga bidraget med vår studie är att presentera fallbaserad kunskap kring allmänna orsaker till avhopp och specifikt om relationen mellan doktorand och handledare. Vidare kommer studien att redovisa en förståelse för vad som kännetecknar en gedigen handledningsrelation. Vår forskning kommer att ge såväl doktorander som handledare möjlighet att reflektera över hur de kan agera för att begränsa risken för avhopp och istället sikta på ett framgångsrikt fullföljande av doktorsutbildningen.

Referenser

Corcelles, M., Cano, M., Liesa, E., González-Ocampo, G., & Castelló, M. (2019). Positive and negative experiences related to doctoral study conditions. Higher Education Research & Development, 38(5), 922-939.

Högskoleverket (2012). Orsaker till att doktorander lämnar forskarutbildningen utan examen –  en uppföljning av nybörjarna på forskarnivå läsåren 1999/2000 och 2000/01. Rapport 2012:1 R.

Sverdlik, A., Hall, N. C., McAlpine, L., & Hubbard, K. (2018). The PhD experience: A review of  the factors influencing doctoral students’ completion, achievement, and well-being. International Journal of Doctoral Studies, 13, 361-388. 

Higher education (HE) today is a diversified area which has grown expansively over the last two decades in response to a rapidly changing educational and political climate (e.g., Englund, 2018). In this age of complexity, development and change are omnipresent and intrinsic parts of the university teacher’s practice, from the development of the teachers’ individual practice at microlevel, to the collaborative development of scholarly practice at the meso-level of the department, and to the strategic institutional approach at macro-level, which links to employment and promotion frameworks and the recognition of teaching quality (Bolander Laksov & Scheja, 2020). As changing demands has placed focus on learning and teaching, higher education in Sweden has followed the European development from quality assurance towards quality enhancement (e.g., Pelik, 2016; Nygren & Sjöberg, 2022). The universities are now responsible for developing their own quality assurance systems and more emphasis has been placed on ownership and the possibilities of influencing the process (Swedish Higher Education Authority), which has grown more complex. Through their professional teaching work, academic teachers are expected to strengthen a pedagogical "culture of quality" at the higher education institution (e.g., Elken & Stensaker, 2018).  

What we are witnessing is a more mature quality assurance work which is characterized by increased trust in the universities themselves and the ways in which they choose to organize their quality work. But we are also witnessing the heightened complexity of academic development where academic developers has become involved in work on all three levels (micro, meso, macro), for example, appointment procedures, career structures and promotion criteria. Academic developers have become central to the implementation of these strategies, which has greatly extended the range of their professional activities. This development goes hand in hand with the shift in focus from quality assurance to quality enhancement. By allowing the universities to develop their own quality assurance systems, the new quality assurance system signals a heightened awareness of the importance of ownership and to affect the process, which relates to national governance strategies of teaching and learning. As the changing educational and political demands on higher education have deeply affected the professional activities of the academic developer and the academic teacher, this article addresses the changes and challenges faced.

The present paper will present the results of a study of Swedish academic development units planned to be conducted in early 2023 and which focus on the areas of responsibilities and everyday practice of academic developers today. In the paper, we will discuss the implications for teachers and academic developers in this diversified context. Our aim is also to contribute with further knowledge and understanding of structural and organisational prerequisites for academic development in higher education.

References

Elken, M. & Stensaker, B. (2018). Conceptualising ‘quality work’ in higher education. Quality in  Higher Education, 24(3): 189-202.

Bolander Laksov, K. & Scheja, M. (2020). Akademiskt lärarskap. SULF Publications XLII.

Englund, C. (2018). Teaching in an age of complexity: exploring academic change and development in higher education. (Doctoral dissertation). Umeå: Umeå University.

Nygren, Å.  & Sjöberg, J. (2022). Om pedagogiskt kvalitetsarbete i högre utbildning: vägen framåt. Högskolepedagogisk debatt: Högskolan Kristianstad.  

Pelik, R. (2016). “Quality assurance and quality enhancement,” i Baume. D och Popovic. D. (Eds). Advancing Practice in Academic Development. London: Routledge: 142-156.

Stensaker, B. (2008b). Outcomes of quality assurance: A discussion of knowledge, methodology and validity. Quality in Higher Education, 14: 3-13. 

The aim of this article is to investigate how newly arrived immigrants’ career learning is implemented and organized in an education reform that focus on work first. As a case,we chose to study the newly launched Combination Education. From this we specify these research questions: 1) How can career counselling support students career learning? 2)How does cooperation between the counsellors and teachers work? 3) Which are the organizational conditions for career learning? The method used was qualitative. First, we made 29 interviews with career counsellors from 22 different municipalities. These interviews were made over the web using the tool Zoom. In the second part, we made IRL visits to 5 municipalities and interviewed 31 persons, who worked as career counsellors, teachers, headmasters, operations managers, and coordinators. In a labour market paradigm that focus on workfare, incentives, and work first, less notice is given to the transition from school to work and the recruitment practice. In such a labour market paradigm, career learning may be devalued. By using a Program Theory framework and setting up the Program Logic for the education programme, we found its critical points.These are 1) when the student applies to the Combination Education, and 2) when the student ends Combination Education and make the transition to work life. To make sustainable career choices, the individual need to have Career Management Skills (CMS), and to develop CMS, the student must have had the opportunity to develop his or hercareer learning. Further, to develop career learning in a wider and broader sense, the cooperation of different professional groups is needed. This cooperation must have organizational and structural conditions, and not depend on individuals. As several other studies and government reports have noticed (e.g., Parliamentary Committee on Education 2018; Swedish Schools Inspectorate 2013) the governing and management of career guidance and counselling (CGC) is weak, and the career counsellor often left alone and isolated. When it comes to Combination Education, we found that managing documents are rare, which shows a lack of interest from the managing level in the municipality.

In this essay, we argue that Rousseau’s lawgiver is best thought of as a pedagogical fiction. It is fictional as it reflects an idea that is entertained despite its contradictory nature, and it is contradictory in the sense that it describes “an undertaking beyond human strength and, to execute it, an authority that amounts to nothing” (II.7; 192). Rousseau conceives of the social contract as a necessary device for enabling the transferal of individual power to the body politic, for subsuming individual wills under the general will, and for aligning the good of the individual with the common good. For the social contract to be valid, however, it needs to be preceded by a desire to belong to a moral community that can induce people to join willingly, and that will grant legitimacy to the laws established. If the social contract is the machinery that makes the body politic function, the lawgiver is “the mechanic who invents the machine” (II.7; 191). In this paper we will look closer at the pedagogical functions of Rousseau’s mythical lawgiver by first examining the relationship between the social contract, the general will and the lawgiver. Then, we aim to flesh out a pedagogical understanding of the figure of the lawgiver by way of the two educational dimensions of accommodation and transformation. Finally, we will argue for the importance of understanding Rousseau’s lawgiver as a fictional device allowing for the fundamental and enduring educational task of balancing between the preservation and renewal of society. 

