School actors work and collaboration for multilingual students' reading and writing development : A qualitative study on the role of different school actors in supporting multilingual students' literacy

This thesis aimed to investigate how different school actors, such as class teachers, first language teachers, study counsellors and principals, construct different patterns in the collaboration and work with multilingual students' reading and writing development. Based on semi-structured interviews with five professionals in a primary school, the participants' experiences are analysed using systems theory concepts such as collaboration, communication and organizational frameworks. The results indicated both opportunities and challenges in the collaboration process, along with a desire for improved cooperation and communication among school actors to better support multilingual students' reading and writing development. Among the identified challenges within school operations are organizational factors such as lack of time, limited resources and insufficient opportunities for joint planning, which constitute an obstacle to further development of the organisation. The study highlights the importance of utilizing the competence of all professional groups, notably is that the competence of study supervisors and first language teachers is not always fully leveraged to support multilingual students. One key conclusion of this thesis is that improved communication among actors, regarding teaching methods and knowledge about multilingual students´ reading and writing development, can help establish a common view of learning and cooperation between actors. This thesis contributes knowledge about how the school organization can be developed to promote the learning of multilingual students and emphasizes the importance of collaboration not only being an organizational issue, but a central part of the pedagogical work.