Purpose: Investigate first- to third-graders' understandings of the police. Design/methodology/approach: Phenomenography is used to analyze elementary students' understandings of the police as a social institution Findings: The results indicate three qualitatively different ways of understanding the police. The police as: attributes, activities…

Purpose: This study focuses on 7- to 9-year-old children attending primary school in Swedish areas of low socioeconomic status, where most children's school language is their second language. The aim was to better understand what factors influence these children's narrative listening comprehension both in an ideal listening condition (in quiet)…

Introduction: Across the world, mathematical expressions are represented very differently in braille. The aim of this study was (1) to gain an overall insight in mathematical braille notations and (2) to investigate how mathematical braille notations support braille readers in reading and comprehending mathematical expressions. Method: Twenty…

The aim of the study is to investigate trends in academic L1 Swedish and L2 English reading comprehension ability among Swedish adolescents, with a specific focus on 18- to 20-year-olds in the period 2012-2018. The material consists of results from regular tests and anchor tests in the spring administrations of the Swedish Scholastic Assessment…

The interaction between student language use and sensemaking is an area in science learning that needs further elucidation in order to meet government standards in science education. In this study, concept mapping was used to explore the relationship between scientific language use and sensemaking defined as the interaction between the scientific…

This longitudinal study investigated the development of oral narrative skills in monolingual Swedish-speaking children (N = 17). The MAIN Cat/Dog stories were administered at four timepoints between age 4 and 9. Different narrative aspects were found to develop differently. In story comprehension, the children performed high already at T1 (4;4)…

Given young children's frequent use of the internet and the expectations formulated in policy documents such as the Swedish national curriculum, teachers need to promote critical awareness about information found online, even in the earliest years of schooling. Responding to the need for more information about how first-graders understand the…

In this chapter we are interested in how undergraduate physics students in three countries experience the equations they meet in their education. We asked over 350 students in the USA, Australia and Sweden the same simple question: How do you know when you understand a physics equation? Students wrote free-text answers to this question, and these…

Some Swedish schools do not identify and support students with reading difficulties efficiently enough during the first years at school. A longitudinal design was used to examine a multitiered RtI-model for identifying and supporting students at risk of reading difficulties in a Swedish school context. The results demonstrated that the RtI-model…

Organizational frameworks in Swedish schools have resulted in instrumentality and measurability. To literature studies, this has led to a focus on comprehension and proficiency at the expense of aesthetic aspects of fiction-reading. This study examines how teachers in Swedish upper secondary schools relate the aesthetic experience to literature…

This study explores literature reading and reception of narrative texts among Swedish middle school students. Through a written assignment and a think-aloud protocol, students' comprehension and interpretation of narrative texts are investigated. The study shows that Swedish middle school students tend to focus mainly on the plot. The main…

The undeniable importance of reading in higher education prompted this investigation into the reading skills of a group often overlooked in previous research: master's level students studying in English-medium instruction (EMI) environments. Participants (148 master's-level students of engineering) completed the Nelson-Denny Reading Test (Form G),…

Listening to academic lectures in a second language (L2) can be a daunting task, as the listener faces various challenges related to processing the speech stream, prioritizing the importance of information, and deciding when, where and how to take notes. A host of factors can contribute to student comfort in and ability to take "good"…

The importance of reading competence has been increasingly acknowledged in the Swedish educational system, not least through the demands for higher standards in reading in all subjects stated in the national curriculum. Still, in the school year 2018/19, approximately 7% of all Swedish pupils did not achieve the learning goals related to reading…

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effects of a multimodal program, designed for practicing reading, on reading development in struggling readers in two different countries. The research question was whether one specific training method will have a positive effect on pupils' reading development in two different countries with…