Contemporary relational theorists offer an alternative vision of pedagogy in a concerning era of teacher accountability. Internationally, teachers experience challenging educational environments that reflect troubled social histories across differences of socioeconomic class, race and ethnicity, gender, and ability status. Climate change, civil and economic instability, and war add global pressures that bring immigrant and refugee students into classrooms around the world. In the United States, histories of slavery, genocide, and indigenous removal continue to resound through all levels of education. Putting the teacher-student relationship at the heart of education offers a way to serve all students, allowing them to flourish in spite of the many challenges we face in the 21st century.

Relational pedagogy is inspired by a range of philosophical writings: this article focuses on theorists whose work is informed by the concept of caring, as developed by Nel Noddings, with the critical perspective of Paulo Freire, or the ethics of Emmanuel Levinas. Although these approaches to ethical educational relations do not necessarily mesh together easily, the tensions among them can bear fruit that informs our pedagogy. After outlining the theoretical contours of relational pedagogy, we will turn to more recent empirical work in the field. New studies help us understand how to turn theory into classroom practices that will benefit all students.

Time för abduction: The carrying capacity of experience in research and education

The article aims to reason with the continuous philosophy of Charles S. Peirce (1839–1914) and argue about a pedagogy for strengthening our ability to diversify and bring forth our experience in knowledge production. The carrying capacity of experience as a basis for reasonable abductions and change is the main argument of the article. Besides this the ambition is to highlight the capacity of abduction as a method to process diverse knowledge practices and make use of pluralistic thus common experiences to produce fair ideas for the future. The temporal attitude of the abductive researcher counteracts the idea of absolute knowledge and reminds us of our tendency to ignore what we actually know, not the least doubt. Thus, the abductive attitude approves of doubt as a wake-up call and starting point for learning, and the acknowledgement of this is by Peirce’s general logic also consistent with a trust in a continuous human and worldly becoming. To further illuminate the educational points of abduction, an ongoing project in higher education is described as a concrete example of abductive, thus experience-based, successive, and common learning. The continuous research/education project unfolds and finds its direction through the triadic abductive process of inference; notifying and acknowledging qualities of past experience, critically comparing qualities to general ideas, and guessing upon new relations or hypothesis about fair future conduct.

This article investigates whether there is any place for the school of thought that is known as analytic philosophy of education in the aftermath of postmodernism, and whether analytic philosophy of education can be treated as a ‘method’, among other alternative ‘methods’, that can be applied regardless of what kind of ‘-ism’ or ideology one embraces. An additional aim is to suggest some important questions for analytic philosophy of education to take into consideration. We argue that conceptual engineering may be a promising avenue for analytic educational theory if it is used with a critical intent that is more heuristic and inconclusive than prescriptively ideal.

This paper examines the introduction of Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) in Denmark and its potential as a pedagogical tool used throughout Danish education culture and particularly in Danish primary schools. The first active Danish users of and trainers in VTS in the country provide purposive qualitative interview data through structured e-mail interviews focused on their experiences with VTS and their impressions of this pedagogical tool in the Danish education culture context. The analysis of this qualitative data indicates that VTS is highly and widely adaptable to Danish education culture which, like other Scandinavian education systems, is based on bildung didactic principles. In their contemporary manifestation, these principles value the emancipation of the individual and the promotion of democratic learning processes. The introduction of VTS is still a work in progress in the Danish context and is not yet formally used in the school system. However, it is precisely there that a rich vein of opportunities exists for VTS in Denmark.

This paper illuminates how teachers are influenced by age, gender and sexuality in teaching about sex and relationships. In this analysis grounded in feminist theory, age, gender and sexuality are considered to be enacted as doings. Six interviews with teachers working with sexuality education in K-12 schools in Sweden were chosen from of a larger body of material consisting of 21 interviews with professionals engaged in school-based sexuality education. The six interviewees were selected because they explicitly addressed how teachers’ age, gender and/or sexuality come to matter in the classroom. Findings show how male and female teachers organise their teaching in relation to normative expectations of age, gender and sexuality. In sexuality education, the diverse life-courses of (hetero)sexual women offer a wide range of pedagogic possibilities for female teachers to address issues of sexuality, consent and relationships whereas male teachers are constrained to doing safe(r) forms of masculinity by directing attention away from their bodies and experiences. In understanding these results, I argue that the figure of the tant has been key in forming the pedagogic backdrop to Swedish sexuality education, hence embedding a normative ‘who’ in the ‘how’ to teach sexuality education.

In The Relational Dimension of the Teaching Profession, we follow four teachers who meet their students in a particularly evolving way. Deploying what is described as pedagogical tact and stance, the author has filmed teachers in order to observe how they create pedagogical meeting spaces wherein the teachers and students meet as people, thus developing an understanding of trustful, relational teaching in practice.The relational dimension of the teaching profession is something that has hitherto played a hidden role in teacher education. Nevertheless, well-functioning teacher-student relationships are a fundamental part of successful teaching. Including a multi-relational perspective on teaching and education (Pedagogical Relational Teachership, or, PeRT) as well as a taxonomy with an observation scheme for student teachers and researchers, this book is aimed at teacher students at undergraduate and advanced levels and is also suitable for teachers in practice.

Using an intersectional analysis, this article critically analyses implied and expressed norms to identify perceptions of appropriate behaviour in children’s play, and to explore how social communicative arenas such as Internet forums construct knowledge and values. Adults’ responses to an incident that occurred amongst a group of children in Swedish early childhood education as part of free play during the preschool day were analysed. The incident was described in a thread posted on the Familjeliv (Family Life) internet forum. The research questions were: what images of children are prominent in discourse on appropriate behaviour as part of free play; what discursive categorisations of children related to age, gender and sexuality can be identified within this discourse; and how do these categorisations intersect? Netnography provided the method used together with thematic content analysis. Findings reveal two contrasting views: first, the view that four-year-olds cannot commit sexual assault on another person; and second, the view that they can. Young children were constructed either as non-sexual, innocent, curious and playful, or as perpetrators who lack consequentialist thinking. Age was the dominant discursive category utilised in relation to sexuality and appropriate behaviour, followed by gender. 

