Swedish Elementary School Research Articles

Exploring students’ conceptual understanding through mathematical problem solving: students’ use of and shift between different representations of rational numbers

ABSTRACT One way to stimulate conceptual considerations is through mathematical problem solving, which requires students to construct new solution methods, potentially including new representations. Hence, this study focuses on students’ use of and shift between representations during problem solving, specifically regarding the fundamental and often challenging concept of rational numbers. Swedish elementary school students were observed when tackling mathematical problems in pairs. The findings revealed that the students’ considerations concerned several conceptual properties of rational numbers through the use of different representations. However, students tended to use the representations presented in the problem, favouring the most familiar representation rather than constructing their own. As a result, they may have overlooked opportunities to explore a wider range of representations which could have deepened their understanding of the concept. This suggests a potential opportunity to design problems that require students to transfer between representations and grapple with unfamiliar ones.

A cluster-randomized controlled trial of a teacher-coaching intervention: a pilot study aimed at supporting classroom climate and student development

ABSTRACT This pilot study examined the utility of a practice-based coaching (PBC) intervention in Swedish elementary schools designed to support the classroom climate and benefit students. The intervention involved activities, self-assessment, observation, and coaching to the teachers, with the aim of improving the classroom climate and students’ self-concept, prosocial behavior, well-being, and academic achievement. The design was a cluster randomized trial with the school as the assignment unit. Participants in the intervention were 66 students in four classes, and in the control, four classes with 77 students. The duration of the intervention was five months. An autoregressive structural equation model was estimated. The correlations between the latent variables at pre-test ranged from low to high. There were significant standardized path coefficients concerning all the latent variables pre- and post-test. The estimates of the intervention at the post-test were non-significant. The results suggested a longer duration of the intervention with more frequent coaching sessions, which may enhance its effect.

Adolescents’ perspectives on SSWs’ counselling practice in Swedish elementary schools: “plumb the depths and navigate to shore”

PurposeThis study aims to gain a comprehensive understanding of adolescent’s experiences of individual school social work counselling in Swedish elementary schools.Design/methodology/approachThe study encompasses interviews with 16 adolescents about their experiences of individual counselling with school social workers (SSWs). The data was analysed using conventional content analysis.FindingsThe main result was the adolescents’ desire “to navigate to shore” to speak freely about their whole lives with a professional SSW and find a “ safe haven,” […] where a trusting professional cared for and comforted them in counselling. The counselling contact contributed to increased knowledge about oneself. The results reveal the importance of the SSWs paying attention and listening to the adolescents’ narratives. The creation of a coherent life narrative enables to finally end counselling and “Cast off.”Originality/valueThe results highlight the importance of Swedish SSWs focusing on individual counselling sessions with adolescents to provide a setting for growth.

School Social Work in Sweden—Who are the Children in Counselling, and What Support are They Offered? A Protocol Study About Individual Counselling in Elementary Schools

AbstractThe overall aim of the present study is to describe and explore the characteristics and content of school social worker’s (SSWs) individual counselling with children as these are imprinted in session protocols collected at Swedish elementary schools. Specific focus is placed on the character of the children’s concerns, the content of the SSW’s helping strategies, and challenges related to the alliance between the SSW and the children as experienced by the SSW. The study was based on data from a survey protocol of 20 SSW’s daily practice regarding their experiences in counselling children and adolescents. The data consisted of 193 protocols from the same number of unique individual sessions. Data were analysed through quantitative descriptive statistics. The data also contained a large proportion of open-ended textual answers, which were analysed through a qualitative summative content analysis. The counselling strategies were primarily divided into three parts, namely coaching, processing, and assessing. The most common practice elements used included elements of empowerment, alliance and relationship, and hope and trust. In counselling children, SSWs identified a broad range of problems in children’s overall lives. Many children suffered from their home situations, which also impinged upon the SSWs, who were affected by the children’s life narrative. Our results can help inform SSW policy and practices as SSWs assist vulnerable children through individual counselling that corresponds to their help-seeking behaviour and by offering a space for alliances and relationships.

