This paper traces the presentation of these traditional minority groups in Finland and the emergence of literature incorporating the more recently arrived groups of immigrants in the history of Finnish language children’s literature. We contextualize the development of multicultural themes in children’s literature within the history of Finnish nation-building and the country’s struggles for independence. We conclude with a brief consideration of how these less than ideal books might, nevertheless, serve to promote pluralism.

Boken ser på betingelsene for psykososial trivsel for barn i de fire landene i Barentsregionen - Norge, Sverige, Finland og Russland. Forfatterne gir teoretiske perspektiver på barns trivsel, og ser på hvordan disse kan overføres til praksis i skolehverdagen. Eksempler på vellykkede undervisningsopplegg gjennomført i skoler i Nordområdene er nøye beskrevet, slik at de kan være til inspirasjon for andre. Boken egner seg for lærere, pedagoger og beslutningstakere som ønsker å skape et læringsmiljø som fremmer vekst og utvikling, med vekt på psykososial trivsel og flerkulturelt samarbeid. Boken er et resultat av forskningsprosjektet ArctiChilden

Crystals of Schoolchildren's Well-Being is an investigative experiment carried out in four countries, involving a topic that is very much of this time, and very global. Children's behaviour at home, at school and in the immediate community says a great deal about the environment, sphere of life and world the children are living in. Despite economic, social, cultural and ethnic differences between countries, the ability of children to cope in the societies of the future is crystallised into a question about the present quality of life, the psychosocial well-being the natural and developed living environment should be able to provide. Health and well-being are supported in a safe and caring school environment free of bullying. At their best, the schools, parents and nearby communities offer a growth environment in which the children's psychosocial health and well-being are the focus of at¬tention. Teachers and educators are more and more conscious of the ways in which they can foster a child's health and development by applying teaching methods related to social interaction and health promotion as well as by utilising the opportunities provided by art and culture in teaching. This book examines the theme by offering both carefully reflected knowledge and practical examples of applications with which psychosocial well-being is being produced in schoolwork. The book is meant for teachers, planners and decision makers who are interested in developing growth environments that support psychosocial well-being as well as cross-cultural co-operation.

‘A picture tells more than a thousand words’, is a common saying. Given that a picture tells more than a thousand words – how can we understand and use this expression? How can a picture, or an image, be analysed and used as part of educational research? In this chapter the use of images, and more specifically drawings, will be explored.

This article attempts to visualise the way in which children and young people think about a specific topic, namely the environment. The aim is to make the thinking of children and young people available and to interpret the meaning of their thoughts about our environment. The theoretical roots of the study are to be found within the phenomenology of the lifeworld. The study is based on empirical material consisting of drawings produced by 109 children and young people, combined with subsequent oral comments. During the drawing analysis different structures and patterns gradually crystallised, and eventually four different themes emerged, consisting of thoughts which focus on the following: the good world, the bad world, the dialectics between the good and the bad world, and symbols and actions protecting the environment. It can be stated that the results which emerged, in the form of the thoughts of the children and young people on the environment, reflect a thinking characterisedby many nuances, such as clean and unspoilt nature in different manifestations, the need for human beings to use nature for recreation and well-being, environmental destruction in different forms, and direct or indirect ways of taking care of the prevailing environmental situation.