Practice-near research has been on the agenda in education policy during the last few years in Sweden. The research is supposed to make the academy and school collaborate and the expectations are high. This article aims to give an account of different kinds of expectations of practice-near research, and the underlying perceived problems it is supposed to solve, in the Swedish educational context. Drawing from theories from the research field sociology of expectations and Carol Bacchi’s discourse analytic WPR approach (What’s the problem represented to be?), different kinds of documents on practice-near research were analysed. Five anticipatory narratives about practice-near research were identified: practice-near research for ensuring a school based on ‘scientific knowledge and proven experience’, as a cure of educational research of little relevance, for increasing teaching efficiency, for making teacher education research-based, and for increasing attractiveness of the teaching profession. The article concludes with a discussion of the anticipatory narratives related to discourses of change and education crisis.

Fictionalism confronts the dual epistemological nature of education. In this book, Johan Dahlbeck argues that all education, at bottom, concerns a striving for truth initiated through fictions. This foundational aporia is then interrogated and made sense of via Hans Vaihinger’s philosophy of ‘as if’ and Spinoza’s peculiar form of exemplarism. Using a variety of fictional examples, Dahlbeck investigates the different dimensions of educational fictionalism, from teacher exemplarism to the basic educational fictions necessary for getting started in education in the first place. Fictionalism will be a valuable resource for anyone interested in the philosophical foundations of education.

Based on arguments about the need for greater individual freedom,school choice was introduced in Sweden in the 1990s. Swedishmunicipalities  now  set  up  local  school  choice  systems,  whoseorganization varies between municipalities. This study is based oninterviews with three politicians and two civil servants from twoaverage-sized municipalities with different school choice system designsand different political majorities. The aim of this study is to analyze howrepresentatives of Swedish municipalities conceptualize their role andresponsibility in relation to the role of parents in school choice systems,with a focus on school choice from pre-school tofirst grade. Theanalysis is focused on those instances in which parents fail to act as thedesign intended in the school choice system. The analysis shows thatparents trouble the local school choice systems by both being passiveand active when they are encouraged to make a choice.

Who decides where a child should go to school? The answer to this question has changed over the past 30 years in Sweden, a country who has faced extensive neoliberal educational reforms during the past decades (Arreman och Holm 2011; Lundahl m.fl. 2013). Based on arguments about increasing individual freedom, free school choice was introduced in Sweden in the 1990s. Ever since, local authorities in Sweden have been commissioned to organize local school choice markets (Dahlstedt m.fl. 2019). 

Education in democratic societies has always had to deal with the tension between individual freedom and a need for public good (Labaree 1997; Börjesson 2016; Levin 1987). The organization of school choice systems varies around Sweden, and there is not yet a single model in place for how to design school choice systems. This paper contributes with knowledge about how civil servants work to organize school choice in dialogue with local politicians, as well as how they balance between different goals in practice (e.g. goal conflicts can arise between freedom of choice and integration, since a high degree of freedom in relation to school choice generally leads to increased segregation (Trumberg och Urban 2020)). 

Knowledge about what happens in the organization and design of local school choice systems is necessary to understand which values that ​​are prioritized in practice. This paper provides knowledge about what municipalities' organization of school choice means for the Swedish school and the students within these schools. 

The purpose of this paper is to identify and problematize the dilemmas and goal conflicts that emerge as civil servants work with the organization on school choice in Swedish municipalities. 

The paper suggests that the tension between individual freedom and the school as a collective good tends to end up with the officials. This means that questions about conflicting goals concerning school's role in relation to freedom, justice, and equality – questions, that may be considered political by nature – often are handed over to civil servants within the municipal bureaucracy. How civil servants interpret their role and function within municipal democracy, as well as the values ​​they express, is important for the link between education and the public's trust in representative democracy. 

I use the theoretical notion of ‘discretion’ (Brodkin 2020), which pinpoints the extent to which micro-practices of street-level organizations take part in shaping meta-politics. The interest in discretion highlights the importance of zooming in on the practices of civil servants and their level of discretion in enabling educational policies. 

I analyze motives, justifications, and dilemmas related to local school choice organization through interviews with politicians and civil servants in two municipalities with different political majority (one conversative and one liberal-left). The two municipalities have organized their local school choice market differently, with different interpretations and ranking of various selection criteria for the local school choice markets, which provide two contrasting examples for the execution of discretion by civil servants in local school choice systems. 

Municipalities in Sweden have an important responsibility for ensuring 1) equality between schools, and 2) that guardians’ preferences of school choice are met, and 3) that all schools offer equal education, regardless of the children’s socio-economic background. There is a previous lack of knowledge about the level of discretion in how civil servants interpret their role and function within municipal democracies. This paper provides such knowledge, which is important for advancing the understanding of the link between education and the public's trust in civil servants who work with educational policies.

References 

Arreman, Inger Erixon, och Ann‐Sofie Holm. 2011. ”Privatisation of public education? The emergence of independent upper secondary schools in Sweden”. Journal of Education Policy 26 (2): 225–43. https://doi.org/10.1080/02680939.2010.502701.

Brodkin, Evelyn Z. 2020. ”Discretion in the Welfare State”. I Discretion and the quest for controlled freedom, redigerad av Tony Evans och Peter Hupe, 63–77. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.

Börjesson, Mikael. 2016. ”Private and Public in European Higher Education”. I Encyclopedia of Educational Philosophy and Theory, redigerad av Michael A. Peters, 1–7. Singapore: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-287-532-7_487-1.

Dahlstedt, Magnus, Martin Harling, Anders Trumberg, Susanne Urban, och Viktor Vesterberg. 2019. Fostran till valfrihet : skolvalet, jämlikheten och framtiden. Stockholm: Liber.

Labaree, David F. 1997. ”Public Goods, Private Goods: The American Struggle Over Educational Goals”. American Educational Research Journal 34 (1): 39–81. https://doi.org/10.3102/00028312034001039.

Levin, Henry M. 1987. ”Education as a Public and Private Good”. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management 6 (4): 628–41. https://doi.org/10.2307/3323518.

Lundahl, Lisbeth, Inger Erixon Arreman, Ann-Sofie Holm, och Ulf Lundström. 2013. ”Educational marketization the Swedish way”. Education Inquiry 4 (3): 22620. https://doi.org/10.3402/edui.v4i3.22620.

Trumberg, Anders, och Susanne Urban. 2020. ”School Choice and Its Long-Term Impact on Social Mobility in Sweden”. Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research 0 (0): 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1080/00313831.2020.1739129.

