Svenskläraren som vision och konstruktion

The aim of this dissertation is to analyse how the teacher of Swedish is envisioned and created in curricula and syllabi. Teacher education in Sweden is regulated in the Higher Education Act, the Higher Education Ordinance, and the Government Bill on Teacher Education. At the same time, universities which have been granted degree-awarding powers are free to organise teacher education according to their interpretation of the regulations. The empirical material consists of 42 curricula and 261 syllabi from teacher education programmes at 22 Swedish universities. The documents were gathered in 2009, a pivotal year for the teacher education, since it was to undergo major changes over the following two years.

For the analysis of the curricula and syllabi, theories and concepts from curriculum studies, as well as discourse theory, and critical discourse analysis, were used. Six interviews were conducted with educators at three selected universities in order to obtain background information on the processes of writing syllabi. In these documents, six patterns for envisioning and creating the teacher of Swedish could be distinguished. The first three emphasise academic goals, professional perspectives, and democratic values, which enjoy privileged positions due to their close connection with officially declared goals for higher education. The fourth and fifth can be interpreted as the results of political, organisational or social considerations. The sixth pattern, favouring function, can be seen as a hybrid of the others. This last pattern proves to be the most common in the empirical material. Its articulation varies considerably, but a common denominator is the need to frame the subject, since there is less of a given framework than in the patterns relying on their connection with different discourses.

In envisioning and creating the teacher of Swedish, teacher education at individual universities can achieve a degree of freedom within the regulating framework. This will allow the educators in the teacher education to make good use of their competence and networks. The profile also matters to trainee teachers, who will get a better overview of their studies. Finally, in developing their ability for meta-reflection on their profession, trainee teachers are more likely to develop a deliberate approach to teaching. Thus, they will be better prepared to create the learning environment and make the demands that will help pupils achieve learning objectives.