”… if we know more about silence, we will know more about ourselves”, states Jaworski. What then do we know about silence? Sometimes people are silent of their own free will, while others have silence thrust upon them. Others are perhaps silent to demonstrate their position of strength or superiority with regard to others. To have understanding of and insight into the meaning and different aspects of silence is of importance to life itself, as well as to different educational settings. Within the framework of this paper, the significance of silence for educational settings will be highlighted and discussed. The discussion will be based on the recently published book ”Om tystnad - i pedagogiska sammanhang” [About Silence - in educational settings] (Alerby, 2012).The presentation will deal with issues like - is it accepted for students to be silent? Or is this seen as a problem? Some students are experienced by others or by themselves as silent. Perhaps they are neither given, nor do they take, the silent space that is required for participation in the conversation. They remain silent even though the ongoing discussion wakens thoughts and opinions, and they continue to be silent even though they know the answer to the question which the teacher has just asked. Most silent students probably have an opinion to add to the discussion or an answer to give to the question, but they choose for some reason not to express this, and therefore remain silent in the eyes (or ears) of others. But are they really silent? One way to approach these issues is to take the phenomenological movement as a point of departure. To be more precise - this paper will discuss silence in educational settings using a phenomenological life-world approach.

Pajala kommun har med stöd från Skolverket bedrivit kompetensutveckling inom skolan i form av värdegrundsprojektet ”Aktivt lärande i Pajala”. Projektet vände sig till personal inom Pajala kommuns skolverksamhet, och det anordnades av Pajala kommun, inre rektorsområdet, i samarbete med Centrum för forskning i lärande, Luleå tekniska universitet. Kompetensutvecklingens huvudmål var att tydliggöra skolans värdegrund samt att arbeta med mål och utvärdering. Detta arbete har kopplats till olika utvecklingsarbeten som genomförts inom ramen för de deltagande arbetsenheterna. Vidare har ett aktionsinriktat arbetssätt tillämpats under hela projektets gång. Ett antal av lärarnas A-dagar samt Pedagogiska caféer har använts för gemensam kompetensutveckling. Övriga A-dagar och även viss tid av den reglerade arbetstiden användes till de utvecklingsområden som varje arbetslag arbetade med utifrån sina behov enligt respektive projektplan. Vid utvärderingen framkom att projektdeltagarna upplever att värdegrundsfrågorna, i och med projektet, har legaliserats och även getts ett stort utrymme i verksamheten. Detta genom att frågorna på ett naturligt och självklart sätt fått en framträdande plats, men även genom skolledningens stöd samt universitetets medverkan. Personalen upplever framför allt att de fått mer tid att fokusera ett gemensamt uppdrag, nämligen att arbeta med och utifrån värdegrunden. Lärarna upplever även att eleverna har givits större möjligheter till delaktighet vid såväl planering som utvärdering. Vidare betonas vikten av man från ledningshåll avsätter tid och att ledningen på ett aktivt och konkret sätt visar projektet intresse och uppmärksamhet. Genom den process som det aktionsinriktade arbetssättet startade ledde projektarbetet till såväl kompetensutveckling som till skolutveckling, eller för att använda andra ord – till det livslånga lärandet.

This thesis attempts to clarify the way in which young people think about our envíronment, based on their experiences as the starting point. The aim is to make the thinking of people available and to interpret the meaning of these thoughts, whose content comprises the environment. The theoretical roots of the study are to be found within the phenomenology of the lifeworld. I also use the phenomenological method as a type of analysis method to use as inspiration when analysing the empirical material. The children and young people who are included in the study are between the ages of 7 and 16. The data collection is based on two partial studies. In one partial study, empirical material is analysed consisting of the production of drawings by 105 children and young people with attached oral comments, and in the other partial study interviews which were conducted with 16 children and young people are analysed. These two studies are partially connected and partially dependent on one another. The drawing study is aimed at developing an understanding of the thinking of the children and young people and also forms the basis for the selection of subjects for the interview study. The interview study for its part is aimed at further deepening the understanding of the thinking process and the interviews took place on two occations with each person. In the drawing analysis four themes of thoughts were crystallised which focus on: the good world, the bad world, the dialectics between the good and bad world, and symbols and actions promoting the environment. In the interview analysis eight themes emerged of thoughts which focus on: pragmatic perspectives, emotional perspectives, future and visionary perspectives, philosophical perspectives, aesthetic perspectives and romantic perspectives. It can be stated that the results which emerged in the form of the thinking of the children and young people on the environment reflect their thinking as having many nuances. If these many-faceted thoughts are to be taken seriously it is necessary in the teaching and learning situation to take into account the thinking of young citizens. Teaching and learning situations should therefore create time and room for conversation and thinking. This is to stimulate the growing power which the experiences of young people have, experiences which are in turn requirements for thinking: thinking which is constituted by beeing-in-the-world.

