I kapitlet undersöks och diskuteras metaspråkets roll för att lärare ska kunna diskutera elevers texter, och i förlängningen kunna skapa goda förutsättningar för alla elevers utveckling av olika typer av skrivande. Lärares samtal om informativa texter skrivna i tidiga skolår undersöktes. Samtalen fördes före och efter en fortbildning om språkliga resurser för att uttrycka, fördjupa och skapa ett sammanhängande innehåll samt för att skapa en relation till en läsare. Den största skillnaden mellan lärarnas samtal före och efter fortbildningen fanns i samtal om hur texterna relaterar till en läsare, där en stor ökning av den metaspråkliga repertoaren syntes. I avslutande textdiskussioner utvecklar lärare också de metaspråkliga begreppen i högre grad genom exemplifieringar och förklaringar i relation till den text som kommenteras, vilket tyder på att metaspråket börjar systematiseras.
This study addresses the question of how different aspects of students’ writing achievement can be recognised and evaluated. We developed a linguistically based framework for criteria-based assessment, anchored in a functional view of language and language learning. The framework was used to determine what traits characterise texts at different Proficiency Groups based on comparative judgement and what traits characterise texts assessed differently. Altogether, 100 texts (written by students ages 6–9) representing four text genres were assessed and ranked using both comparative judgement (holistic assessment) and criteria-based analysis. The results indicate that texts generally are assessed as stronger (i.e., placed in a higher Proficiency Group) when comparative judgement is used than what the assessment of a specific language resource indicates. The results also indicate that assessment differences might be a result of different quality expectations for different genres. This points towards the need for genre- and subject-specific assessment criteria to scaffold students in their emergent disciplinary writing development.
This paper deepens the understanding of conditions for students' subject-specific reading comprehension created through different ways of working with reading in civic education, and the support students thus get to read verbal texts. Motivation for the study is found in an increasing need for knowledge about reading in various school subjects, and theoretical foundation is found in New Literacy Studies and disciplinary literacy. Video recordings were analyzed from lessons in three different schools and six different classes (ca 100h in total). The schools worked with reading in different ways, two schools used different models for teaching reading and one school did not use any particular model. The material was analyzed using thematic content analysis. Seven different functions for reading were identified together with reading materials. Furthermore, we analyzed which text levels were in focus. Results show that the classrooms where teachers work according to special models give clearer support to read and comprehend longer coherent verbal texts by using this type of texts and working with them through a variety of functions for reading activities, activities general for several subjects as well as more subject specific activities.
Den åttonde nordiska konferensen för modersmålsdidaktisk forskning genomfördes den 24–25 november med Uppsala universitet som värd. Deltagare var forskare som anlägger didaktiska perspektiv på svenska, norska och danska – som modersmål, andraspråk och som det språk som används i olika skol- och universitetsämnen. Temat var Ämnesdidaktiska perspektiv på språk och litteratur. I denna volym presenteras artiklar som bygger på två plenarföreläsningar och ett urval av sektionsföredragen.
Research on early school writing has focused primarily on formal aspects of writing, such as spelling, punctuation and various aspects of text structure. Less attention has been given to what distinguishes the content of these early texts and how particular disciplinary content is developed and identified. This study endeavours to examine the subject specific content in early school writing of literary texts with the following research questions: (1) What content is construed in narrative texts written by students in early school years (grades 2-3)? (2) What linguistic resources are used to construe this content? This study offers a model for addressing content aspects of early school writing, giving empirical example of analysis of early narrative writing in primary school. The data consists of two groups of narrative texts written by the same children in school years 2 and 3, in relation to two comparable tasks. Our analytical framework is inspired by Systemic Functional Linguistics and in particular the analytical tool set provided by cohesion and transitivity analyses. We conclude that narrative writing in primary school can mean both to explore a diverse textual world and a more uniform one. We further claim that signs of emerging literary literacy may be detected throughout the analysed data sets by using the text analytic method suggested.
