FinELib - lisensioinnin rakenteellisen kehittämisen pilotit

Esitys FinELibin aineistopäivässä 2011

E-kirjat Helsingin yliopiston kirjastossa

Esitys FinELibin aineistopäivässä 2011

Kurssikirjat verkkoon: oppia e-muodossa

Esitys FinELibin aineistopäivässä 2011

Ajankohtaista e-kirjoista yleisissä kirjastoissa

Esitys FinELibin aineistopäivässä 2011

Lisensoitujen aineistojen käyttö

Esitys FinELibin aineistopäivässä 2011

FinElibin kysely tutkijoille

Esitys FinELibin aineistopäivässä 2011

Ulkoistettu tutkimuslaitoskirjasto

Esitys FinELibin aineistopäivässä 2011

Turun yliopiston osaorganisaatiopilotin tulokset

Esitys FinELibin aineistopäivässä 2011

Nuoret luupin alla – koulukysely: 6.- ja 9.-luokkalaisten hyvinvointi, osallisuus ja vaikutusmahdollisuudet Varsinais-Suomessa

Käsillä oleva raportti on vuonna 2008 toteutetun 6.- ja 9.-luokkalaisten varsinaissuomalaisten lasten ja nuorten valtaa, vaikutusvaltaa, hyvinvointia ja osallisuutta laajasti selvittäneen tutkimushankkeen loppuraportti. Hanketta on rahoittanut Länsi-Suomen lääninhallitus ja sen on toteuttanut kokonaisuudessaan Turun yliopiston alaisuudessa toimiva Turun lapsi- ja nuorisotutkimuskeskus. Hankkeen vastuuhenkilönä toimi tutkimuskoordinaattori Leena Haanpää ja käytännön toteutuksesta hänen lisäkseen vastasivat tutkija Mervi Tiensuu-Tsiopoulos, amanuenssi Camilla Ehrs sekä tutkimusjohtaja Hanna Lagström.Tutkimusaineiston tilastollisesta käsittelystä vastasi statistikko Anne Kaljonen. Tutkimustietoa lasten ja nuorten elämästä tarvitaan niin päätöksenteon, lasten ja nuorten kanssa työtään tekevien toiminnan tueksi kuin lasten ja nuorten oman äänen esiin saamiseksi. On tärkeää saada tietoa siitä, miten nuoret kokevat siirtymävaiheet esimerkiksi alakoulusta yläkouluun tai yläkoulusta toisen asteen koulutukseen. Mitä muutoksia nuoressa ja hänen suhteissaan vanhempiin, ikätovereihin ja yhteiskuntaan tapahtuu nuoren edetessä koulutaipaleella? Onko muutos samanlaista tytöillä ja pojilla tai suomen- ja ruotsinkielisillä? Panostukset lasten ja nuorten elämään tässä hetkessä kantavat hedelmää tulevaisuuden aikuisten hyvinvoinnille. Perusta elämälle luodaan lapsuudessa ja nuoruudessa, sillä elämäntavat, koulutuspäätökset ja sitä kautta aikuisuuden elämänura rakennetaan nuorena. Tämä Turun lapsi- ja nuorisotutkimuskeskuksen raportti nostaa esille lasten ja nuorten oma äänen monilta elämänalueilta. Toistaiseksi suomalaisten nuorten aikuisten elämää laajasti kartoittavaa tutkimusta on tehty vielä vähän. Siksi Nuoret luupin alla -tutkimushanketta on tarkoitus jatkaa laajentamalla sitä toisen asteen oppilaitoksissa toteutettavaksi, sillä aikuisuuden kynnyksellä olevien nuorten äänen kuuleminen on myös tarpeen.

