Tailored course for study supervisors and mother tongue teachers

The municipality of Jönköping is working on targeted initiatives to enable multilingual pupils to better absorb the teaching in school. Part of this is a collaboration with the School of Education and Communication (HLK) at Jönköping University (JU) where study supervisors and mother tongue teachers have taken a custom-made course ‘Study guidance in mother tongue in theory and practice’.

“Targeted initiatives for the education of newly arrived and multilingual children and pupils” is an initiative in which the Swedish National Agency for Education (Skolverket) has selected Jönköping municipality, together with 30 other municipalities. The initiative started in the spring term of 2023 and will run until the end of this year. Jönköping municipality's main focus is on collegial learning as part of the school's quality work, where all teaching staff are involved in the systematic quality work in order to understand the areas of the organisation in need of improvement. The course ‘Study guidance in the mother tongue in theory and practice’, 7.5 credits, is part of the initiative.

‘We have been working on theoretical perspectives and how to integrate language and subject knowledge’

9 June was the last day of the course for the 30 mother tongue teachers and study supervisors who have been studying since August 2024. The course is specially developed, in collaboration between Jönköping municipality and HLK, with the aim of further developing the teaching of multilingual students and strengthening the link between the municipality’s mother tongue unit and the primary schools that have taken part in the project.

"It has been very instructive. We have worked with theoretical perspectives and how language and subject knowledge can be integrated," says Nadine Gerji, mother tongue teacher and study supervisor in Arabic.

Sundus Mohammad, mother tongue teacher in Arabic, agrees that the course was good.

"The course content was very rewarding, we have learnt a lot. We got confirmation that structure is important as well as cooperation between study supervisors, subject teachers and the pupil’s home," she says.

Good co-operation between HLK and Jönköping municipality

Shaping the course, the content and the course literature has been carried out cooperatively between the course leader Susanne Evertsson Grahn, lecturer in Swedish as a second language, Sara Dommartine, assignment coordinator at HLK and Ahmad Mahmoud, deputy head of the Mother Tongue and Reception Unit and Linda Lundblad, coordinator of the targeted initiative.

“We have been able to influence the course quite a lot, which has felt very good. Right from the start, the co-operation with the course leader and coordinator worked well. They have been responsive and taken into consideration our thoughts that the course should be practical and linked to our everyday work. For example, we have been involved in looking at the literature before the course began, and HLK has been flexible in terms of how we organised the meetings," says Ahmad Mahmoud.

Uzma Habib, mother tongue teacher and Urdu study supervisor, is very positive about the fact that Jönköping municipality is investing in skills development for them.

"It is positive that the municipality understands the significance of our work and invests in our professional development. This course gave us a lot and it is important for us that the municipality gave us this opportunity," she says.

Other actions by the municipality

The municipality of Jönköping also undertakes initiatives such as collegial learning for headteachers, focusing on pedagogical leadership, to support a culture of professional collaboration in schools. In addition, the principals have attended a course for school leaders in prioritised areas, while a number of primary school teachers have received targeted training through ‘The Global Classroom’ – a programme with a second language perspective. This course aligns closely with the training that the study counsellors have attended at HLK. The teacher coordinators who lead the collegial learning have also attended a course focusing on collegial learning, dialogue structures, systematic quality work and student participation. These efforts will thus lead to strengthening collegial learning and making it a sustainable improvement structure in the participating schools.

“Thus, the improvement work that takes place is based on the areas that school staff see as problematic, rather than using pre-designed modules for teachers to work through. All actions included in targeted initiatives are designed to strengthen collegial learning. In addition to the Mother Tongue and Reception Unit, four primary schools (Reception to Year 6) and one secondary school (Years 7-9) are participating - Södergårdsskolan, Öxnehagaskolan, Österängen, Råslätt and Stadsgårdsskolan,” says Linda Lundblad.