Previous research has pointed out the importance for teachers as well as students to use metalanguage in order to develop writing in school. Few studies have however focused on how teachers talk about content aspects in young students’ informational texts, using formal (technical) as well as informal (non-technical) metalanguage. The main purpose of the present study is therefore to analyze how primary teachers discuss student texts before and after a series of six professional development workshops.Based on research within a social semiotic perspective, the workshops focused linguistic resources to express and develop ideas, create cohesive texts and interact with an audience. During audio recorded discussions, a group of teachers were asked to comment on strengths and weaknesses in two informational texts written by students in grades 2 and 3. In order to investigate the effect of the subsequent training, the same texts were discussed during the first and the last meeting. The analysis shows no difference in the total number of metalinguistic comments before and after the workshops. However, explicit formal metalanguage replaces informal metalanguage to a significant degree. It is also shown that the informal metalanguage to some extent displayed other affordances than the formal metalanguage.
Kritisk literacy har de siste årene blitt mer sentralt både i forskningen og i skolens praksis, i likhet med nært beslektede begreper som kritisk tenking, kritisk lesing og kritisk skriving. Hvordan vi snakker om kritisk literacy er noe forskjellig i de ulike fagene. Både verdenssituasjonen og den gjennomgripende digitaliseringen av de nordiske samfunnene har aktualisert behovet for en kritisk tilnærming, og det har vært ulike drivkrefter for at kritisk literacy har blitt satt på dagsorden i de nordiske skolesystemene i de senere år. Den fornyede forskningsinteressen for kritisk tilnærming gjenspeiles i praksisfeltet og i lærerutdanningene, ikke minst gjennom de rammene for undervisning som læreplaner og forskrifter gir.
Denne introduksjonsartikkelen til temanummeret om kritisk literacy i skolens fag klargjør hva en kritisk tilnærming kan innebære innenfor ulike fagtradisjoner. I temanummerets 12 artikler ses kritisk literacy i sammenheng både med fagenes egne uttrykk og det samfunnet og med de kulturene som fagene kan gi en kritisk tilnærming til, mens her ser vi nærmere på literacy-begrepets utvikling og på hvordan kritisk literacy har vært forstått, først i språkfagene og så i naturfagene og samfunnsfagene.
Vi velger kritisk tilnærming som det overordnede begrepet, og som i ulike fag og situasjoner kan innebære både lesing og skriving, kritisk tenking eller andre praksiser. Dette temanummeret belyser fagspesifikk literacy, og i denne introduksjonsartikkelen ser vi på fagbegrepenes røtter og på hva som forener og hva som skiller de ulike fagenes perspektiver fra hverandre.
In this paper, we aim to explore and exemplify what opportunities to develop disciplinary reading literacy students are given access to in particular types of classroom reading environments in social science subjects. The investigation focuses on how the teacher organizes activities around reading, on what content is approached in text-related discussions and on whose perspectives are allowed space in the classroom discourse. The empirical data consists of classroom observations from two classes in year five and two classes in the Swedish upper secondary school, using different approaches to teaching reading, one being Reading to Learn. With a theoretical base in systemic functional linguistics (SFL), dialogism and reception theory, the classroom discourse was analysed in terms of sequential reading stages, text movability and dialogicality. The findings reveal how differently organized reading environments provide different support structures for students’ disciplinary reading. For example, the findings indicate that text activities that support the reading process in several stages bring about a larger potential for the development of reading literacy. However, the picture changes depending on to what extent students are given room to express their reception of the text, and thereby contribute to an active understanding of text in a dialogical classroom.
We report on results from using the multivariate readability model SVIT to classify texts into various levels. We investigate how the language features integrated in the SVIT model can be transformed to values on known criteria like vocabulary, grammatical fluency and propositional knowledge. Such text criteria, sensitive to content, readability and genre in combination with the profile of a student’s reading ability form the base to individually adapted texts. The procedure of levelling texts into different stages of complexity is presented along with results from the first cycle of tests conducted on 8th grade students. The results show that SVIT can be used to classify texts into different complexity levels.
We report results from ongoing research on developing sophisticated measures for assessing a student’s reading ability and a tool for the student and teacher to create a profile of this ability. In the project we will also investigate how these measures can be transformed to values on known criteria like vocabulary, grammatical fluency and so forth, and how these can be used to analyse texts. Such text criteria, sensitive to content, readability and genre in combination with the profile of a student’s reading ability will form the base to individually adapted texts. Techniques and tools will be developed for selecting suitable texts, automatic summarisation of texts and automatic transformation to easy-to-read Swedish.
