Martin Sutton wins RUSU Excellence Award

Picture of Martin Sutton on LRC campus

We are delighted that Martin Sutton has won a RUSU Excellent Teaching Award.

The RUSU Excellence Awards recognise University of Reading staff who display excellent and innovative teaching practice. They award the staff who students believe have gone above and beyond expectations, tirelessly working to improve the delivery of their teaching and learning experience.

Martin is the Subject Leader for Secondary Geography and Secondary Religious Education within the Institute of Education, University of Reading. He is also the Geography Education Lecturer for our Primary teaching programmes.

“I am genuinely surprised yet honoured to have won this teaching award. The Institute of Education (IoE) is a superb place to work with lots of amazing people. Thank you so much to the students that have said many kind things – you’re all worth it!” 

Institute of Education hosts Creative Multilingual Identities conference · Education, Language and Learning

By Dr Carol Fuller

Our identities are shaped in highly individual ways – and if you have more than one language, probably even more so! Academics, teachers, students, artists, poets and other interested parties came together on 2/3 February 2018 at Reading University’s Institute of Education  (IoE) to exchange ideas on creative multilingual identities. The IoE’s very own Professor Suzanne Graham strand leader for the Creative Language Learning section of the large-scale AHRC-funded  Creative Multilingualism  programme which the conference was part of, welcomed delegates to the first day. Suzanne introduced some splendidly varied presentations by early career researchers on topics such as translation, translanguaging (yes that’s a word,) language learning, and bilingual poetry and art. I flew the flag for the IoE with some examples of my research on how teenage German learners use metaphors  – see what I did there??

Professor Suzanne Graham introduces key note speaker Professor Jean-Marc Dewaele (Birkbeck, University of London) at the IoE-hosted Creative Multilingual Identities conference

A lively panel and audience then debated whether Modern Languages in the UK needs a new identity. No easy answers, but plenty of thought-provoking questions to think about.

On the second day, we heard about nature’s many languages, and how linguistic and biological diversity complement each other perfectly in the area of conservation. Professor Jean-Marc Dewaele  gave a highly entertaining and enlightening talk about diversity, linguistic and otherwise: culture cannot exist without it. Society needs people who don’t fit into the usual pattern.

There was not a dry eye in the house when Amerah Saleh and Bohdan Piasecki, Free Radicals’ from the Beatfreeks Collective moved the audience to tears for all the right reasons with their multilingual poetry in Arabic, Polish and English. Powerful stuff.

Next up were two hands-on workshops, which were also joined by many local teachers. Dr Anna Wolleb from Reading University’s Centre of Literacy and Multilingualism  helped delegates to explore the roles different languages have on the lives of multilingual speakers, and Carey Mayzes from the Association for Language Learning got participants to try out a new language as part of her talk on Language Futures, an initiative for primary and secondary schools to develop languages beyond the classroom.

Then Rinkoo Barpaga , an amazing storyteller and comedian, took the stage and had us all enthralled. Rinkoo is deaf and used sign language and an interpreter to communicate with the audience.

Finally, Professor Terry Lamb chaired a panel on community languages in schools. A lot of good work goes on here already which sadly does not receive much publicity, but it’s crucial that teacher education should support multilingual classrooms in the UK.

An inspiring two days passed by in a multilingual flash, but the ideas and connections made will stay with us for a long time. If you’d like to follow up on  conference contributions, have a look on the Creative Multilingualism conference page .

Heike Krüsemann is a recent IoE PhD student and current post-doctoral researcherClick here for Heike’s PhD blog

 

Heike Krüsemann on her PhD research (supervised by Professor Suzanne Graham, IoE) on adolescents’ motivation for language learning

Coming into the final furlong of your degree? Thought about transforming lives through education? Remembered your alumni discount for further study here?

One of the most attractive career options available to students from almost any discipline is the University of Reading’s own Institute of Education. 

With us you have the advantage of your alumni discount; you can explore the many routes to becoming a teacher; discover short courses that convert your knowledge to teaching power; and engage in a career in one of the UK’s most rapidly expanding fields of expertise. 

Embracing the demands of the 21st century requires educated, engaged and active citizens; individuals with resilience and the confidence to tackle challenges. At the Institute of Education we have the research, the expertise and the passion to help develop you into one of these leaders.

The IoE is ranked 3rd in the UK for Education (The Guardian University League Table 2018), with internationally renowned and award-winning academics. Our highly reputable partnerships with over 300 schools enables us, together, to train the next generation of outstanding teachers.

Come and see us in London Road to find out more – it’s beautiful here!

CONTACT US: Email: ioe@reading.ac.uk, Telephone:  + 44 (0) 118 378 2601