Do principals discriminate against school parents less when having close minority colleagues? A field experiment

ABSTRACT Interethnic contacts are generally assumed to reduce discrimination and prejudice. According to this optimistic view – and in conflict with Allport’s well-known theory – contacts have positive effects even when they are rather distant. However, findings of recent experimental field research indirectly cast doubt on this belief. To our knowledge, this is the first field experiment thoroughly investigating close as well as more distant contacts simultaneously. In a correspondence study (n = 3015), Swedish elementary school principals were randomly contacted by fictional parents with Arabic- or Swedish-sounding names asking school-related questions. The unique design also used registry data (e.g., on ethnicity). The results support Allport’s more pessimistic view: working closely with minority members of school management was associated with lower levels of ethnic discrimination regarding important qualitative aspects of the principals’ communication with the school parents, but no such pattern was observed for more distant workplace contacts with minority teachers.

Elementary students’ ‘outdoor – digital’ explorations in ecology - learning through chains of transduction

This article illustrates a research project in a Swedish elementary school where young students are engaged in a project on ecology. Species, digital resources and nature contribute to place-based exploration of ecological issues, relevant in learning for sustainability. Since children grow up in a digital era, their meaning-making is transversed by oral, digital and physical modes. By launching the terms relations, gaps, stand fast and chain of transduction as an analytical apparatus and connecting video ethnography to pragmatic theory and multimodal analysis, we contribute to the body of knowledge on students’ participation and meaning-making featured in digital and physical representations. Specifically, ecological and sustainability learning takes place in the transduction displaying students’ drawings, texts, digital images and biological arrangements. The article concludes with several education concerns: the teacher’s responsibility in supporting agency-processes, the growth of ecological literacy in a blurred ‘digital-ecology’ environment and the educational need to support students’ attachments and care for the living and nonliving.

“You Talk and Try to Think, Together” – A Case Study of a Student Diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder Participating in Philosophical Dialogues

AbstractWe present results from a single case study based on semi-structured interviews with a student (a boy in school year 3) diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder and his school staff after participating in a short and small-scale intervention carried out in a socio-economically disadvantaged Swedish elementary school in 2019. The student participated in a seven week long long intervention with a total of 12 philosophical dialogues (ranging from 45 to 60 minutes). Two facilitators, both with years of facilitation experience and teacher degree and at least BA in philosophy, facilitated the majority of the dialogues, mainly followed a ”routine” procedure. The student was interviewed in direct connection to the end of the intervention about his experiences from the dialogues and his perceptions about wether and how the dialogues had influenced him. The student’s two teachers, who had participated in the dialogues as participants, were interviewed as a pair, also in direct connection to the end of the intervention, while the school principal was interviewed two years after the study. These staff interviews concerned the staff’s experiences of the influence of the dialogues on the students within the intervention as well as transfer effects to other contexts in school. The data from the study include detailed elaborations from a student perspective of different effects on the student’s communicative and cognitive development, which are in several respects supported also by staff reports. The results show that the student was able, interested, and willing to participate in philosophical dialogues, and our data point to several positive outcomes for the student in the communicative and cognitive domains.

Therapist, Intermediary or Garbage Can? Examining Professional Challenges for School Social Work in Swedish Elementary Schools

The overall aim of this article is to describe and analyse critical components that influence the role and performance of school social workers in the Swedish elementary school. Special attention will be paid to aspects related to formal regulations, professional self-understanding, and SSWs’ role in the interplay between professional domains involved in elementary school.

Educationalising Death: The Emergence of Traffic Education in Swedish Elementary Schools

When a social problem is educationalised, i.e. formulated as a responsibility for educational institutions, knowledge becomes a solution for societal ills. This article examines the history of traffic education in Swedish elementary schools as a particular form of knowledge. Focusing on the three first decades of traffic education, the ambition is to delve deeper into the issue of what constituted traffic knowledge during a period of mass motorisation. In teaching about traffic, what were the main things that had to be conveyed? What were the main challenges in teaching the essentials of traffic, and what techniques were used to make traffic possible to understand for an audience of children? Drawing on handbooks for teachers and textbooks in traffic education, the article discusses five forms of knowledge that were used in traffic education: knowledge about risk, juridical knowledge, visual knowledge, moral knowledge, and practical knowledge.