We present T-MASTER, a tool for assessing students’ reading skills on a variety of dimensions. T-MASTERuses sophisticated measures for assessing a student’s reading comprehension and vocabulary understanding.Texts are selected based on their difficulty using novel readability measures and tests are created based on thetexts. The results are analyzed in T-MASTER, and the numerical results are mapped to textual descriptionsthat describe the student’s reading abilities on the dimensions being analysed. These results are presented tothe teacher in a form that is easily comprehensible, and lends itself to inspection of each individual student’sresults.
The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of intervention, combining instruction in cooperative learning and reading comprehension strategies on students’ reading comprehension in grade 5. The teachers in the experiment group implemented the intervention while the teachers in the control group received training in reading comprehension strategies and taught as usual. Students in the experiment group and control group participated in tests of reading comprehension before and after the intervention. The results showed that being a part of the experiment group did not lead to greater gains in reading comprehension above the control group. Students of teachers who did not fully implement the intervention attained higher scores on reading comprehension than students in the control group. Students of teachers who fully implemented the intervention, on the other hand, received lower scores. The results are discussed with regard to research on teachers’ integration of intervention into their instructional routines.
Läsande och skrivande av olika typer av texter är oerhört betydelsefullt för lärandet i alla skolämnen. När man lär sig något inom ett ämnesområde, innebär det också att man lär sig tala, läsa och skriva på ett nytt sätt. Det är framför allt så man får visa upp den kunskap man erövrat. Man förväntas exempelvis lära sig matematikens, fysikens, historieämnets och idrottsämnets språk. För många elever innebär det att de möter och förväntas gå in i ett för dem helt nytt och okänt sätt att uttrycka sig. Det är ett kulturmöte som för en del inte alltid är helt problemfritt. Frågor om elevers språk-, läs- och skrivutveckling och därmed om deras kunskapsutveckling står med andra ord högt upp på skolans agenda.I den här boken behandlas läs- och skrivundervisningen inom olika ämnesområden i framför allt grundskolans mellanår. I de olika kapitlen ger författarna redskap för att utforska läs- och skrivundervisningens grunder, texter och skrivuppgifter, samtalande, läsande och skrivande samt vilka kunskaper och tidigare läs- och skriverfarenheter eleverna men också lärarna själva har med sig in i skolarbetet. Med hjälp av utforskandet ges läraren möjlighet att utmana och utveckla sin egen undervisning. Boken vänder sig till blivande och verksamma lärare i grundskolan, i synnerhet till dem som arbetar med barn i åldrarna 9-13 år.
Previous research has shown that teachers’ knowledge of a functional metalanguage plays a central role in supporting students’ writing development. However, only a few of these studies have focused on primary school teachers and their use of metalanguage in various text types. The aim of this study was to investigate how primary school teachers talk about young students’ (ages 7–9) narrative and informational texts before and after taking part in professional development workshops presenting different language resources and accompanying metalanguage. These resources represent a broader view of language than the more formal tradition offered to primary school teachers in Sweden. The results showed that after participating in the workshops, the teachers had broadened their repertoires concerning what aspects they talk about and how they talk about them; that is, their talks became more text-specific and extensive, and they used a formal metalanguage to a greater extent. These results are discussed in relation to the tradition of writing instruction used in primary grades in Sweden and the teachers’ pathways to broadening their repertoire of metalanguage. Also discussed is the potential a broader language view in early grades may have in supporting students’ writing development throughout their school years.
Previous research has highlighted how young people struggle to distinguishnews from misinformation. In this study, we investigate how ca. 400 students determine the trustworthiness of false, biased and credible news.We find that students use different strategies depending on what they evaluate. For example, students who fail to debunk a manipulated image often rely on what they see in the image in contrast to students who determine credibility upon what is not in the image. Students finding junk news credible may have special problems separating different kinds of sources. We identify potentials and pitfalls among students important for further investigation, research and a focus on in education.
In this study, we investigate how ca. 400 students, age 16-19, determine the trustworthiness of false, biased and credible news. We examine their justifications of their assessments of the credibility with regard to the source (who?), the content (what?), the design (how?) and the underlying purposes (why?). We find that students’ patterns of justifications can be linked to different assessments. For example, students finding junk news credible may have special problems separating different kinds of sources. Students who fail to debunk a manipulated image often rely on what they see in the image in contrast to students who determine credibility upon what is not in the image. We also find that test-items used in previous research can be linked to aspects of civic online reasoning not identified in previous research. We identify complex potentials and pitfalls among students important for education and further research.