Who we are

Emma’s field of expertise is second language teaching and learning, specialising in several interconnected areas: the learning and teaching of morphosyntax; how learners process the input; the nature and roles of different types of knowledge; and motivation and attitudes to language learning.

Emma works to improve access to research, engaging with teachers, teacher educators, and policy-makers to increase awareness of and involvement in research. She has taught French, Spanish, and English as foreign languages, including as head of Spanish in a comprehensive 11-18 school in Derby.

She has supervised PhD students on topics including motivation, home languages in the classroom, input processing, metaphoric competence, effective grammar teaching, and primary school language teaching. Between 2015-2022, Emma was Associate then Journal Editor for Language Learning (Wiley), one of the most highly cited journals in the field. She has published over 70 peer-reviewed articles, chapters, and books. 

Rachel is an influential and renowned speaker as well as past President of the Association for Language Learning (ALL), previous Head of Modern Languages, AST and SLE.  

Co-author of several textbooks, Rachel has both MEd and PhD from Cambridge University, focusing on teacher and learner interaction in the secondary languages classroom.  

Seconded until recently as Co-Director NCELP, the National Centre for Excellence for Language Pedagogy, Rachel is now back in role as Director of Languages and International Education for The Cam Academy Trust and working as collaborator on the Progression in Primary Languages project (IoE, Uni of Reading).

Victoria is a highly experienced MFL teacher and SENCo. Over the course of her career she has held positions of leadership at subject, departmental, whole school and Local Authority level, and as a Specialist Leader of Education for MFL, SEND and Pupil Premium.

 Whether as a class teacher or a leader, developing and enabling others is the aspect of Victoria’s professional practice which motivates her the most.  

She is also highly committed to her own professional development and as such holds a Masters in Special Educational Needs, from the University of Leeds.

Jenny possesses a wealth of MFL teaching and leadership experience.  

She has taught German, French and Spanish for 21 years, and has  successfully led a high performing MFL department for 12 years. As an associate Assistant Head she has also led whole school projects on embedding formative assessment.

Through her roles as Teacher Training Coordinator and MFL Subject Tutor for SCITT-based ITT providers, as well as ECT facilitator, Jenny has enjoyed sharing her expertise with new entrants to the profession.

Jenny’s significant contributions to teaching were recognised in 2021 by the Goethe-Institut who honoured her with a lifetime achievement award as part of the German Teacher Awards.