Based on bioecological systems theory, engagement is the mechanism for children's learning and development. However, children with hyperactive behavior tend to be less engaged in early childhood education and care (ECEC), which might negatively influence their learning and development. On the other hand, social interaction might support children with hyperactive behavior staying engaged in these activities. The current study investigates whether the association between teacher responsiveness, positive peer-to-child interaction (i.e., the quality of peer interaction) and children's hyperactive behavior and engagement levels are transactional. Two hundred and three children aged 1 to 5 in Swedish preschool settings were followed. Data was collected at three points in time between 2012 and 2014. This data was then analyzed to identify associations and how they changed over time. Transactional paths were found between children's levels of core engagement, teacher responsiveness, and the quality of positive peer-to-child interaction. Children's core engagement increases the probability of better quality positive peer-to-child interaction and teacher responsiveness, increasing core engagement over time. Teacher responsiveness and the quality of positive peer-to-child interaction are predictors of reduced hyperactive behavior over time. Meanwhile, children's hyperactive behavior does not significantly influence these two types of social interaction, that is, decreased hyperactivity may not improve social interaction to the same extent as increased engagement. The findings are discussed in relation to how special support for children with hyperactive behavior can be designed, with a focus on increasing core engagement in preschool settings.

In Europe and other parts of the world, many new schools are to be built. In Sweden, for instance, some 1000 new schools are to be built between year 2020-2025. As a response to this need of new school buildings, there are policies emerging. One example is the Swedish National Board of Housing, Building and Planning (SNBHP), who published policy by presenting a digital collection good examples. In this paper we are zooming in on the learning environments in the policy and examining the meaning that is made of the learning environments. With the aid of the practical epistemological analysis (PEA), four the learning environments are identified: 1) general and flexible learning environment; 2) stimulating learning environment with spatial diversity; 3) an exciting learning environment that encourages creativity; and 4) an open learning environment. How these learning environments come about is further analysed with the concept of material classification, which helps identify some of the implications on teaching and learning and how the pedagogical vocabulary and material classification condition behaviours. This is further discussed in terms of what happens when"good learning environments" are made into policy.

Problem-based learning (PBL) has been implemented with different levels of success in first-year engineering education in response to the rapidly growing requirements for a higher degree of learner agency in graduates. This study is contextualised in a systemic problem-based learning environment and explores the sources of first-year engineering students' learner agency development in relation to the main features and skillsets of PBL, such as teamwork, student-centredness, problem orientation and project organisation. Q methodology was employed, including both qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis based on a 39-statement Q sample and 102 valid Q sorts. The Q analysis identified four statistically distinct viewpoints on the key sources of learner agency for students: (1) Team dynamism and self-directed learning within the project team, (2) Trust and peer support within the project team, (3) Individual efforts at career readiness and (4) Team efforts at project management. The findings highlight the potential of PBL for offering more and better pedagogical support for first-year engineering students in developing learner agency.

This article is about how negative discourses of teacher education position teacher educators and how they might influence or inspire action. We use self-study methods to investigate the political dimension of teacher education in two national contexts: Sweden and the USA. More specifically, we examine the emotions stirred by the positioning related to being a teacher educator and how those emotions can be used to take a line to and resist boundaries that limit us within the profession in the two contexts. We aim to contribute to the self-study field by emphasizing a political dimension, in addition to the personal and professional dimensions of teacher education more often studied by scholars. Using the concepts of positionality, emotions, liminality, and action, we conclude that the liminal spaces offered us time to think about the emotions we have experienced due to the derisive discourses that position us in negative ways as teacher educators, and with that thinking came opportunities to reflect on our identity as teacher educators and what we look to accomplish as teacher educators. A new understanding of liminality as a space of possibility has boosted us to take action. An important conclusion is that emotional labor can be a hindrance in relation to teacher educator action, while emotions can act as clues for opportunities of growth and action. Telling our stories opened space for us to use our emotions to take a line to and resist the derogatory discourse, engage in the political, and move closer to becoming teacher educator activists.

This paper aims to share new knowledge about tensions in establishing a new school in a marketised educational landscape, with a special focus on teachers’ experiences of enacting a highly profiled vision. The paper is based on a single case study using observations, surveys, interviews and document studies. To cover the complex enactment process, we have created a multilayered enactment triangle to analyse the enactment process of the school and strategies the teachers use to realise the vision. To be able to hold on to the vision when the first generation of students arrive, the teachers in this study connect the vision to a more abstract ‘future school’. Meanwhile, in the daily practice in the ‘present school’, they perceive difficulties in working in line with the vision. The relations between teachers and vision and the relations between teachers and students, respectively, become parallel lines. It seems then, that for visionary work to function from the start in a newly established school, all the relations in the enactment triangle, i.e. between the vision and the teachers, the vision and the students, and the teachers and the students, need to be there.

Traffic is the most dangerous environment for police officers to work in, both in terms of numbers who lose their lives in the line of duty and injuries to both people and vehicles. In addition, driver training is an important part of police training at basic level and in continuing education. However, such training is resource-intensive and certain driver tasks cannot be practiced. In order to create an effective, safe, and secure educational environment, driving simulators were tested as part of the driver training at the Police Program at Malmö University. 83 students who completed the second and then third semester participated in a study where groups that received different types of training and then performed the same examination were compared regarding low-speed maneuvering and driving on country roads. The results show that there are no significant differences in how the students perform on the practical examination depending on whether they trained in the simulator, both in the simulator and in the police car or only in the police car. Implications of the results and future research are discussed.

The Relational Dimension of the School Leader Profession 

An ethnographic study was carried out at the Oak school, situated in a segregated area in Sweden, where the school leader and the teachers handle major pedagogical and social challenges. With a clear focus on changes in teaching and learning, the school leader decided to face the challenges by developing a distributed leadership (Gronn, 2000), which needs to be based on trust (Liljenberg, 2016). Viewing leadership from a relational perspective enables the visualisation of interpersonal relationships (Gergen, 2009). With a focus on school development, the aim of the study was to explore the complexity in developing a distributed leadership over time. From a relational perspective (Ljungblad, 2021) a specific aim was to explore how the school leader relate to her personnel, face to face, in everyday practice, which is presented in this presentation. The school leader was shadowed one day a week during a year, enabling a profound data production. The field work consisted of observations of spontaneous meetings with the personnel. An observation scheme based on pedagogical tact (Ljungblad, 2023) was used for detailed observations of the interaction in scheduled meetings. In the end of the day the school leader participated in meaning making dialogues (Ljungblad, 2016) about events during the day. Furthermore, 32 semi-structured interviews with the school leader and the teachers were conducted. 