A university is among other things a building with its own spatial formations. These spatial formations can create expectations and be experienced as inspiring; they can create opportunities but also limitations. What then conveys the experience of these places? Based on the research study Places of a University, but also on previous studies about places of education, the overall aim of this article is to problematize and discuss the educational room. More specifically, I discuss how earlier experiences influence present experiences of educational rooms, but also the intertwined relationship between emotions and the spatial formations of a university. Student reflections exemplify the reasoning in the article.

This paper attempts to elucidate pupils' experience of school and to interpret the meaning of their experiences. The theoretical roots of this study are to be found within the phenomenology of the lifeworld. The pupils' experience of school is made apparent with the aid of creative activity in the form of the production of drawings, combined with subsequent oral comments. During the analysis of the empirical material, different patterns and structures were noticed, and eventually six different themes emerged, which are presented without any relative order of precedence. The themes are in the space of experience of: learning and knowledge, social relations, orderliness and rules, subjects, feelings and time-dimensions. The results which emerged, in the form of the pupils' experience of school, show multifaceted experiences which have many nuances, such as a lack of time to accomplish schoolwork, the importance of breaks and relations between friends, the importance of the relations between the teacher and the pupils, the fact that rules are decided upon over the pupils' heads and the fact that learning things and developing knowledge are positive even if school is sometimes experienced as boring.

Pajala kommun har i samarbete med Institutionen för utbildningsvetenskap, Luleå tekniska universitet och Regionalt utvecklingscentrum, Karlstads universitet, under läsåret 2002/2003 bedrivit kompetensutveckling inom förskola och skola genom projektet ”Uppdraget – att utveckla lärandet genom att skapa goda lärmiljöer”. Syftet med kompetensutvecklingen var att utveckla barns, ungdomars och vuxnas lärande genom att skapa goda lärmiljöer utifrån det uppdrag som skolan har. Projektet vände sig till all personal inom sju rektorsområden i Pajala kommuns skolverksamhet, från förskola till och med gymnasiet. I kompetensutvecklingen deltog sammanlagt 180 personer fördelade på 30 arbetslag. Ett antal gemensamma kompetensutvecklingsdagar har använts till pedagogiska caféer samt seminarier. Under dessa caféer och seminarier har styrdokument, pedagogisk litteratur och aktuell forskning diskuterats och behandlats. De olika arbetsenheterna har däremellan kontinuerligt fört diskussioner i respektive arbetslag. Ett antal uppgifter, både muntliga och skriftliga, har genomförts i syfte att föra processen framåt och koppla ihop diskussionerna från de gemensamma träffarna till arbetslagsnivå. De olika arbetslagen har även arbetat med olika utvecklingsarbeten där elev- och/eller föräldrainflytande fokuserats. Utvecklingsarbetena har behandlats vid de erfarenhetsseminarier som anordnats varje termin. Vid utvärderingen av detta projekt framkom att projektdeltagarna upplever att de genom projektet fått möjlighet att arbeta med förståelsen av uppdraget genom att tid har avsatts och möten har anordnats. Det framgår tydligt att förståelsen av uppdraget varierar såväl inom som mellan arbetslagen. Genom ett medvetet arbete med styrdokumenten har man nu fått ökade kunskaper om uppdraget och känner sig därför säkrare i sin profession. Kunskaper om det egna lärandet har ökat och vikten av att skapa goda lärmiljöer har blivit tydligare för samtliga berörda. Projektdeltagarna poängterar vidare att de genom projektet lärt sig och praktiserat olika pedagogiska samtal som ett redskap för att utveckla skolan. Deltagarna anser att det är viktigt att samtalen och reflektionerna fortsätter och en förutsättning för att så ska ske är att skolledningen tar ansvar för att möjliggöra detta. Vidare framkom att tid har avsatts för att tillsammans med barnen och ungdomarna samtala kring samt förankra skolans demokratiska värden i enlighet med uppdraget. Arbetet har fokuserat inflytande och delaktighet, men personalen upplever att det finns mycket kvar att göra innan inflytandet för barn och ungdomar blir en naturlig del av skolans verksamhet. Att utveckla ett reellt inflytande är en process som måste fortsätta under en längre tid innan resultat syns i verksamheten. Därför är det angeläget att processerna som startat får ytterligare tid för att kunna utvecklas vidare.

