The aim of this symposium is to display and critically reflect on the current development of approaches and methods in special educational research, policy and practice, for school-based special educators, doctoral students, and researchers.
In order to strengthen collaborative pathways between researchers and school-based practitioners, practitioners are encouraged to register for and attend the first day of the symposium. The second day will focus on doctoral students’ projects, and participants are invited to engage with and discuss their research topics.
The program will be continuously updated, and the registration will open soon.
In a rapidly changing educational landscape, special education is being reshaped by global policy shifts, digital transformation, and evolving understandings of inclusion, diversity, and equity. This symposium invites researchers, practitioners, and policymakers to critically explore how special education is reconfigured in relation to contemporary societal challenges and opportunities. Building on traditions of bridging research, policy and practice, the symposium focuses on how knowledge is produced, translated, and enacted in educational contexts. Particular attention is given to interdisciplinary collaboration, practice-near research, and the voices of learners in shaping inclusive and sustainable educational futures.
Trude Nergård-Nilssen, UiT the Arctic University of Norway
Bio
Professor Trude Nergård-Nilssen is a professor of educational psychology at UiT the Arctic University of Norway. She teaches dyslexia, developmental language disorder (DLD), reading-comprehension disorders, and reading and language intervention, emphasising evidence-based prevention and management of reading, writing and language difficulties across all ages. Her research investigates the cognitive–linguistic mechanisms underpinning DLD and dyslexia, with particular attention to individual risk factors and response to intervention. She developed the Dysmate screening and diagnostic tools for ages 7 to adulthood, which have been adapted into Swedish and German, and led a major randomised controlled trial completed in 2025.
Abstract
Lasting gains, different paths – insights from the UiT-ReadWell RCT
Reading comprehension is the goal of reading instruction, yet programmes that build decoding or oral language often show modest gains on comprehension tests. UiT-ReadWell, a comprehensive programme targeting both components, was tested in a large multi-site randomised controlled trial with 415 children (ages 7–9; 2nd–3rd grade) across 26 schools in Northern Norway. Pupils were randomly assigned to UiT-ReadWell or to business-as-usual. The intervention included four 45-minute weekly sessions over 92 sessions, delivered by trained teachers using digital tools, focusing on phoneme awareness and word reading, as well as broader language skills (including grammar and vocabulary). Assessments were at pre-test, post-test, and six-month follow-up.
Compared to controls, UiT-ReadWell produced significantly greater gains in decoding (SMD 0.26), language comprehension (0.20), and reading comprehension (0.26), all of which were sustained at follow-up (0.22, 0.16, 0.24). Mediation analyses showed that improvements in reading comprehension were partly attributable to gains in word reading (~27%) and language (~34%).
Reanalysing the intervention group within the Simple View of Reading model revealed multiple growth trajectories, with baseline profiles in decoding and language predicting trajectory membership. Despite robust average effects, response heterogeneity emphasises the importance of tailoring intensity and content to learners.
The Education Act mandates monitoring and timely, tailored support. This talk covers how to identify who needs what and when, with practical principles on when to prioritise decoding vs. language, how to sequence components, how to monitor growth, and how to account for limits and context.
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Eva Norén, Stockholm University
Bio
Eva Norén, professor in mathematics education, has been researching in, with teachers, and about multilingual mathematics classrooms for more than 20 years. She has worked at School of Education in Stockholm since 2003, and at Stockholm University since 2008.
Abstract
Flerspråkiga elever – ”särskilda behov” och inkludering
Among the biggest challenges for multilingual students in the mathematics classroom are math tasks with text—so-called word problems. Multilingual students need to be challenged in instruction to develop their skills in mathematics, and word problems play a significant role in this. Since the Lgr 80 curriculum, word problems in mathematics (problem-solving) have held a prominent place in textbooks and teaching. However, humans have been engaging in problem-solving for thousands of years. Over the years, word problems have been studied in mathematics education research, and every math teacher is well acquainted with them. I myself have spent considerable time on this genre of tasks, primarily in upper primary school math classrooms and in collaboration with math teachers. I have gone back to 1999 and examined word problems that have proven to be difficult for multilingual students to solve. The difficulties can be linked to language but also to culture, norms, and values. Language as a problem or resource in (mathematics) teaching is a continually relevant topic. The idea of language as a resource was introduced in 1984 by Ruiz (in the USA). Allowing students to use all their languages as resources is a foundation for language- and knowledge-developing instruction (in mathematics). Such instruction also rests on students being active language users both orally and in writing, the context being familiar to the students, and students receiving long-term linguistic support.
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Fritjof Sahlström, University of Helsinki
Bio
Fritjof Sahlström has studied learning and socialisation in educational settings since the mid 1990:s. A continued interest has been the relationship between everyday interaction and societal aspects of education. Sahlström has been involved in many international and Nordic research collaborations. Sahlström is leading the research community Diversity, Multilingualism and Social Justice at the University of Helsinki, DIMISO. Currently, he is the chair of the committee for educational sciences at the Swedish National Agency for Education.
Abstract
All aboard? Nordic basic schools as differentiated social and epistemic meeting places
Nordic basic schools have since their introduction in the late 1960:s and early 1970:s been balancing between the collective aims of one school for all and individualisation. In my research, I have been trying to study and understand how these at times contradictory goals have turned out from student perspectives in the everyday reality of learning and socialization. Until approximately 2005-2006, this mainly took place in face-to-face interaction. Since then, the introduction of broad-scale digitalisation has changed the social and epistemic landscapes of education, with a rapid increase until the mid 2020:s, followed by a subsequent combination of back-to-basics public discourse and a rapid generative AI development.
While organizational differentiation, such as tracking and different schools for different students, has been limited in the Nordic countries, with the exception of school choice in Sweden, different forms of internal differentiation have always existed. In early work, I showed how these differentiating practices in part were a consequence of the interactional organization of teaching. In later and on-going work, we have explored how the hybridisation of education seems to further strengthen differentiating practices. There also seems to be a small but growing mistrust in public education, expressed in part through the increase of home education in all Nordic countries except Sweden, where it is forbidden, and Iceland, where it is heavily limited. Further, new possibilities for distance education, AI-driven individualisation, and continued increase in expectations on individualisation seem to create pressure for a reconceptualization of the idea of one school for all.
Jonny är doktorand i pedagogik vid Örebro universitet. Han var en av deltagarna under symposiedagarna 2025.
Siv är lärare och specialpedagog i Umeå. Hon var en av deltagarna under symposiedagarna 2025.
