Christina Olin-Scheller

Christina Olin-Scheller holds a PhD in Comparative Literature and is professor of Applied Pedagogy and professor of Literature in Education. She works as a teacher educator, lecturer, research leader, supervisor and researcher, primarily with a focus on reading issues in education. She is currently the research leader and coordinator of the Centre of Language and Literature Education, CSL (www.kau.se/csl). CSL addresses issues of practice-related educational research in a multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary environment, in cooperation with various disciplines/subjects as well as external partners in education. Olin-Scheller is also the research leader of ROSE, Research on Subject-specific Education, a strong research grout at Karlstad university (www.kau.se/rose). She also heads the national Literacy Network and represents the University in the committee organising the open morning culture seminars at the Museum (project co-organised by Karlstad University, Region Värmland, and Karlstad Municipality). In addition, she is a member of the teacher union’s research council and a part of the editorial board of the research journal ForskUL (Forskning för undervisning och lärande).

Christina Olin-Scheller pursues interdisciplinary research relating to the conditions for learning, development and identity creation in formal and informal educational settings. Her doctoral thesis, titled Between Dante and Big Brother: A Study of Upper Secondary Students’ Text Worlds in 2006, laid the foundation for her continued interest in issues related to children and young people’s reading and writing opportunities in the new media landscape. In the period 2008-2011, she was the leader of the project “Beyond the Confines of the Book: Young People’s Engagement with Fiction Online” (with Patrik Wikström). The project, financed by the Swedish Research Council, focused on the genre fan fiction, that is, narratives based on books in print, and problematized literacy competence and literacy development in the new media landscape.

The research project “Net Shadow” (financed by the Karlstad University Career Development Initiative 2012–2015) aims to describe growing up in non-urban areas in terms of media and media use. The study was conducted with Carin Roos, and clarifies non-urban children’s learning process, identity creation and digital participation.

Developing reading skills is also an important research area. Her participation in the professional development project “Text, Reader, and Reading” (financed by The Agency for School Development 2008–2010 with Ingrid Mossberg Schüllerqvist), provided the foundation for the research project “Reading between the Lines” (2012–2015, with Michael Tengberg and financed by the Swedish Research Council). The project, which she headed, is an intervention study investigating the effects of the dialogue based teaching strategy with quantitative and qualitative methods. The results are presented in the anthology Reading between the Lines (Olin-Scheller & Tengberg, eds.).

She has also worked with Anna Nordenstam on the project “Easy Reading?” which centres on the values and ideologies of easy to read literature for children and young people, a text type dramatically increasing in publication and circulation. The results from the study is presented in the book Lättläst. Bokmarknad, ungdomslitteratur och skola (Gidlunds förlag, 2022).

In the period 2016–2018, she worked on two projects funded by the Swedish Research Council. The first is “Connected Classrooms”, which she headed and worked with Marie Tanner to explore the role of smartphones in the classroom and the changing literacy practice and interaction. The second was “Professional Development on Facebook”, with a focus on the professional development of teachers in social media, specifically teachers of Swedish and Mathematics on Facebook, in conjunction with Yvonne Liljeqvist, Jorryt van Bommel and Ann-Christine Randahl.

During 2018-2022 Olin-Scheller, together with Johan Samuelsson (project leader) and Niklas Gericke participates in the project "Teachers on the border", also funded by the Swedish Research Council.

Olin-Scheller also participates in the project  Plattformspedagogik, Platform Pedagogy (VR/UVK, 2020-2023) where the role of Learning Management Systems in different subjects at upper secondary school is studied. The project is run together with  Marie Nilsberth (PI), Johan Samuelsson and Yvonne Liljekvist.

During 2022-2024 Olin-Scheller participates in the research project forskningsprojektet Lärare och influencer? Sociala medier som arena för yrkesutövning (VR/UVK) in cooperation with Ann-Christine Randahl, Gothenburg University and Marie Nilsberth, Karlstads University. Olin-Scheller particpates 2023-2025 in the project TELL-ABILITY: Muntligt berättande som livskunskap och interaktionell kompetens i andraspråksundervisning (PI, Erica Sandlund, projektledare), funded by the Swedish Research Council. During 2023 Olin-Scheller aslo participates in the project Att läsa Värmland (PI, Sofia Wijkmark,  financed by Wettergrenstiftelsen), where the focus in place-based reading on upper secondary school .

During 2018-2024, she participates in the Nordic Nordic Centre Excellence Quality in Nordic Teaching (QUINT) where questions about quality in teaching in nordic classrooms is in focus. She is also a member of the Nordic project INSPECT Societal Security after COVID 19 - Inquiring Nordic Strategies, Practices, Educational Consequences and Trajectories (PI, Ane Qvortrup, University of Southern Denmark).

Christina Olin-Scheller has broad and extensive experience of teaching different courses at various levels in schools as well as in higher education. Presently, she teaches third-cyle courses and supervises doctoral and licentiate students.

Besides the collaboration with researchers desbribed above, Olin-Scheller has within ROSE a close cooperation with the SSRG-group at University College London, Institute of Education as well as HuSoEd at Helsinki University. This network, KOSS (Knowledge and Quality across School Subjects and Teacher Education) was awarded with Olin-Scheller as main applicant, a 3-year-grant (1,2 mil SEK) 2019-2021 from the Swedish Research Council.

Christina Olin-Scheller collaborates with a number of actors in the field of education. She is a member of the Teacher Union’s research council, of the board of the Association of Teachers of Swedish and a columnist in the journal Alfa. Below, some examples of her assignments carried out the last years are listed.

Challenges for literary instruction and challenging literary instruction. Plenary talk at in-service-training for teachers within Läslyftet, Jönköping and Stockholm, 2018.

Reading, reading strategies and reading instruction. Plenary talk at in-service-training day for teachers in Norrköping, 2016.

Easy readers - a contemporary text type. Plenary talk together with Anna Nordenstam for teacher in Växjö, 2017.

Multimodalitity and Literacy. Plenary talk at for the project Läs- och språksatsningen,  Stockholm, 2015.

Reading between the lines. Plenary talk at in-service training for teachers, Lund, 2015.

Reading instruction and motivation for reading. Seminar at Bokmässan (The Book Fair), Göteborg, 2015.