Integrating environmental education in primary school education in Tanzania : teachers’ perceptions and teaching practices

The study focuses on primary school teachers’ perceptions of environmental education, its integration into primary school education and teachers’ teaching practices in Tanzania. The thesis is based on empirical research. The theoretical underpinnings of the study are based on Palmer’s (1998) model of environmental education. According to the model, meaningful environmental education should include education about, in or through and for the environment. The study is supported by national and international literature from research done on environmental education and education for sustainable development and policy statements. The study is qualitative in nature, adopting phenomenography and phenomenology as points of departure. The empirical data was collected from four primary schools in Morogoro region in Tanzania. The study sample consisted of 31 primary school teachers. Data was collected through interviews and lesson observations. According to the results of the study, primary school teachers expressed variations in their perceptions of environmental education and education for sustainable development. Most of the teachers focused on the aspect of knowledge acquisition. According to Tanzanian education and training policy, environmental education has to be integrated into all subjects. Although there is environmental education in the primary school curriculum, it is not integrated on an equal footing in all subjects. Some subjects like science, social studies and geography have more environmental content than other subjects. Teachers claim that the approach used to integrate environmental education into the school curriculum was not favoured because many claimed that what is to be taught as environmental education in the various subjects is not shown clearly. As a result, many teachers suggested that to ensure that it is taught properly it should be included in the curriculum as an independent subject or as specific topics. The study revealed that teachers’ teaching practices in integrating environmental education varied from one subject to another. Although most of the teachers said that they used participatory methods, lesson observations showed that they limited themselves to question and answer and group discussion. However, the teachers faced a number of barriers in the teaching of environmental education, some of which include lack of teaching and learning resources, time and large class size. The role of teachers in the implementation of environmental education in developing an environmentally literate citizenry is of great significance. The responsibility of the government in developing a curriculum with clear goals and content, developing teachers’ capacity in the teaching of environmental education and provision of teaching and learning materials needs to be taken seriously by the government in educational plans and programs.

Immateriellt kulturarv som begrepp och process : folkloristiska perspektiv på kulturarv i Finlands svenskbygder med folkmusik som exempel

Cultural heritage has become something of an in-word in recent times. Intangible cultural heritage, however, is a category that has received relatively little attention. This folkloristic study focuses on intangible cultural heritage as concept and as process. Folkloristics as a scholarly branch emphasizes non-material culture. Consequently, there is a big potential in bringing existing knowledge of folklore together with current scholarly theories concerning cultural heritage in order to expand the understanding of intangible cultural heritage. In this thesis cultural heritage is regarded as a symbolic construct, which is spoken of and discussed in specific ways. The study of intangible cultural heritage (Swe. kulturarv) as concept focuses on this area. For a cultural component to be experienced as intangible cultural heritage it is, however, not enough to discuss it in those terms. Instead, cultural heritage status needs to be acted out during lengthy processes. This is demonstrated by the study of intangible cultural heritage as process. As a consequence performativity appears crucial to an understanding of cultural heritage – when a sufficient number of people speak and act as if a cultural component has a special status, it will also be perceived as cultural heritage. In this dissertation intangible cultural heritage is studied through cultural analysis, more specifically through discourse analysis. The usage of the concept intangible cultural heritage within cultural organizations, in scholarly use and in the Swedish-speaking press in Finland is examined. Traditional music in the Swedish-speaking districts of Finland is used as a case study of intangible cultural heritage as process. The examination concerns how traditional music, an intangible cultural component, has been discussed, transformed, standardized and objectified in a cultural heritage process. Cultural heritage is generally used as a token of value so that certain cultural components, both intangible and tangible, which are discussed in terms of cultural heritage are perceived to be valuable and should therefore be safeguarded. Intangible cultural heritage depends on performance, that is practitioners use their bodies to act out their traditional knowledge through song, handicraft, storytelling and so on. Intangible cultural components can be transmitted to other individuals in a performance situation, and they can also be documented. In Finland documentation and subsequent filing in archives have been associated with safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage. If the aim of safeguarding is to uphold traditional practices, which is the case for among others UNESCO’s programs aimed at intangible cultural heritage, other efforts are called for: forms of safeguarding that support performance and transmission.