The Key Indicator Taxonomy of Relational Teaching (Ljungblad, 2022) was used as an analytic tool for analysing the school leader’s way of relating to the personnel on a micro-level. The Taxonomy consists of six key indicators and the characteristics of each key indicator were analysed. The results are presented under the themes incalculable tact, con-tact, pedagogical tactfulness, responsible considerations, curiosity and pathfinder. A general pattern in the results highlight a school leader’s tactful balancing act in developing the school organization, with the necessity to constantly balance organizational factors and interpersonal values. Over time, in the collaboration between the school leader and the personnel a trustful climate emerged. At the same time the school enhanced its performances. Hence, the results underline the importance of trusting leadership, which creates opportunities for teachers to act and operate freely, face new challenges, grow and contribute to the school to their full potential. To conclude, the results give insight into that a relational leadership has to be lived every day, face to face. In line with this insight, the findings elucidated the vulnerability within interdependent professional relationships where the school leader and the personnel mutually needed to find ways to trust each other while working in the incalculable processes of school development. 

References

Gergen, K. (2009). Relational Being: Beyond Self and Community. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Gronn, P. (2002). “Distributed leadership as a unit of analysis.” The Leadership Quarterly, 13(4), 423–451.

Liljenberg, M. (2016). “Teacher leadership modes and practices in a Swedish context – a case study.” School Leadership & Management, 36(1), 21–40.

Ljungblad, A-L. (2023). The Relational Dimension of the Teaching profession. NY: Peter Lang.

Ljungblad, A-L. (2022 accepted). Key Indicator Taxonomy of Relational Teaching, Journal of Education for Teaching.

Ljungblad, A-L. (2021). “Pedagogical Relational Teachership (PeRT) – a multi-relational perspective.” International Journal of Inclusive Education, 25(7), 860–876.

Ljungblad, A.-L. 2016. Takt och hållning – en relationell studie om det oberäkneliga i matematikundervisningen [Tact and Stance – A relational study about the incalculable in mathematics teaching]. PhD diss., Gothenburg Studies in Educational Sciences, 381. Gothenburg: Acta Universitatis Gothoburgensis. 

This article is a reflection piece on the use of the futures cone and an expanded futures cone (which draws on queer theory) as a tool for dialogue and planning between the supervisor and the doctoral student. I do so by situating the use of this tool in relation to three supervision typologies: the product-orientated,process-orientatedand doctoral student-orientated approaches. I claim that it is an underused and highly versatile tool for doctoral supervision.

Barn lever med större risker än vuxna att drabbas av klimatförändringaroch andra miljörelaterade fenomen. Exempelvisär dödligheten större hos barn som drabbats av malariaoch denguefeber, två sjukdomar vars spridning ökar till följdav klimatförändringarna. I denna bok analyseras olika idéerom vad som utgör den goda barndomen under den tidsperiodsom föreslagits få namnet antropocen: människans epok.Med utgångspunkt i en kritisk tradition och utifrån ett fokuspå hur vuxenvärlden skapar önskvärda barndomar ställer författarenfrågan om vilka ideala barndomar som framträderoch vilka barn som ges plats i antropocen. Genom kritiskaanalyser identieras och problematiseras idéer om barndomari antropocen som oskyldiga, speciella och ansvarsfulla.

I boken studeras vad som utspelar sig i skärningspunktenmellan idéer om barndomar och tillståndet antropocen inomtre olika arenor: politisk klimataktivism, utbildningsforskningriktad mot yngre barn samt litteratur för barn i åldrarna 6–12år med miljö- och klimattema. Författaren argumenterar förvikten av vuxenvärldens roll och ansvar i den antropocenaepoken och att barns liv och tillvaro bör få utgöra startpunktenför beslutsfattande och politik för klimat och miljö.

Boken vänder sig till forskare inom fälten barndomssociologi,grön humanvetenskap och pedagogik, samt till studenter i pedagogik, miljövetenskap och barn- ochungdomsvetenskap.

Although co-creation of artefacts is a common practice in virtual exchange (VE), there are still few studies that explore the connection between collaboration on multimodal texts and student teachers' development of intercultural and pedagogical awareness. Based on a trinational VE, coincidentally developed during the outbreak of the pandemic in March 2020, this case-study explores how COVID-19, as the impromptu context for VE, fostered preservice teachers' intercultural and pedagogical perspectives. Through a multiliteracies approach, findings indicate that co-creation both generated and scaffolded intercultural dialogue and that, the disruption caused by the pandemic was experienced by students as an expansive learning opportunity.

Introduction: Thesis supervision is crucial for the development of students’ research expertise and communication skills so they can think and behave like members of an academic community (Golde, 2010). However, research on thesis supervision has mainly been conducted at doctoral level in Anglophone context with limited attention on cross cultural aspects. Therefore, this project aims to shed light on undergraduate thesis supervision in non-Anglophone contexts. It explores how thesis supervision is experienced by students and supervisors and how feedback provision and feedback uptake are negotiated and used to develop the students’ drafts. This project is conducted as a part of graduate school education, learning and globalisation programme. It focuses on exploring thesis supervision in Sweden and Indonesia to contribute to the discussion on the complexities of language pedagogy in multilingual contexts as a result of globalisation where English is used as an additional language (EAL) (Bianco, 2018), particularly in the expanding circle (Kachru, 1985). It also illuminates the dialogue on thesis supervision related to the identified needs and strategies of academic writing and publication in the diverse linguistic contexts (Canagarajah, 2022). This project also adds negotiation within the Northern and Southern perspectives (see Pennycook & Makoni, 2020) where Sweden is culturally and geographically associated with Northern context while Indonesia is associated with Southern context. 

Method and findings: A multi-case study (Yin, 2018) was carried out to illuminate supervisory practice in Sweden and Indonesia and will be reported in the form of compilation thesis. It involved 39 participants (14 supervisors and 25 students) from one Swedish and three Indonesian universities. Online questionnaire, one-on-one semi-structured interviews, non-participatory observation of video-recorded thesis supervision sessions, and document analysis to students’ drafts were conducted and analysed thematically. The whole project will be seen based on dialogic pedagogical supervision driven by Bakthin’s (1981) dialogism as the main lens. 

For the first article, I took inspiration from Gee’s (2014) discourse model and used systemic-functional linguistics from appraisal theory (Halliday & Maythiessen, 2014; Martin & Rose, 2007) to analyse supervisors’ interviews. The findings revealed that supervisors described experiencing (a)symmetrical relationship with students and colleagues and juggling unwanted supervisory roles (i.e being editor, pseudo-debt-collector, and spoon feeder). In the second article, the interview results between supervisors and students focusing on the feedback provision and supervisory priorities were analysed by using Biesta’s (2009) functions of education, Habermas’ (1984) communicative action theory, and perspectives on academic literacy. The findings indicated that supervisors have different priorities in giving content/form-focused feedback. Students reported having difficulties decoding supervisors' feedback and react strategically to the feedback that is phrased as questions. Students' strategic reactions seemed rooted from their lack of feedback and disciplinary literacies. The third article will focus on how feedback is phrased and negotiated between students and supervisors in video-recorded online supervision sessions. I consider doing conversation analysis by using Activity Theory or Social Presence Theory as theoretical framework. Feedback and suggestions on theoretical frameworks and perspectives to analyse supervision sessions (third article) and students’ drafts (fourth article) are most welcome. 

Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) is an inquiry-based pedagogical tool grounded in teacherstudent discussions. It was created originally to improve a participant's ability to interpret, describe, and analyze imagery and do this through active observation and collective discussion. In this presentation, I explore how VTS goes beyond visual literacy and is a highly adaptable elicitation and communication technique for language learning and in developing reciprocally respectful communication skills, which are very relevant for English language teaching in Sweden. VTS could be described as a “meta-visual-lingual” activity as it is the act of talking out load about the thinking inspired by a visual object. And this, especially when part of the activity’s focus is language development. The impact of VTS could be significant in the Swedish education system. It has proven very effective in nurturing the abilities and skills which are valued in Sweden such as those explicated in the compulsory school curriculum. VTS has also proven to be a very efficient technique in language teaching and can directly help to fulfil several of the ambitions of the curriculum and the English language syllabus.

There is a social and political dimension to Spinoza’s theory of affects that is important to highlight for educational purposes. Because all people are always in part passionate (i.e., determined to act by causes that are external to them), it makes no sense to assume that empowerment is ever an entirely individual affair. On the contrary, Spinoza contends that if people want to become more active and more empowered, they need to join with others who are striving for the same thing. Accordingly, ‘the good which everyone who seeks virtue wants for himself, he also desires for other men’ (E4p27d). There are two upshots to this idea that can be addressed in terms of practical (educational) questions. First, it demands that we find out more about how people can be influenced to want the same thing. Second, it means that we need to look closer at how passivity can help bring about activity. Because different people have different ingenium (i.e., affective constitution) it is not a straightforward thing to assume that we would all naturally strive for something similar. At bottom, we all want to become more empowered, but what we take to be empowering may differ widely depending on our past experiences and our culturally encoded patterns of association. The educational concern at the heart of this matter is therefore bound up with the question of how different people can be made to strive for the same thing so as to help them flourish, individually as well as collectively. 

Main points: With this paper we aim to investigate how the relationship between education and emotion can be ethnographically traced through an autoethnography of our parental experience in relation to school marketization. Both authors of this paper have academic backgrounds in critical education studies, and we have previously published on the marketization of education, particularly in Sweden. We have a previous theoretical interest in understanding how ideologies are reinforced and challenged in education, but so far, we have failed to theorize how our experiences as parents of school children might partake in the operation of capitalist ideology in and through education. Thus far, in our previous attempts to understand marketization we have neglected parents’ school-market-anxiety, and our own role as prospective consumers of education within the late modern educational capitalism. We aim to share, critically analyze, and put into context some of the experiences we have had of being approached as consumers of education for our own children and the affective dimensions of these experiences.

Fieldwork methods: We investigate our different experiences and emotions of being addressed as parents on a school market by comparing memories, information from the local school authorities, and advertisements for private schools owned by a venture capital company that we have received in the form of postcards, catalogues, and via digital mails in our roles as parents of school children. 

Analytical methods: We argue for the need of critical concepts from a psychoanalytical (post-)Marxist tradition that can help us understand – and resist – the increasingly strong grip that a that a capitalist ideology has on contemporary Swedish education and its different actors. Our turn to a post-Marxist vocabulary enables us to connect the hyper-abstract impersonal structure of capitalism with our deeply personal experiences of how we come to embody this structure in our role as parents. We do this by critically compare notes of urban parenting in late capitalist educational landscape in the Swedish cities Gothenburg and Malmö, inspired by an autoethnographical methodology (Reed-Danahay, 2009).

Conclusions: The purpose here is to understand and make sense of our feelings of anxiety as inherently shaped by a neutralization of capitalist ideology (see e.g., Bauman, 1999), which we want to resist and move beyond. We specifically lean on the work of Mark Fischer (2009), Slavoj Žižek (2008), Jason Glyson (2021), and Matthew Clarke (2020) to critically examine the seemingly neutral state of (un)conscious parental anxiety in late capitalism.

References

Bauman Z (1999) In Search of Politics. Cambridge: Polity.

Clarke M (2020) Eyes wide shut: the fantasies and disavowals of education policy. Journal of Education Policy 35(2). Routledge: 151–167. DOI: 10.1080/02680939.2018.1544665.

Fisher M (2009) Capitalist Realism : Is There No Alternative? Winchester: O Books.

Glynos J (2021) Critical fantasy studies. Journal of Language and Politics 20(1). John Benjamins: 95–111. DOI: 10.1075/jlp.20052.gly.

Reed-Danahay, D (2009) Anthropologists, Education, and Autoethnography, Reviews in Anthropology, 38:1, 28-47, DOI: 10.1080/00938150802672931

Žižek S (2008) The Sublime Object of Ideology. London ; Verso.

Reflekterande kommentar till temanumret ”Kraftfull professionskunskap i ämnesundervisning”.

”Lärarnas vetenskap” har getts olika namn såsom pedagogik, utbildningsvetenskap, didaktik och pedagogiskt arbete. Artikelförfattaren föredrar didaktik som namn.

Didaktik, inkluderande ämnesdidaktik, kan ses som lärarnas centrala kunskapsområde (bl.a. Sjöström & Tyson, 2022). Kärnan i didaktik är didaktiska teorier och modeller. Didaktiska teorier för lärarprofessionen liksom didaktiska modeller kan ses som en brygga mellan teoretiska perspektiv å ena sidan och undervisningspraktik å andra sidan. Didaktiska modeller bidrar med teorigrundade lärarprofessionsstöd för informerade och reflekterade (ämnes)didaktiska val. De kan även ses som ”organisatör” och förmedlare av ”kraftfull professionskunskap”. Det är dock först vid användningen och i mötet med erfarenheter och praktik som professionskunskapen blir del av ett kraftfullt professionskunnande.

Artikeln innehåller en niofältstabell/karta över ”lärarnas vetenskap”. Ämnesdidaktik, som finns i centrum av tabellen och som fokuserar på innehåll i relation till undervisning, får näring av andra områden av ”lärarnas vetenskap” såsom läroplansteori, lärandeteori, pedagogisk filosofi, utbildningssociologi och metodik.

