Dr Laura Grassick

Profile

I am an experienced specialist in second language education, with a strong background as an English language teacher, teacher educator, researcher and project manager. My career has spanned diverse international contexts, notably in Vietnam and Egypt, where I led both regional and national language education initiatives in partnership with ministries of education.

My work includes research in curriculum change and implementation and second language teacher develpment. I have also contributed to the field through educational consultancy projects focused on designing English language teacher education programmes and developing instructional materials.

From 2021 – 2025, I was Programme Leader for MA TESOL Studies, one of our largest taught postgraduate programmes. I hold a PhD in Education from the University of Leeds, awarded through an ESRC studentship. I am a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, reflecting my commitment to excellence in teaching and learning in higher education.

Responsibilities

• Module Manager

Research interests

My main research interest lies in English language curriculum change; the relationships involved in how people make sense of a new curriculum and how the social and emotional dimensions of change influence actual implementation.

My research focuses on the complex dynamics of English language curriculum reform. Its main contribution lies in the new understandings of complexity it establishes in relation to language curriculum innovation, which positions relational, emotional and social dimensions as key concerns in the langauge curriculum change implementation process and suggests why some of the difficulties surrounding curriculum innovation in many contexts are not easy to address.

I am also interested in areas of second language teacher education - the role of practical and theoretical knowledge in CPD and the implications for how both teachers and educators achieve agency, particular in times of curriculum change.

Recent research projects:

• A Community of Exploratory Practice: Teachers' Developing Culturally Responsive English Language Pedagogy in Ethnic Minority Group areas in Vietnam". 2023-2024. A British Council-funded project helping secondary school English language teachers explore their own classrooms, learners and teaching practice to get a better understanding of how to engage and motivate learners from ethnic minority groups in English language learning. Through a community of exploratory practice and in-school mentoring, teachers have the opportunity to plan and try out classroom approaches and activities which reflect and value learners' own languages and cultural heritage.
• English Language Teacher Educator Professionalism 2025-2026. An internally funded project investigating aspects of expertise and knowledge needed by language teacher educators in China. The findings will help us to (re)examne the knowledge base of teacher eduators and provide insights into the preparation for English language teacher educators.

Qualifications

• PhD Education
• MSc Educational Research Methods
• MA TESOL Teacher Education
• BA (Hons) Sociology and Social Anthropology
• CELTA and DELTA

Professional memberships

• British Association of Applied Linguistics (BAAL)
• British Association of International and Comparative Education (BAICE)
• International Association of Teaching English as a Foreign Language (IATEFL)

Student education

I teach modules on the MA TESOL and MA TESOL Studies programmes covering the following areas:

• language teaching methodology
• language teacher education
• research methods

I support the MA TESOL China programme and teach a module in China at Guangdong University of Foreign Studies.

I supervise taught postgraduate and research students.

Research groups and institutes

• Centre for Language Education Research

Current postgraduate researchers

• Zachary Chai