“I’m Often Alone”: An Ethnographic Study of School Loneliness and Bullying in a Swedish Elementary School

BackgroundDespite extensive work to prevent and reduce bullying interactions, bullying is still a prevalent problem in many schools. Children and youth also report that they feel involuntarily left out in school. While research has demonstrated the ways in which school bullying is connected to risk factors across different ecological layers or contexts, relatively little consideration has been given to aspects beyond the individuals directly involved in bullying situations, such as the exo, and macrosystem layers.ObjectiveThe aim of this study was to examine three pupils’ experiences of school loneliness and bullying. The following questions guided the study: (1) What are the pupils’ experiences of school loneliness and bullying? (2) How can the pupils’ experiences of school loneliness and bullying be understood beyond the individuals directly involved in the bullying situations?MethodThe research is based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted at one Swedish elementary school including 34 pupils and 7 teachers in two sixth-grade classes (i.e., ages 11–12). The findings presented in this article are based on a group interview with three pupils about their experiences of school loneliness and bullying. The interview responses are put into perspective using findings from the ethnographic fieldwork. The findings were analysed using methods from constructivist grounded theory and through the lens of Bronfenbrenner’s ecological theory of human development as well as critical bullying studies.ResultsThe findings of this study demonstrate the ways bullying interactions are tied to the different layers, or “settings”, of the bullying ecology as the pupils draw from a range of differential points of reference so as to socially evaluate themselves, their classmates, and their peers.ConclusionsAn important conclusion of the study is for principals, teachers, and other school personnel to consider more thoroughly the interdependent interplay of the bullying ecology.

Materiality, Wallcharts, and Educational Change in Sweden from the Mid-nineteenth to the Early Twentieth Century

This article investigates the dissemination of wall charts as an instructional technology in the subjects of history, geography, natural science, and geometry in elementary schools in Sweden, particularly in the Uppsala diocese from 1861 to 1910. Previous research lacks empirical analyses of the charts’ actual dissemination, making this case study of Sweden a valuable contribution to the fields of material culture and the visual aspects of schooling in the history of education. Using school inspector reports, protocols from national inspector meetings, and national and regional pedagogical statistics, the article provides empirical evidence of the active work of school inspectors and state initiatives that contributed to the widespread dissemination and use of wall charts in Swedish elementary schools by 1910.

Self-Concept, Prosocial School Behaviors, Well-Being, and Academic Skills in Elementary School Students: A Whole-Child Perspective

Whole-child development focuses on supporting not only academic but also social emotional skills. This cross-sectional study’s aim was to examine the associations between the child-rated self-concept and well-being, teacher-rated prosocial school behaviors, and academic skills (as measured by child performance tasks) and to examine if there were group differences by gender for these constructs. The sample was 143 s grade students (M age = 8 years old). The results indicate that self-concept correlated highly with well-being and moderately with prosocial behaviors, while academic skills correlated moderately with prosocial behaviors. The results also show that the boys had lower average prosocial behavior (teacher-rated) and self-concept (child-rated) ratings relative to the girls. The findings indicate that prosocial behavior, well-being, and self-concept can be measured in psychometrically sound and practically meaningful ways in Swedish elementary schools. Because many of the socioemotional and behavioral constructs were correlated with academic skills, these constructs could be important targets for early academic support interventions inspired by a whole-child approach.