In this paper, we will propose an idea of education as conversations between friends on matters of common concern. In a scholarly and pedagogical climate of competition, testing and accountability, there seems to be little room for true pedagogical and scholarly conversation. What we aim to develop here, is a vocabulary that is able to capture some educational experiences that are being repressed in the current educational and academic discourse and practice. Starting from our own experiences as higher education workers, we argue for a way of speaking about educational practices that focus on the matters of common concern that gather - and put into conversation - students and teachers. We call this conversation a studious discourse so as to distinguish it from other forms of conversation and outline a definition of the kinds of friendships that potentially revolve around this form of communication. We base our argument on a reading of Jurgen Oelkers and Martin Wagenschein's pedagogical and didactical reflections and propose ultimately that education is not about the inner development of measurable skills or competences, but rather about becoming part of particular forms of communication about matters of common concern.

AbstractSAAC as a special education didactic tool in preschool education

The purpose is to increase knowledge about how SAAC, signing as augmentative and alternative communication, is said to be used by professionals in preschool education. Furthermore, the study aims to shed light on how SAAC can be understood in the light of special education didactics. Didactic questions have guided the analysis: Where and when is SAAC said to be used? Who is/are SAAC said to be used with and for? How and why is SAAC said to be used? The study has been limited to the statements of 30 professionals in a post in the internet forum Facebook’s group “Förskolan.se”. The chosen method is netnography and the analysis is qualitative with special education didactic modelling as theoretical approach.

The results show that descriptions of the use of SAAC can be likened to a multi-voiced approach as SAAC is described as being used in the education in several different ways, in several different situations and in several different environments – with everyone and for everyone. The conclusion is drawn that with special education didactic modeling, SAAC can become a tool broad enough to constitute support in an inclusive way.

Keywords: Didactic modeling; early childhood; netnography; preschool education; special education didactics; Signing as Augmentative and Alternative Communication (SAAC); teaching

Documentation as a technology of power in early childhood education and care

Chair(s): Noora Heiskanen (University of Eastern Finland, Finland)

Discussant(s): Kaisa Pihlainen (University of Eastern Finland), Terese Wilhelmsen (University of South-Eastern Norway)

The extent of documentation is increasing in early childhood education and care (ECEC) in the Nordics and plays a key role in its quality work. In addition, documentation has special importance when it comes to early childhood special education as it is seen to safeguard the child's right to support, to raise the quality of ECEC and to create obligations for professionals. Despite its prevalence, the centrality of documentation is a new feature in Nordic ECEC (Nordic Council of Ministers, 2022), reflecting the trend of data-based governance in Global North. This increased focus on data-based governance has been called the governance turn of education (Ball, 2009). During the governance turn, demand for documenting practices, including the production of either written or numerical data, has become a dominant technique of governing (Ozga et al., 2011; Piattoeva, 2018). However, the values hightlighted in Nordic ECEC such as democracy, emphasis on play and the absense of child assessment as a measure of quality are not easily combined with this governance turn (Nordic Council of Ministers, 2022).

In research, traditionally, documentation is often approached as a process of neutral recording of facts, consequently, framing documentation as passive, objective, and innocent (Dahlberg et al., 2007). In addition to its function of recording practices and agreements, documents can also be seen as institutional actors (Ferraris, 2013). This means that documentation is understood having consequences. However, only a little is known about what documentalization actually does in ECEC.

In this symposium, documentation is discussed as a technology of power, possessing multiple possible consequences to children, professionals, and institutions (Miller & Rose, 2008). With theoretical and empirical investigations, we crically examine the predominant understandings of documentation in Nordic ECEC. First, Noora Heiskanen and Maiju Paananen discuss theoretical and methodological approaches used in research about documentation using the two ongoing research projects as a starting point. Second, Linda Palla’s presentation illustrates an empirical research from Swedish ECEC documentation about mapping materials. Third, Karianne Franck’s presentation will investigate the barriers for listening to young children’s views and opinions in expert assessment documents with the help of a study conducted in Norway. Finally, discussants Kaisa Pihlainen and Terese Willhelmsen lead the discussion on documentation as a technology of power in research and ECEC practices.

References

Ball, S. (2009). The governance turn! Journal of Education Policy. 24(5), 537–538.

Dahlberg, G., Moss, P., & Pence, A. (2007). Beyond quality in early childhood education and care: Languages of evaluation. Routledge.

Ferraris, M. (2013). Documentality: why it is necessary to leave traces. New York: Fordham University Press.

Miller, P., & N. Rose. (2008). Governing the present: Administering economic, social and personal life. Polity.

Nordic Council of Ministers (2022). Nordic Approaches to Evaluation and Assessment in Early Childhood Education and Care. Final report.

Ozga, J., Dahler-Larsen, P., Segerholm, C., & Simola, H. (Eds.). (2011). Fabricating quality in education: Data and governance in Europe. Routledge.

Piattoeva, N. (2018). Elastic numbers: National examinations data as a technology of government. In Governing by Numbers (pp. 18–36). Routledge.

The need for speed: Identification of “the deviant” as the ultimate goal for high returns in ECEC

Linda Palla Malmö University

Swedish early childhood education and care (ECEC) is part of an educational system which has a prominent and widespread culture of documentation. Documentation can be viewed as a tool for achieving high quality but can also be considered a technology of power where the primary purpose of education is seen as providing guidance on and assessment of childhood performance based on predetermined goals and outcomes (Moss, 2017). One could call it an investment of early intervention, intended to produce high returns. At the core of these intervention efforts are those who do not live up to the expectations placed upon them. In line with this reasoning, these children need to be identified; and the earlier, the better. Consequently, extra emphasis is put on documentation and assessment of certain children who, for various reasons, are identified as being in need of special education.

Special education is often preceded by some kind of identification process using specific documents; for example, mapping materials. Previous studies (e.g., Heiskanen et al., 2019; Franck, 2021Palla 2018) show multiple challenges, uncertainty, and resistance around special-education-related documents. The studies show that This type of documentation focuses primarily on the individual, rather than on how the education can contribute to development and learning, or how such strategies evolve. Instead, the (perceived lack of) performance of certain preschoolers tends to be assessed and evaluated in the documentation built upon specific norms.

However, there is a limited body of research regarding the mapping material used in the identification processes related to special education. The purpose of this project is therefore to develop knowledge about how “the deviant” is portrayed through the mapping materials that Swedish preschools use in their daily practice. The project is limited to identifying and critically reviewing a base of individual mapping materials commonly used in Swedish ECEC today. Drawing on ideas from Michel Foucault (e.g., 1977), the documentation can be viewed as a technology of power, where the mapping materials are used for making normalizing judgments. The mapping materials will be scrutinized with a particular focus on how the social categories of gender, ethnicity, age, and function appear, and possibly intersect with each other.