What significance does the body have in the process of teaching and learning? In what way can the thoughts of a contemporary junior-level teacher in this regard be connected to the theory of the lived body formulated by the French phenomenologist philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908-1961), and vice versa? The aim of this paper is to illuminate, enable understanding and discuss the meaning of the body in the learning process, with specific focus on the learning of writing as embodied experience. In the process, the boundaries of learning are also explored. While understanding the significance both of learning as embodied experience and of the boundaries of learning is essential within the educational field, in this paper the discussion is limited to exploring how learning as embodied experience and the boundaries of learning can be viewed by taking Merleau-Ponty's notions as theoretical starting points. In an attempt to answer the aim and connect the paper's theoretical point of departure with a voice from a teacher, an interview with a junior-level teacher was conducted. The paper thus offers a theoretical contribution to the field of educational research, but one in which the theory is exemplified by, and connected to, a teacher's voice. Accordingly, the paper concludes by summarising the common understandings of learning held theoretically by Merleau-Ponty and made real in the activities of the contemporary junior-level teacher.

"Knowledge must take a run through the whole body before it becomes real knowledge. If it just goes in one ear, without a ‘body run', it will immediately disappear out of the other ear and no knowledge will emerge." A junior-level teacher formulated these thoughts. In this paper they will serve as a point of departure for the discussion of learning. The aim of the paper is to illuminate, understand and discuss the meaning of the body in the learning process - the learning of writing as embodied experience. Furthermore, the boundary of learning will be highlighted. Understanding the importance of learning as embodied experience as well as the boundary of learning are probably essential elements within the educational field. In this paper I limit the discussion to raising some ideas of how learning as embodied experience and the boundary of learning can be viewed taking Maurice Merleau-Ponty's notions as theoretical starting points. Merleau-Ponty's thoughts will be discussed in relation to the contemporary junior-level teacher's view.

In this paper, it is my intention to not only explore the notions and significance of places for silence in education today, but also to develop insights into diverse understandings of silence – such as aspects of power in silence and issues of silent students – to inform school practices and educational policy. The discussion will be illustrated by some students’ experiences of a place in the school’s playground – the silent place known as the Peace Area. The students at this playground emphasised the significance of a silent place, a place of stillness, to visit during one’s time at school. A place for relaxing together with friends, but also a place to be alone with one’s thoughts. The students clearly expressed their desire to withdraw to a silent and peaceful place during the school day. But, how many places of silence and stillness are there in the schools of today? As humans, we are, in our daily life, more or less surrounded by different forms of sounds and noise, but also of silence and stillness, even though we do not always recognise or hear the silence. Silence can also be experienced and understood in various ways: pleasant and something to be longed for or unpleasant and unwelcome – or even in some cases as something to be feared. An essential question to raise for future educational policy is not only to what extent students can be in a place of silence and stillness during the school day, but also whether places of silence and stillness are appreciated in today’s schools.

