Applied Linguistics

Global Englishes-informed Language Teaching

Global Englishes Language Teaching—a curriculum framework created by Professor Heath Rose (Oxford) and Professor Nicola Galloway (Exeter/Oxford)—is being introduced in Hong Kong secondary schools through a HK$30 million Quality Education Fund initiative. The centrepiece, the Global Englishes AI-assisted Virtual Reality Learning System (GAVIS), integrates AI and VR with Global Englishes-informed pedagogy.

Drama-based Learning

A booklet of 15 drama-based classroom activities, developed from Dr Faidra Faitaki’s John Fell Fund project, supports children with English as an Additional Language. Shared across nine countries via CPD/Knowledge Exchange workshops, it promotes drama-based approaches to language learning.

Teaching and Learning of Arabic

A database of studies on learning and teaching Arabic has been compiled by Dr Anna-Maria Ramezanzadeh, Dr Robert Woore, Dr Emilie Zuniga and funded by Qatar Foundation International. The team also co-host the annual Oxford–QFI Research Forum, bringing together teachers, researchers and policymakers globally, and convened a priority-setting project, webinar, and QFI Autumn Institute sessions to align research with practice.

Materials for MFL Teachers

• Dr Robert Woore features in two CPD videos from The National Consortium for Languages Education.
• The FLEUR project, funded by the Nuffield Foundation, provides semi-authentic French texts designed for beginner and lower-intermediate learners.
• The OLLA project, funded by the ESRC, offers free online French resources built from the 2,000 most frequent words, created during COVID-19 to support learner engagement.

Research Priority Setting with Practitioners

The group co-develops research agendas with teachers through initiatives like the priority-setting partnerships in Arabic and English as an Additional Language, and knowledge-exchange projects such as “Are We Singing in Tune?” (led by Dr Catherine Hamilton), ensuring research directly informs classroom practice.

Raising Methodological Standards

The International Database of Education Systematic Reviews, founded by Dr Hamish Chalmers, is a free database of the bibliographic information about published systematic reviews in Education. This is the first dedicated protocol repository in the field. It supports transparency and higher methodological standards in educational research.

Working collaboratively with other research groups in the Department, Dr Hamish Chalmers with Dr Michelle Meadows and Professor Jo-Anne Baird produced an online self-paced course on how to conduct trustworthiness appraisal of experimental and quasi-experimental research. This has been used by Doctoral and Master’s students in the Department to upskill this element of their research practice, and is publicly available.

Oxford Education Deanery

Applied Linguistics members contribute to Deanery workshops, conferences, podcasts, digests and resources, such as the Association of Language Learning conferences, highlighting the group’s strong record in public engagement and knowledge exchange. Visit the Oxford Education Deanery website.

