Department of Education

Dr Laura Molway

Departmental Lecturer in Modern Languages Education

College Affiliation: St Antony's College

Laura specialises in modern languages teacher education.

Before working with the department, she taught French and German in state secondary schools in Oxfordshire. She became interested in teacher education whilst mentoring beginning languages teachers during their school placements.

Laura is the subject lead for the PGCE in modern languages and she also supervises higher degrees in the fields of instructed second language learning and language teacher education. Her recent research has focussed on: the use of the target language for instruction; explicit teaching of language learning strategies; students’ motivation for learning languages other than English; languages teachers’ professional learning needs and experiences; and formative language teacher evaluation.

Thesis

MFL Teachers’ Professional Learning: In Search of Impact

Funded Research Projects:

  • LANGUAGES: Comparing language use and instruction across contexts

    • Sept 2021 - Sept 2025

    Funder: Norwegian Research Council

Doctoral Applications

Laura welcomes doctoral applications from students interested in the following research areas:

  • Modern languages teacher education (both initial and in-service professional learning)
  • Curriculum, pedagogy and assessment in secondary school modern languages (with a focus on learning languages other than English (LOTE))
  • Formative language teacher evaluation (including the development and/or trial of student perception surveys, self-assessment tools and observation protocols)

  • Subjects Taught

    MSc Applied Linguistics & Second Language Acquisition

    MSc in Learning and Teaching

    PGCE (Modern Languages: French, German, Spanish, Mandarin)

    DPhil in Education

Publications:

  • Featured Publications

    • Molway, L (2021) “Measuring effective teaching: Student perceptions of their modern languages lessons in England”, System. Elsevier BV.
      DOI: http://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2020.102440

    • MOLWAY, L (2021) “Which aspects of their practice do modern languages teachers in England’s secondary schools say they want to develop?”, Language Learning Journal. Taylor & Francis (Routledge).
      DOI: http://doi.org/10.1080/09571736.2020.1862897

    • Molway, L, Mutton, T (2020) “Changing mindsets in the modern foreign languages classroom: An intervention combining intelligence theories and reading strategies”, Language Learning Journal. Taylor & Francis (Routledge).
      DOI: http://doi.org/10.1080/09571736.2018.1554693

    • MOLWAY, L, Macaro, E, Arcos, M (2020) “Language teachers’ reported first and second language use: A comparative contextualized study of England and Spain”, Language Teaching Research. SAGE Publications.
      DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/1362168820913978

  • Book chapters

    • MOLWAY, LJ, MUTTON, T, WOORE, R, Porter, K (2018) “What are the possibilities and limitations of small-scale, mediated classroom interventions? Two cases from Modern Foreign Languages”, In: G STYLIANIDES, A CHILDS (eds.) Classroom-based Interventions Across Subject Areas: Research to Understand What Works in Education. Abingdon: Routledge.

  • Conference papers

    • Molway, L (2016) What factors facilitate or impede languages teachers’ engagement in continued professional learning?. (Birmingham Aston University)

    • Molway, L, Mutton, T, Woore, R (2015) Professional learning through a subject-specific Masters programme: engaging with and in research to develop teachers’ epistemological beliefs and classroom practice. (Queen’s University, Belfast)

    • CHAN, J, MOLWAY, L, MUTTON, T, WOORE, R Learning and Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language: A Systematic Review.

  • Journal articles

    • MOLWAY, L (2021) “Which aspects of their practice do modern languages teachers in England’s secondary schools say they want to develop?”, Language Learning Journal.
      DOI: http://doi.org/10.1080/09571736.2020.1862897

    • Molway, L (2021) “Measuring effective teaching: Student perceptions of their modern languages lessons in England”, System. 102440-102440.
      DOI: http://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2020.102440

    • Molway, L, Mutton, T (2020) “Changing mindsets in the modern foreign languages classroom: An intervention combining intelligence theories and reading strategies”, Language Learning Journal. 48(5) 598-612.
      DOI: http://doi.org/10.1080/09571736.2018.1554693

    • WOORE, R, MUTTON, T, MOLWAY, L (2020) “‘It's definitely part of who I am in the role’. Developing teachers' research engagement through a subject-specific Master's programme”, Teacher Development. 24(1) 88-107.
      DOI: http://doi.org/10.1080/13664530.2019.1693421

    • MOLWAY, L, Macaro, E, Arcos, M (2020) “Language teachers’ reported first and second language use: A comparative contextualized study of England and Spain”, Language Teaching Research.
      DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/1362168820913978

    • MOLWAY, L (2019) “’It’s all about coping with the new specifications’: Coping professional development – the new CPD”, London Review of Education.
      DOI: http://doi.org/10.18546/LRE.17.2.01

  • Other

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