Relations between school bullying, friendship processes, and school context

ABSTRACT Background Despite considerable anti–bullying efforts and greater awareness of the social processes underpinning bullying, bullying is still a serious problem across schools in many countries. In exploring the social processes that contribute to school bullying, research indicates complex relationships between bullying and the maintenance and building of friendships. While such findings provide important information about the social context of school bullying, more needs to be understood about the institutional context within which school bullying – and friendship – occur. Purpose The aim of this study is to better understand how school bullying relates to friendship processes, and how these are, in turn, influenced by the institutional constraints of the school context. Method The findings discussed draw on 3 months of ethnographic fieldwork conducted at one Swedish elementary school. The fieldwork involved participant observations, as well as semi–structured group interviews with 34 sixth-grade pupils (approx. 12 years of age), which were conducted towards the end of the fieldwork. Data were analysed thematically. Findings The analysis highlighted the importance of friendships to pupils but also identified the ways in which understandings of friendship relations were closely tied to the importance of social perceptions and the organisational constraints of the school context. Conclusions Taken together, the findings suggest that school bullying cannot be de–contextualised from the social and institutional contexts of school but may rather be connected to the perceived need for control in that particular arena. The study draws attention to how the complex relations between bullying, friendship and school context need to be better understood, in order to support efforts to prevent school bullying.

The effects of implicit biases on real-life client discrimination among public officials

Discriminatory behavior is often assumed to partly be a result of implicit or unconscious biases. However, to my knowledge, no published experimental studies exist on the presence of such attitudes among public officials such as teachers or police officers and the related effects on real-life client discrimination. This study attempts to fill this research gap by combining a field experiment that captures ethnic discrimination among principals with an implicit attitude test (IAT) capturing their implicit attitudes toward Arab parents. The results suggest that Swedish elementary school principals have a moderately negative implicit bias toward Arabs according to the IAT. However, their implicit associations do not appear to drive the differential treatment of clients to a significant degree. Hence, implicit biases as captured by the IAT may possibly not be the most significant drivers of ethnic discrimination today among public officials.

School inspection and state-initiated professionalisation of elementary school teachers in Sweden, 1861–1910

ABSTRACT This paper examines the role of school inspection in the early (1861–1910) professionalisation of Swedish elementary school teachers. International research on school inspection has focused on educational reform, but rarely on the role of inspection in teachers’ theoretical and practical development. The paper’s theoretical assumption is that school inspection was initiated by the Swedish state as part of its effort to professionalise teaching in the 1860s. Using inspectors’ reports, the paper examines two specific areas: (1) the quality of teaching observed in the classroom and inspectors’ recommendations for improvement, and (2) the development of teachers’ seminars and continuous pedagogic development. The results demonstrate that, although faced with various challenges, inspectors contributed to teacher development, indicating the benefit of state intervention in elementary school education.

The counselling practice of school social workers in Swedish elementary schools. A focus group study

ABSTRACT This article describes the counselling practice of school social workers (SSWs) with individual children. The work of SSWs is mainly about helping children and adolescents who for various reasons suffer from mental ill-health, school absenteeism or stress that make them unable to achieve their intended goals. SSWs preferably meet these children in individual counselling sessions. The aim of this article is to describe and analyse SSWs’ experience of counselling with children and to examine the characteristics of counselling practice. The data collection was conducted through four semi-structured focus group interviews with a total of 22 SSWs in four different regions in Sweden. SSWs provide counselling to children in order to bring about improved feelings or behavioural changes. It can be noted that SSWs put emphasis on both the counselling process and the alliance with the child. The interviews showed a common practice among SSWs regarding the structure of the counselling sessions, with certain steps and approaches being employed. However, the specific interventions differed and were characterized by an eclectic standpoint in which SSWs utilize a broad repertoire of therapeutic schools and techniques. Furthermore, a relational perspective emerged as a most prominent focus for the SSWs by re-emerging throughout the material. We believe that SSWs could benefit from theoretical perspectives on ‘contextual model’ and ‘attachment theory’ as ‘models of the mind’. Being emotionally close to the child and being able to follow their development requires a lot from SSWs, as both professional caregivers and as ‘safe havens’.