• Brekelmans, G., Lavan, N., Clayards, M. & Wonnacott, E. (2022). Does high talker variability improve the learning of non-native phoneme contrasts? A replication. Journal of Memory and Language. Vol 126 (Registered Report). Manscuript(finalStage2). Supplementary files on OSF.   Oasis Accessible Summary
• Chalmers, H., Brown, J., & Koryakina, A. (2023). Topics, publication patterns, and reporting quality in systematic reviews in language education. Lessons from the international database of education systematic reviews (IDESR). Applied Linguistics Review, https://doi.org/10.1515/applirev-2022-0190.
• Chalmers, H., Faitaki, F., & Murphy, V.A. (2023). Setting research priorities for English as an Additional Language What do research users want from EAL research? Language Teaching for Young Learners. https://doi.org/10.1075/ltyl.00043.set
• Faitaki, F., Liggins, S., & Murphy, V.A. (2025). Piloting a drama-based oral language intervention. First Language, 45(3), 282-302. https://doi.org/10.1177/01427237251326982
• Faitaki, F. & Murphy, V.A. (2020). “Oral elicitation tasks in language acquisition research”, in H. Rose and J. McKinley (Eds.). The Routledge Handbook of Research Methods in Applied Linguistics (pp. 360-369). Routledge.
• Faitaki, F. & Murphy, V.A. (2023). Subject realization in Greek preschool learners of English. Second Language Research, 40(4), 911-933. https://doi.org/10.1177/02676583231195308
• Graham, S. J., Woore, R., Porter, A. M., Courtney, L. and Savory, C. (2020) ‘Navigating the challenges of L2 reading: self-efficacy, self-regulatory reading strategies and learner profiles’. The Modern Language Journal, 104(4), pp. 693-714. https://www.jstor.org/stable/45387168
• Hamilton, C. & Murphy, V.A. (2023) Folk pedagogy? Investigating how and why UK early years and primary teachers use songs with young learners, Education 3-13. https://doi.org/10.1080/03004279.2023.2168132
• Hamilton, C., Schulz, J., Chalmers, H., & Murphy, V.A. (2024). Investigating the substantive linguistic effects of using songs for teaching second or foreign languages to preschool, primary and secondary school learners: a systematic review of intervention research. System, 124(103350). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2024.103350
• Isaacs, T., & Chalmers, H. (2023). Reducing ‘avoidable research waste’ in applied linguistics research: lessons from healthcare research. Language Teaching, doi:10.1017/S0261444823000411.
• Lee, S., Jeon, J., McKinley, J., & Rose, H. (2025). Generative AI and English language teaching: A global Englishes perspective. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 1-24.
• Li, S. & Woore, R. (2021) ‘The effects of phonics instruction on L2 phonological decoding and vocabulary learning: An experimental study of Chinese EFL learners’. System, 103. https://doi-org.ezproxy-prd.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/10.1016/j.system.2021.102677
• Li, S., & Woore, R. (2023). How Chinese learners decode L2 English words: evidence from a phonics instruction programme. Reading Research Quarterly, 58(4), pp. 584-600. https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.515
• Macaro, E. & Woore, R. (eds.) (2021) Debates in second language education. Routledge. [SOLO link here.]
• Ramezanzadeh, A.-M., Woore, R., & Malmberg, L.-E. (2025). Imagining, believing and achieving in L2 Arabic: Motivational self-concepts and language outcomes in a multiglossic context. System (Linköping), 135, Article 103866. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2025.103866
• Ramezanzadeh, A.-M., Woore, R. & Malmberg, L. (2025) ‘Imagining, Believing and Achieving in L2 Arabic: The relationship between motivational self-concepts and language outcomes in a multiglossic context’. System.
• Rose, H., & McKinley, J. (2025). Global Englishes and TESOL: An editorial introduction to innovating research and practice. TESOL Quarterly, 59(1), 5-23.
• Ramezanzadeh, A.-M., Woore R. & Zuniga, E. (2025) A scoping review into the teaching and learning of Arabic as an Additional Language (2025 update) – database of studies. https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:da0bc45e-2ddd-429d-b710-6d0e84a49df8.
• Rose, H., McKinley, J., & Zhou, S. (2026). Data Collection Research Methods in Applied Linguistics (2^nd Ed). Bloomsbury Publishing.
• Singh, D., Wonnacott, E., & Samara, A. (2021). Statistical and explicit learning of graphotactic patterns with no phonological counterpart: Evidence from an artificial lexicon study with 6–7-year-olds and adults. Journal of Memory and Language. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2021.104265 Preprint Rcode & data
• Viviani, Ramscar & Wonnacott (to appear) Go above and beyond: Does input variability affect children’s ability to learn spatial adpositions in a novel language? Royal Society Open Science preprint at https://osf.io/sd9zm/files/v3ab9 data and scripts at at https://osf.io/8whz7/
• Vujović, M., Ramscar, M., & Wonnacott, E. (2021). Language learning as uncertainty reduction: The role of prediction error in linguistic generalization and item-learning. Journal of Memory and Language. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2021.104231Preprint R code & data
• Woore, R (2018) ‘Learners’ pronunciations of familiar and unfamiliar French words: what can they tell us about phonological decoding in an L2?’. The Language Learning Journal, 46(4), pp. 456-469. https://doi.org/10.1080/09571736.2016.1161062
• Woore, R., Graham, S., Porter, A., Courtney, L. and Savory, C. (2018) Foreign Language Education: Unlocking Reading (FLEUR) – A study into the teaching of reading to beginner learners of French in secondary school.  https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:4b0cb239-72f0-49e4-8f32-3672625884f0
• Woore, R. (2021) ‘Teaching Phonics in a second language’, in E. Macaro & R. Woore (eds.), Debates in Second Language Education. Routledge, pp. 222-246. [SOLO link here.]
• Woore, R., Molway, L. & Macaro, E. (2022) ‘Keeping sight of the big picture: a critical response to Ofsted’s 2021 Curriculum Research Review for languages’. Language Learning Journal special edition, 50(2), pp. 146-155. https://doi.org/10.1080/09571736.2022.2045677
• Woore, R., Molway, L. & Mutton, T. (2025), ‘Modern Languages in England’s National Curriculum: a call for (r)evolution!’. Language Learning Journal special edition.
• Woore, R. (2022) ‘What can second language acquisition research tell us about the phonics “pillar”?’ Language Learning Journal special edition, 50(2), pp. 172-185. https://doi.org/10.1080/09571736.2022.2045683
• Woore, R., Molway, L. & Savory, C. (accepted for publication pending minor revisions) ‘Motivation for learning Chinese compared to European Languages: An exploration in English Secondary Schools’. Foreign Language Annals.