References

Foucault, Michel. (1977). Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison. Penguin Books.

Franck, K. (2021). The educational context in expert assessments: A study of special education documents of children in ECEC institutions. European Journal of Special Needs Education. 37(5), 819–833.

Heiskanen, N., Alasuutari, M., & Vehkakoski, T. (2019). Recording support measures in sequential pedagogical documents of children with special educational needs. Journal of Early Intervention, 41(4), 321–339.

Moss, P. (2017). Power and resistance in early childhood education: From dominant discourse to democratic experimentalism. Journal of Pedagogy – Pedagogický časopis, 8(1), 11–32.

Palla, L. (2018). Individcentrerad prestation och måluppfyllelse i förskolan?: När åtgärdsprogram blir examinerande dokument och verktyg i specialpedagogiska processer. [Individual centered achievement and goal attainment in pres-chool? When assessment plans become examining document and tools in special educational processes] Pedagogisk forskning i Sverige,

Literature on thesis supervision emphasises collaborative approaches with strong and supportive relationships. Despite an increasing research interest in supervisory relationships, little cross-cultural research has been conducted on supervisory roles and relationships in expandingcircle countries. This study explores how thesis supervisors negotiate different rolesand relationshipsin supervision in English as an Additional Language (EAL) contexts. A multi-case study was employed in three contexts: a Swedish university, two Indonesian private universities, and an Indonesian public university. Semi-structured interviews were conducted withfourteenthesis supervisors. Thematic analysis and systemic-functional appraisal theory were used to analyse the discourse. Our findings revealed that supervisors expressed dealing with (a)symmetrical relationships with students and colleagues, dealing with different supervision roles, and managing priorities relating to intellectual development and instrumental goals. However, these dimensions of supervision were described differently in the three contexts. The Swedish supervisors expressed concernsabouthavingweak authority; meanwhile, the Indonesian private supervisors described frustrated attempts to form a closer relationship with the students, whereas the Indonesian public supervisors reacted to students trying to become too familiar. Furthermore, supervisors in the three contexts had to take different unwanted roles in supervision. The article concludes with implications for understanding situatedaspects ofsupervision.

Research on English as an Additional Language (EAL) academic acculturation has focused on international students as newcomers in English speaking countries and has frequently used a linguistically oriented approach. This research aimed to examine EAL thesis supervision as an academic socialisation practice in non-Anglophone context. We focused on exploring supervisors’ feedback provision priorities and students’ reactions to the feedback in one Swedish and three Indonesian universities. We contribute to the Nordic educational context by shedding light on thesis supervision as part of students’ dynamic academic socialisation. The research was conducted in response to the identified need of new strategies for academic literacy development to manage multicultural assets in the EAL academic writing and publication. We employed a multi-faceted view of academic literacy development, involving both cognitive activities and socially situated practice, integrated with. Biesta’ functions of education and Habermas’s Communicative Action concepts. Semi-structured interview was conducted with thirty-nine participants (14 supervisors and 25 students). The findings indicated different supervisors’ feedback provision priorities. Swedish supervisors explained focusing on content to strive for students’ socialisation and subjectification, while Indonesian supervisors mostly prioritise giving both form and content-focused feedback to target the function of qualification. A few Indonesian supervisors described focusing on socialisation in thesis writing and peer-reviewed publication. While supervisors in both contexts expressed striving for learning orientation through supervision, most students in both contexts described focusing on instrumental goals (finishing their thesis projects and getting degrees). Also, many students explained difficulties dealing with feedback in the form of questions. They indicated resistance to the socialisation process by employing strategic action (deleting or shortening the commented part to avoid further questions and revision). Only a few students viewed question-feedback as a communicative means of learning. Students’ responses signalled a lack of disciplinary literacy through unfamiliarity with research methodologies and theoretical framework that created problems in deciphering the supervisors’ feedback. Since the findings illustrate that students and supervisors have different feedback orientations, we call for increased clarity in communicating aims for thesis supervision. Also, the task of students’ academic literacy development and socialisation cannot fall on thesis supervisors alone. Pedagogical practices through embedded-curriculum programmes are required to foster students’ belonging to academic community and identity adaptation.

It is widely recognized that the Swedish educational landscape has undergone major changes in the past three decades. In fact, Sweden is now commonly referred to as having the most de-regulated school system in the world. The change of the educational landscape has taken place together with a general transformation of the entire welfare system in Sweden, guided by neoliberal ideology in which decentralization and marketization were core features. This restructuring was launched in the early nineties with competition, privatization, accountability, and school choice as steering mechanisms aiming for quality improvement and efficiency.

In this paper, we grapple with our personal experiences of this development by investigating how this educational capitalism have permeated our minds, focusing on the feeling of school-market-anxiety, which we both have experienced in our role as parents. We aim to share, critically analyze, and put into context some of the experiences we have had of being approached as consumers of education for our own children and the affective dimensions of these experiences. When writing this paper, we both merged and compared our different experiences in a style inspired by the feminist premise that the personal is political, and that awareness-rising of ideological oppression can emerge from sharing and discussing personal experiences. We do this by critically compare notes of urban parenting in late capitalist educational landscape in the Swedish cities Gothenburg and Malmö, inspired by an autoethnographical methodology (Reed-Danahay, 2009). The purpose here is to understand and make sense of our feelings of anxiety as inherently shaped by a neutralization of capitalist ideology (see e.g., Bauman, 1999). We specifically lean on the work of Mark Fischer (2009), Slavoj Žižek (2008), Jason Glyson (2021), and Matthew Clarke (2020) to critically examine the seemingly neutral state of unconscious parental anxiety in late capitalism. To put our work in a critical (post-)Marxist terminology we are particularly interested in understanding how we, as parents of school children, are ‘interpellated’ (Althusser, 1971) by the ideology supporting the current reality of late capitalist education.

Our question throughout this paper is: How can school-market-anxiety, from the perspective of parents’ experiences, be conceptualized as a manifestation of ideology, what consequences can be discerned and what can we do about it? We argue for the need of critical concepts from a psychoanalytical (post-)Marxist tradition that can help us understand – and resist – the increasingly strong grip that a that a capitalist ideology has on contemporary Swedish education and its different actors, and increasingly, throughout all Nordic countries.

Both of us have an academic background in critical education studies, and we have previously published on the marketization of education. However, in our previous attempts to understand marketization we have neglected parents’ school-market-anxiety, and our own role as prospective consumers of education within the late modern educational capitalism of Sweden.