Investigating the effects of whole-class singing activities on the linguistic outcomes of young foreign language learners in English primary schools: a doctoral research study

Cate Hamilton is a DPhil candidate at the Department of Education, University of Oxford, supervised by Hamish Chalmers and Victoria Murphy. Cate’s research questions arose through her practice as an early years languages teacher where she introduced children to ten languages through songs across multiple EYFS settings in England, and only ever heard “well everyone remembers Frère Jacques” as the rationale to justify claims that songs were a superlatively effective pedagogy. Wondering if there was any empirical evidence to support her own (and others’) teaching practice and beliefs, she embarked on the MSc ALSLA programme supervised by Victoria Murphy in 2020. The randomised controlled trial presented today forms the second and final phase of her doctoral thesis, due for completion in 2025.