Spanning the field of English education and multiple humanities disciplines, Shelby’s broad research interests include literature pedagogy, approaches to literary interpretation, the reception of classical texts, current revivals of mid-twentieth century American theatre, and British literature of the long nineteenth century.
His doctoral project investigates how Pride and Prejudice is taught in UK secondary schools and, more specifically, the ways in which the teaching of Austen’s novel can serve as a test case to understand how knowledge operates in a literature class and what kinds of knowledge a student needs to read and interpret a work of literature. In addition to his doctoral research, he is revising a manuscript on reviving literary knowledge in English education in the US. He is also part of a research team (led by Professor Victoria Elliott) conducting a scoping review of methods used to study the teaching of literature in secondary education. A first-generation college student and a product of Mississippi public (state) schools, Shelby aspires to make literary education accessible to students through his research and teaching.
Shelby Knighten graduated valedictorian from the School of Education at the University of Mississippi, where he was a Taylor Medalist and a fellow of the inaugural cohort of the Mississippi Excellence in Teaching Program. A member of UM’s Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College, Shelby defended his senior thesis on the need for a coherent high school literature curriculum in the United States and the current sources of incoherency that hinder this goal. During his final semester at UM, Shelby was awarded the university’s outstanding student teacher award from the Mississippi Association of Colleges of Teacher Education.
After completing his BAEd. in English with additional licensure in French and theatre, Shelby taught in Mississippi public schools. He has teaching experience in all secondary age groups in both city and county schools. As a literature teacher for the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme, his classes achieved a 100 percent course pass rate based on composite marks from the IB’s series of assessments. Most recently, Shelby wrote the English curriculum and part of the science curriculum for Team 36, an organization he helped charter as an undergraduate at UM which provided ACT preparation classes to students in under-resourced schools in Mississippi.
During the summer holidays, Shelby undertook graduate work at Middlebury College’s Bread Loaf School of English. His work was supported by Phi Kappa Phi’s Love of Learning Grant, the Methodist Foundation of Mississippi Scholarship, and Bread Loaf memorial scholarships in honor of John M. Kirk, Jr. and Charles Orr. He completed his master’s degree in English at Bread Loaf’s Lincoln College campus, Oxford University, this past summer as an inaugural Roxanne McCormick Leighton Scholar.
His DPhil in the Department of Education is generously funded by the Grand Union Doctoral Training Partnership of the United Kingdom’s Economic and Social Research Council.
Shelby is a proud member of the honor societies of Phi Beta Kappa, Phi Kappa Phi, and Pi Delta Phi.
Publications
Knighten, S. R. “Mausoleum, Museum, or Menagerie?: A 2022 Survey of West End Revivals of Classic American Texts” (under review, Theatre Annual: A Journal of Theatre and Performance in America)
Knighten, S. R. “Like Father, Like Son? Reading & Rereading Homer’s Odyssey in Daniel Mendelsohn’s An Odyssey.” Classical World, vol. 116, no. 1, Nov. 2022, pp. 51–73. https://doi.org/10.1353/clw.2022.0024
Louise Vincent is a DPhil in Education candidate researching how teachers become who they are.
Louise’s work situates the schoolteacher as a particular type of subject, that is both made and makes itself from within a network of power relations. Her study combines Foucauldian theory, Critical Discourse Analysis and Narrative analysis to provide an account of schoolteachers’ ethical agency in the context of top-down policy practices.
In March 2023 she presented her study’s philosophical premises at the Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain (PESGB)’s annual conference. By forefronting teacher’s perspectives, Louise hopes to contribute to practical questions of education policy given the UK’s “teacher shortages.” By interrogating how individuals experience becoming teachers, she believes, we can develop better models for the teaching profession.
Prior to her studies at Oxford, Louise was awarded a first class honours BA in Human, Social, and Political Sciences and a MPhil in Political Thought and Intellectual History, both of which she completed at the University of Cambridge. She then pursued a Postgraduate Diploma in Education (PGDE) at University College London’s Institute of Education, which informed her practice as a secondary school English teacher.
Zhengyuan is a highly motivated DPhil candidate in the Department of Education at the University of Oxford, with a strong passion for research and a deep commitment to advancing the field of language and cognition. She is currently supported by Swire Scholarship.
After completing her undergraduate studies at the University of Toronto, Zhengyuan pursued a MSc degree in Applied Linguistics and Second Language Acquisition at the University of Oxford. During her studies, she developed a keen interest in adult second language learning and processing, which has since become the focus of her research.
As a DPhil candidate, Zhengyuan is currently working on their doctoral thesis, which explores the acquisition and processing of grammar and semantics in adult second language learning. Her research is focused on statistical learning approach, with the goal of uncovering new insights and contributing to the wider body of knowledge in their field.