Rapporten belyser och diskuterar lärande ur några olika perspektiv. Texterna är resultatet av en forskarutbildningskurs - Lärande - som gavs vid Institutionen för utbildningsvetenskap hösten 2005, och fokuserar följande områden; lärande i dialog, skolans lärandemiljö sett ur etiskt perspektiv, traditionella kontra nätburet lärande, lärande och utveckling av ledarskapet inom idrotten, pragmatiska perspektiv på lärande.

This article endeavours to visualise the thoughts of children about a specially selectedsubject, namely the environment. The aim is to make this thinking visible and to interpretthe meaning of these thoughts. The theoretical starting points for the study are to befound within the phenomenology of the lifeworld. The study is based on empirical materialconsisting of interviews with sixteen children, and the interviews were carried out ontwo occasions with all sixteen persons. During the interview analysis eight themesemerged consisting of thoughts which focus on the following perspectives: pragmaticperspectives, teaching-and-learning perspectives, responsibility perspectives, emotionalperspectives, future and visionary perspectives, philosophical perspectives, aestheticperspectives and romantic perspectives. The thoughts about the environment, whichhave emerged in this study have many nuances and are multi-faceted. If these thoughts are to be taken seriously, it is necessary in the teaching situation to take the thinking ofyoung citizens into account.

This paper attempts to elucidate Sámi children's experience of school and to interpret the meaning of their experiences. The Sámi children's experience of school is made apparent with the aid of creative activity in the form of the production of drawings, combined with subsequent oral comments. The children who were included in the study live within the municipal area of Jokkmokk in the County of Norrbotten in northern Sweden. They attend a special school for Sámi children and were all aged between nine and twelve years old. During the analysis of the drawings five different themes emerged, which are presented without any relative order of precedence. The themes are tasks, the future, relationship, time and health. The results which emerged, in the form of the Sámi children's experience of school, indicate that these children's experiences have many nuances which are not recognised by mainstream systems. If these multi-faceted experiences are to be considered by the school and the needs of these children met, it is necessary to first understand the ways in which these children experience school and then to take these understandings into account in teaching situations.

This book explores the significance of silence within and beyond pedagogical contexts. Silence is a complex and multidimensional phenomenon for everyday life: since schools mirror society, it is also significant in education. While silence can be experienced in a multitude of different ways, the author reflects on whether silence itself can bear a message: is there an aspect of dialogue in silence, or is it a language all of its own? This book examines a variety of silences essential for education, examining such topics as silence and aspects of power, silent students, and the relationship between listening and silence. Drawing on a range of empirical data, the author elucidates the significance of silence in pedagogical contexts.

'What time is it?', 'When are we going to have a break?' These questions are probably recognised by most people who are working in the school. The questions demonstrate clearly how time controls a large part of the everyday life of the school. Time is linked to one of the most basic questions of philosophy, and several philosophers in the course of history have discussed questions concerning time. The present paper tries to elucidate time as a phenomenon, and especially to focus on the school's relation to time. To provide a historical background, the paper begins with a short retrospective survey of what certain philosophers have thought and written on the subject of time. Does time exist in itself? Or does time exist only through people's experience of it ? We can pause to reflect on the thesis that time, considered from one perspective, exists through people's being-in-the-world and through their experience of the same. Within different organisations, for example the school, time must be regarded as being under strict chronological control. This time-control influences, of course, the experience of time within the school, and the subject experience of time can be called 'subjective time', or rather - lived time.

"The only wise one, is the one who understands silence", emphasise Erik Gustaf Geijer in a poem from 1840. But how can we understand silence? This paper focuses on silence in educational contexts. Silence can be desirable and enjoyable, aggravating and embarrassing for everyone involved. Silence can also be regarded as an essential and an unavoidable part of human life. If we look into a classroom we can sometimes see the teacher's struggle to get the pupils to be silent. But then again a moment later what happens when a pupil fails to participate during a planned discussion, and remains silent, even though the topic might provoke responses whereby everyone has something to say? How do the teacher and the other pupils react to the silent pupil? We can assume that silence means different things to different people, and that it can communicate many and different things. Silence can, so to say, be "used" in various ways. We can, for example, elect to be silent, but in some situations silence is imposed, as one cannot find words to respond, or we can be silenced. Within this paper multiple meanings of silence, as well as different expressions of silence, will be highlighted. Finally, the value of silence in the process of teaching and learning will be discussed.