Are more affluent parents treated more favourably by elementary school principals? Socioeconomic discrimination among local Swedish public officials

ABSTRACT This article argues that previous public administration and political science research might have missed important class-based inequalities by primarily focusing on ethnic discrimination among public officials and ignoring discrimination based on socioeconomic status (SES). A large-scale field experiment on the presence of SES discrimination among local Swedish public officials is presented. A total of 3430 Swedish elementary school principals were randomly contacted by parents with low- or high-SES professions and with Arabic- or Swedish-sounding names. The fictional parents were considering moving to the municipality and were interested in placing their children at the school. The results show clear signs of SES discrimination, particularly in regard to the more qualitative aspects of the replies. The findings also show interactions between SES and ethnicity, in which primarily the more formal aspects of the replies suggested that SES discrimination could be more prevalent against ethnic minority aliases than against other aliases.

Elementary Students’ First Approach to Computational Thinking and Programming

Digital competence and programming are actively highlighted areas in education worldwide. They are becoming part of curricula all over the world, including the Swedish elementary school curriculum, Children are expected to develop computational thinking through programming activities, mainly in mathematics—which are supposed to be based on both proven experience and scientific grounds. Both are lacking in the lower grades of elementary school. This article gives unique insight into pupils’ learning during the first programming lessons based on a group of Swedish pupils’ experiences when entering school. The goal of the article is to inform education policy and practice. The large interdisciplinary, longitudinal research project studies approximately 1500 students aged 6–16 and their teachers over three years, using video documentation, questionnaires, and focus group interviews. This article reports on empirical data collected during the first year in one class with 30 pupils aged 6–7 years. The social semiotic, multimodal theoretical framework “Design for Learning” is used to investigate potential signs of learning in pupils’ multimodal representations when they, for example, use block programming in the primary and secondary transformation unit. We show that young pupils have positive attitudes to programming and high self-efficacy, and that pupils’ signs of learning in programming are multimodal and often visible in social interactions.

Relational competence regarding students with ADHD – An intervention study with in-service teachers

ABSTRACT Research suggests that supportive teacher–student relationships are a prerequisite for student development. Developing such relationships requires teachers to observe, interpret, and reflect on teacher–student interactions and on teachers’ relational competence in practice. Although teacher–student relationships are especially challenging with students with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), few studies have examined how these relationships develop. In this qualitative study, teachers from two Swedish elementary schools comprising one intervention (n = 33) and one control group (n = 20) completed pre- and post-tests in which they analysed videos of teacher–student interactions. We explored how the teachers understood relational competence in relation to students with ADHD before and after the video-based intervention, which included a presentation on the concept of relational competence and a model for analysing such competence. Our findings suggest that the intervention promoted teacher development regarding relational competence. Compared with the pre-test period, participants i) used more nuanced relational language, ii) substantiated their claims with concrete cues regarding interpersonal communication, and iii) adopted both teacher and student perspectives regarding the relationship. Finally, new understanding regarding relational competence was combined with knowledge regarding the importance of teacher sensitivity and responsiveness when working with students with ADHD.

Spaces for translanguaging in mother tongue tuition

ABSTRACT The aim of this article is to generate knowledge about an MTT classroom in a Swedish elementary school and how MTT is positioned as a safe space for translanguaging. By studying a school context as a potential translanguaging space, our focus is mainly on two dimensions of space: the physical, including the material space of MTT, and the social, including safe spaces in MTT. The material is mainly from one selected Kurdish MTT classroom, in the form of field notes from lesson observations, photographs in the classroom interior, video recordings co-created with the MTT teacher. This classroom may be perceived as a space where Kurdish dominates, while being included in a Swedish-dominant school setting. This Kurdish space has borders that are physical and related to the scheduled lesson in the specific classroom. Both students and the teacher pass the door and through this shift language practices. Linguistic landscaping as a method, in combination with the collective reflection between the researcher and teacher, added another dimension to the study of MTT. Schoolscaping made language hierarchies and the language policy of the school concrete and visible.