Dan is a part-time DPhil Education student whose research focuses on investigating reasons why individuals choose to study and then teach physics as a subject discipline and how these relate to issues of equity and power. He previously worked as a secondary school physics teacher in the West Midlands of England for around 15 years before taking up his current post as Associate Professor of Physics Education at the University of Birmingham where he works in widening participation in physics and teacher education.
Publications
- Cottle, D 2022, ‘Harnessing the potential of recently retired physics teachers to mentor new physics teachers’, Physics Education, vol. 57, no. 1, 015020. https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6552/ac3931
- Cottle, D 2021, ‘Improving students’ mathematical skills in secondary science: ideas from mathematics pedagogy’, School Science Review, vol. 102, no. 381, pp. 61-64. <https://www.ase.org.uk/resources/school-science-review/issue-381/improving-students-mathematical-skills-in-secondary>
- Cottle, D 2021, ‘The effects of Covid-19 on student transition from school to university in STEM subjects’, New Directions in the Teaching of Physical Sciences, vol. 16, no. 1, 3847, pp. 1-4. https://doi.org/10.29311/ndtps.v0i14.3847
- Cottle, D & Marshall, R 2016, ‘Exploring electrical resistance: a novel kinesthetic model helps to resolve some misconceptions’, Physics Education, vol. 51, no. 5. https://doi.org/10.1088/0031-9120/51/5/054004
Emmanuel Edudzie is a Doctoral Student and a member of the Comparative and International Education Research Group at the Department of Education, University of Oxford.
His doctoral research is at the confluence of education policy and school-to-work transition in Africa, with a specific focus on the effect of secondary education on the employability skills of school-leavers in Ghana. When completed, the research will contribute to strengthening learning ecosystems across Africa so that they are more focused on and effective in the development of foundational skills and socioemotional learning.
Shuo-Fang earned a Bachelor’s degree from National Chengchi University (Taiwan) and a Master’s degree from Boston University. He has teaching experience in various EFL contexts including international high school, educational institute, and graduate language program.
Shuo-Fang’s areas of interest lie in applied linguistics, particularly phonetics/phonology and speech perception. As an Oxford-Taiwan Graduate Scholar, Shuo-Fang is currently undertaking his doctoral research, supervised by Dr Elizabeth Wonnacott and Dr Robert Woore. His doctoral project is mostly experimental and explores second language learners’ difficulty in processing English connected speech.
Shuo-Fang is affiliated with two research groups: Applied Linguistics and Wonnacott-Nation Lab (developmental cognitive psychology).
Publications
Liang, S., & Yu, H. (2021). Chinese students’ willingness to communicate in EFL classrooms: A case study of students at a Sino-foreign university. Professional and Academic English, 28(2), 15–33.
Rachel’s research focuses on exploring the experiences of ethnic minority trainee teachers with a view to better supporting their progress through teacher education and beyond.
Rachel received a BEng in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Birmingham. She later completed a PGCE in secondary science and an MSc in Teacher Education at the University of Oxford. She also has a MA in Photography.
Rachel taught physics for seven years in local Oxfordshire secondary schools, becoming a mentor to trainee science teachers and Head of Physics. She most recently worked on the second year Teach First science course at the Institute of Education at UCL and as a curriculum tutor on the Oxford science PGCE. She has taught the Teaching Physics in Schools option for second year physics undergraduates studying at Oxford for the past four years.
Candace’s research focuses on assessments of early-stage literacy in low-and-middle-income countries. Specifically, around examining the challenges and opportunities relating to the alignment, measurement and use of SDG 4.1.1 on proficiency levels at primary and lower secondary education.
Candace completed her Masters in Educational Assessment and has chosen to continue her studies within the OUCEA.
TITLE OF THESIS
Teachers’ metaphysical beliefs about truth
My research investigates teachers’ metaphysical beliefs about truth; a matter that has largely been neglected in previous research, which has tended to focus on epistemology. That is to say that, in addition to normative beliefs about the justificatory grounds for truth, teachers will also hold metatheoretic beliefs about the nature of truth in their relative subject disciplines. This research will cast light on the conceptualisations of subjects, and on the relationship between metaphysical beliefs and teachers’ self-perceptions regarding their professional responsibilities.
I have a philosophical background (BA Cantab) and have worked as a teacher of religious education. I have worked as a research assistant for a project, seed-funded by the John Fell Foundation, which investigated the forms of expertise drawn upon in the educational policy decision-making process of the COVID-19 pandemic. I have also worked as an assistant for a project funded by the Scottish Qualifications Authority, which developed and piloted a survey designed to measure stakeholders’ trust in examinations