In this chapter, the relationship between humans and educational places and spaces is explored, reflected and discussed, using the phenomenology of the life-world as a theoretical foundation. The discussion is based mainly on the writings of the French philosophers Gaston Bachelard and Maurice Merleau-Ponty and the Swedish philosopher and educator Jan Bengtsson, and is grounded in the intertwined and reciprocal relationships between humans in the physical world in which they exist. The building itself, the place, the space, the room is explored in terms of its physical and actual existence and also metaphorically. The relationship between the school space and the people who inhabit is highlighted and problematised. In addition, the horizon of the classroom is discussed, as well as the spaces beyond the room. On an ontological level, rooms and spaces, which are both shaped by humans and provided by nature, are discussed. Alongside this, how the space/room sometimes arouses memories and feelings that may affect the human body is explored. The discussion also takes into account how educational sites, schools, during the current era of neoliberalism have been altered to become marketplaces.

Time is linked to one of the most basic questions of philosophy, and several philosophers in the course of history have discussed questions concerning time. The present paper tries to elucidate time as a phenomenon, and especially in relation to the child. To provide a historical background, the paper begins with a short retrospective survey of what certain philosophers have thought and written on the subject of time. Does time exist in itself? Or does time exist only through people's experience of it? We can pause to reflect on the thesis that time, considered from one perspective, exists through people's being-in-the-world and through their experience of the same. Within different organisations, for example the pre school, time must be regarded as being under strict chronological control, and time controls a large part of the everyday life of the pre school. This time-control influences, of course, the experience of time, and the subject experience of time can be called "subjective time", or rather - lived time.

Många elever känner sig stressade av brist på tid även om tiden också upplevs som långsam ibland. Klockan kontrollerar deras skoldagar. Stunder för reflektion och kontemplation saknas oftast helt under skoltid. Upplevelserna visar sig i barns teckningar och berättelser. Men varför räcker inte tiden till? Är det verkligen brist på tid som är problemet eller handlar det om ett effektivitetstänkande i synen på lärande som riskerar att motverka sitt syfte? Frågorna diskuteras av Eva Alerby.

The aim of this paper is to challenge the physical and conceptual boundaries of educational places and spaces with the use of metaphor: the story of Professor Kirke’s magic wardrobe in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the first book in The Chronicles of Narnia by CF Lewis (1950). By explicating and theorising the concerns that arise, we provoke diverse ways of thinking about the complexities of shifting, expanding, constantly evolving educational spaces and places. In our theorisations, we draw on the philosophy of the life-world through Maurice Merleau-Ponty, on a post-structural approach through Julia Kristeva’s work, and on the new-materialist perspective of Gilles Deleuze. As these three philosophical perspectives draw upon different basic assumptions about humans and the world, they also illuminate different aspects of a variety of phenomena and concepts, which we elaborate on in this paper to reach a more comprehensive understanding of educational spaces and places. Our argument arises from philosophical engagements with the story of the Pevensie siblings’ transformation – and transportation – to Narnia through the wardrobe, with notions of educational openings and opportunities, to explore possibilities for reimagining the conceptions and realities of places and spaces in education. To conclude, citizens of today, including children, students, teachers, politicians and researchers, need to discuss basic assumptions for education and policy to reimagine the entangled complexities of educational spaces and places.

