The rapid advancement of artificial intelligence (AI) in education necessitates a shared understanding of its intended purpose and societal implications. This paper underscores the significance of societal perspectives in AI and education, often overshadowed by technological aspects. At the same time, policy guidelines for the integration of AI technology within educational systems are playing a pivotal role in shaping the future of education. What we as society imagine AI and education to be, will in some shape or form lead the development of suggested fixes. The aim is to aid the understanding of why and how visions of learning and education are framed in relation to developments in Educational Technology (EdTech) and their introduction in education. It thereby contributes to the ongoing discussion on the integration of AI in education and its potential societal impacts.

Domineras skolundervisningen av en baklängespedagogik? Ja, när betygskriterierna förvandlas till kunskapsmål kan man fråga sig det. Bakgrunden är den målstyrning som infördes i skolan på 1990-talet.

Mål för offentlig verksamhet har funnits länge, men de har blivit ett allt viktigare styrmedel under de senaste decennierna. För skolans del gick målstyrningen hand i hand med marknadsutsättningen: staten satte målen – i synnerhet kraven för ”godkänd” – och lät sedan skolorna bestämma hur de skulle uppnås. Men målstyrning är ett på samma gång tydligt och diffust begrepp. Och trots att reformen knappast har levt upp till förhoppningarna, förblir målstyrningen en grundbult i skolpolitiken.

Riksbankens Jubileumsfond publicerar under 2024 en samling essäer på temat Misslyckat? Utbildningsforskaren Magnus Hultén skriver om målstyrningens avigsidor i skolan.

The chapter unravels how formal curricula turned into foundational conditions to form national histories in two Nordic states, Norway and Sweden, during the twentieth century. First, we present curriculum reforms that used pietistic, scientific, and civic rationales to legitimize education during the early twentieth century. Second, we look into changes of the 1960s when knowledge become a signifier for initiating research-based reforms. Third, we look into policy processes where international large-scale assessments set the reform agenda. In all three periods, we track subject-specific descriptions in mother tongue and history, and how these detailed what to teach and learn about the nation. Despite similarities, there are significant differences between the national curricula that can be linked to the different constitutional histories of the two countries. Notably, the chapter demonstrates how national curricula serve as public attempts to raise children to be and become national citizens.

As has been pointed out in previous research, teacher-led learning plays an important role in developing preschool children's technological skills and technological self-esteem. What is missing in research are more detailed analysis of how the children’s and teachers’ actions and interactions shape the learning process. In order to study this within the field of construction, an action research project was conducted, where construction activities were developed, implemented and revised in an iterative procedure. Data from the second cycle were analyzed for this article using graphic transcriptions and multimodal analysis, with a focus on action, interaction and experience from a pragmatist perspective. Our findings show that children who quickly and decisively engage with the material, the teachers and their peers in suggesting which material to use and/or how the material can be used, end up in a central role in the design process. These children (or their actions) often get legitimized by the teachers. Thus, in order to give children access to equal opportunities in the construction activities, it is important for teachers to understand how the children’s construction-focused actions become constitutive and what their role in that process is.

Whereas previous studies show that children are able to make meaningabout evolutionary concepts within read-aloud contexts, little is knownabout how semiotic resources and interaction influence children’s meaningmaking about evolution. This study investigates children’s meaning makingabout evolutionary concepts during a modelling activity conducted after aninteractive storybook read-aloud describing the evolution of a foraging traitof a fictitious mammal (the pilose). Forty children (13 groups) were videotapedas they produced a clay pilose model, while explaining how theythought their pilose would appear after inhabiting a ‘future’ environment(mountainous, snowy or forest). A multimodal analysis focused on howchildren demonstrated their meanings of seven evolutionary conceptsdescribed in the book. An eighth concept, ‘adaptation to environment’,was also often discussed. While all eight concepts emerged, the mostfrequent concerned survival and adaptation. The eighth concept appearedto serve as a synthesis of children’s interpretation of the storybook thathighlighted the visible consequences of evolution. The children engagedfive interactional resources, dominated by the interactional resource ofcommunicating the concepts in direct relation to their produced pilosemodels. The findings shed light on how children’s representational andrelational practices impact making meaning about evolution.

Even though construction tasks have a long history as an activity in the Swedish preschool, technology as a content matter (e.g., construction) is relatively new. Hence, preschool teachers are generally unsure of the content of technology and how to handle it from a teaching perspective. Thus, there is need for deeper understanding of how construction tasks in preschool can be enacted and what kind of premises are offered to the children. To investigate this, we took our stance in activity theory and the concepts of mediating artifacts, rules and division of labour. This helped us discern what type of instructional practices that were enacted by preschool teachers when working with construction tasks. Activity theory in combination with thematic analysis helped us distinguish four general didactic actions that the teachers used to bring about the construction task-to engage, to guide, to coordinate, to show. These four strategies were then formulated into specific technology didactic actions through the perspectives of technology as product, process and concepts.

I den här rapporten redovisas en kvalitativ studie av försöksverksamheten med betyg från årskurs 4. Syftet med studien är att beskriva hur bedömningspraktikerna ter sig och formas på fem av de skolor som deltog i försöksverksamheten mellan år 2017 – 2020, samt på två referensskolor som inte deltar i försöket. I följande sammanfattning ges korta svar på studiens frågeställningar samt hänvisningar till de delar av rapporten som behandlar respektive frågeställning. Först ges en sammanfattande bild av skolornas bedömningspraktiker, därefter pekar vi på några förändringar i försöksskolornas bedömningspraktiker och avslutningsvis presenteras de viktigaste skillnaderna i bedömningspraktikerna på försöks-, respektive referensskolorna. En del av dessa skillnader motsvaras av förändringar i försöksskolornas bedömningspraktiker. Det är viktigt att beakta att samtliga försöksskolor som ingår i studien, förutom en, är friskolor och att elevernas meritvärden på de skolorna överlag är höga (se Metodval och studiens genomförande och Resultaten i förhållande till studiens urval i denna rapport).

"Skolans styrdokument bör ha kunskapen i fokus" skriver Svenskt Näringsliv i ett svar på Skolverkets pågående revidering av skolans styrdokument 2019. De är inte ensamma om att lyfta kunskapsfrågan i debatten, tvärt om. Att skolan bör satsa mer på kunskap är ett budskap som präglat många inlägg i skoldebatten de senaste åren. I ljuset av den starka ställning kunskapsfrågan har i dagens skoldebatt kan man fråga sig hur det ser ut historiskt. Har kunskapsfrågan alltid varit viktig, eller är det först på senare år som den blivit central? I denna text studeras kunskapsfrågans ställning i mediedebatten under perioden från 1960-talet fram till början av 2000-talet.