Identifying first graders at risk of reading and writing difficulties : creating a group-based screening tool in kiswahili in Tanzania

Early identification of beginning readers at risk of developing reading and writing difficulties plays an important role in the prevention and provision of appropriate intervention. In Tanzania, as in other countries, there are children in schools who are at risk of developing reading and writing difficulties. Many of these children complete school without being identified and without proper and relevant support. The main language in Tanzania is Kiswahili, a transparent language. Contextually relevant, reliable and valid instruments of identification are needed in Tanzanian schools. This study aimed at the construction and validation of a group-based screening instrument in the Kiswahili language for identifying beginning readers at risk of reading and writing difficulties. In studying the function of the test there was special interest in analyzing the explanatory power of certain contextual factors related to the home and school. Halfway through grade one, 337 children from four purposively selected primary schools in Morogoro municipality were screened with a group test consisting of 7 subscales measuring phonological awareness, word and letter knowledge and spelling. A questionnaire about background factors and the home and school environments related to literacy was also used. The schools were chosen based on performance status (i.e. high, good, average and low performing schools) in order to include variation. For validation, 64 children were chosen from the original sample to take an individual test measuring nonsense word reading, word reading, actual text reading, one-minute reading and writing. School marks from grade one and a follow-up test half way through grade two were also used for validation. The correlations between the results from the group test and the three measures used for validation were very high (.83-.95). Content validity of the group test was established by using items drawn from authorized text books for reading in grade one. Construct validity was analyzed through item analysis and principal component analysis. The difficulty level of most items in both the group test and the follow-up test was good. The items also discriminated well. Principal component analysis revealed one powerful latent dimension (initial literacy factor), accounting for 93% of the variance. This implies that it could be possible to use any set of the subtests of the group test for screening and prediction. The K-Means cluster analysis revealed four clusters: at-risk children, strugglers, readers and good readers. The main concern in this study was with the groups of at-risk children (24%) and strugglers (22%), who need the most assistance. The predictive validity of the group test was analyzed by correlating the measures from the two school years and by cross tabulating grade one and grade two clusters. All the correlations were positive and very high, and 94% of the at-risk children in grade two were already identified in the group test in grade one. The explanatory power of some of the home and school factors was very strong. The number of books at home accounted for 38% of the variance in reading and writing ability measured by the group test. Parents´ reading ability and the support children received at home for schoolwork were also influential factors. Among the studied school factors school attendance had the strongest explanatory power, accounting for 21% of the variance in reading and writing ability. Having been in nursery school was also of importance. Based on the findings in the study a short version of the group test was created. It is suggested for use in the screening processes in grade one aiming at identifying children at risk of reading and writing difficulties in the Tanzanian context. Suggestions for further research as well as for actions for improving the literacy skills of Tanzanian children are presented.

The effectiveness of short-term literacy skills intervention on children at risk of reading and writing difficulties in Tanzania : a study of grade one children with dynamic assessment approach

The aim of the study was to create and evaluate an intervention programme for Tanzanian children from a low-income area who are at risk of reading and writing difficulties. The learning difficulties, including reading and writing difficulties, are likely to be behind many of the common school problems in Tanzania, but they are not well understood, and research is needed. The design of the study included an identification and intervention phase with follow-up. A group based dynamic assessment approach was used in identifying children at risk of difficulties in reading and writing. The same approach was used in the intervention. The study was a randomized experiment with one experimental and two control groups. For the experimental and the control groups, a total of 96 (46 girls and 50 boys) children from grade one were screened out of 301 children from two schools in a low income urban area of Dar-es-Salaam. One third of the children, the experimental group, participated in an intensive training programme in literacy skills for five weeks, six hours per week, aimed at promoting reading and writing ability, while the children in the control groups had a mathematics and art programme. Follow-up was performed five months after the intervention. The intervention programme and the tests were based on the Zambian BASAT (Basic Skill Assessment Tool, Ketonen & Mulenga, 2003), but the content was drawn from the Kiswahili school curriculum in Tanzania. The main components of the training and testing programme were the same, only differing in content. The training process was different from traditional training in Tanzanian schools in that principles of teaching and training in dynamic assessment were followed. Feedback was the cornerstone of the training and the focus was on supporting the children in exploring knowledge and strategies in performing the tasks. The experimental group improved significantly more (p = .000) than the control groups during the intervention from pre-test to follow-up (repeated measures ANOVA). No differences between the control groups were noticed. The effect was significant on all the measures: phonological awareness, reading skills, writing skills and overall literacy skills. A transfer effect on school marks in Kiswahili and English was found. Following a discussion of the results, suggestions for further research and adaptation of the programme are presented.