Inom ramen för denna artikel diskuterar vi såväl den psykosociala som den fysiska miljön i skolan. Vidare argumenterar vi för att skolans miljö är av betydelse för elevernas möjligheter att lära sig, likväl som för deras upplevelser av lärandesituationerna. Särskilt intressant blir då att lyssna till eleverna. Syftet med denna artikel är därför att synliggöra och diskutera elevers röster i förhållande till hur skolan kan bli den bästa platsen för lärande. Detta görs med utgångspunkt i forskningsprojektet ”Skolan suger” eller?, där drygt 200 elever i åldrarna 11–15 år deltog. Eleverna fick skriftligen reflektera över hur skolan ska bli en riktigt bra lärandemiljö. För att utveckla skolan till den bästa platsen för lärande uttryckte eleverna en önskan att kunna påverka sin lärandemiljö, att uppnå ömsesidighet och samspel, att kunna hantera tidsregleringen i skolan, samt att uppfylla behov för välbefinnande.

Forskningsrapporten "Några nedslag i livsvärlden. Teori och praktik i pedagogisk forskning" är resultatet av en forskarutbildningskurs i fenomenologisk livsvärldsforskning som hölls vid Institutionen för lärarutbildning, Luleå tekniska universitet. Kursdeltagarna erbjöds möjligheten att publicera sina texter inom ramen för universitetets forskningsrapportserie. Då kursens deltagare representerar flera olika ämnesområden, såsom lärande, pedagogik, musikpedagogik, idrottspedagogik, hälsovetenskap och social omsorg avspeglar sig detta i de texter som presenteras. Valet av texternas ämnesområden skiljer sig således åt, men samtliga texter förenas i att ämnena är såväl pedagogiska som behandlas med livsvärlden som utgångspunkt.

A school can be regarded from its spatial configuration. These spaces can create expectations and be experienced as inspiring, they can create opportunities but even limitations for the learning of teachers and pupils. Then, what conveys the impression of the spaces? How does the space formation affect the learning process? To what extent do the spaces in school give rise to human relations? What actions and thought space is constituted? A school building can from an architectural starting point be regarded from many perspectives, where perhaps the most prominent are the material characteristics. However, to understand a building only from material characteristics will not give a comprehensive view of the situation. Instead there are also both functional and aesthetic characteristics within a building. Added to that are complicated questions concerning the architecture formation in relation to the human. One way to approach these dimensions, from a scientific perspective, is to take the phenomenological movement as a point of departure, and to be more precise - the phenomenology of the life-world. We claim that it is possible to study and to make a theoretical set of concepts of the meaning of space within learning. This paper will discuss these questions from a life-world approach.

De demokratiska värdena, elevernas delaktighet och inflytande, ska vara lika centralt i utbildningen som kunskaper i olika skolämnen. Det framgår tydligt i skollagen och läroplanerna.

Denna kunskapsöversikt lyfter fram forskning som handlar om vad delaktighet och inflytande innebär och hur man kan arbeta med elevers inflytande över beslutsprocesser och elevaktiv undervisning.

Kunskapsöversikten riktar sig i första hand till personal i grund- och gymnasieskolan och mot-svarande skolformer eller till dig som vill veta mer om elevdelaktighet och inflytande.

Education is one way for society to promote active engagement and participation as forms of civic responsibility. The decline in academic achievement in schools in Europe, and particular in Swedish schools, can be addressed through working with issues related to teaching, where student participation is an important part.

In this article, we aim to illustrate and exemplify how student participation can be described and understood as a continuous process that includes both students’ influence over formal decision-making and student active education. The content of the text emerges from a research overview (Swedish National Agency for Education, 2015), in which current research about student participation and influence in schools was collected, illuminated, analysed and discussed.

The article illustrates existing challenges and opportunities identified in educational research, relating to students’ influence over decision-making processes and students being active in their education. The article concludes with a few thoughts about the future, including how student voices are becoming a clearer part of school improvement. Furthermore, we discuss the need for staff training, organisational conditions for developing participation work and the importance of further educational research that will highlight student participation and influence.