Dr Marnie Seymour - University of Winchester

We encourage our staff and students to be enterprising in all they do and we maintain close ties with regional employers

View content

Biography

Marnie is Co-Director of the Institute of Education. The Institute of Education is home to over 1000 full-time students and 500 part-time students who are involved with a range of courses from within the Institute’s portfolio. Marnie is jointly responsible for the strategic and operational direction of the Initial teacher education (ITE) programmes in the department; post-graduate courses and CPD; as well as research and knowledge exchange. She is the subject lead for Primary Foreign Languages (PFL) across all of our Primary ITE provision. She is also the Academic Lead for Quality through Leadership (QTL), the lead provider for the National Professional Qualifications for Executive Leadership, Headship, Senior and Middle Leadership across the south of the region.

Marnie actively works to form collaborative partnerships with colleagues from other HEIs, local schools, Hampshire Local Authority and other professional bodies in order to explore ways in which the University can support school-based research e.g. through formal accreditation and through CPD. She has a successful track record for attracting funding to provide CPD for teachers. Prior to taking on the leadership of the department in 2018, Marnie was a senior lecturer in education and Programme Leader for our very successful MA Education programme. She has taught across all of our ITE programmes, the MA Education and EdD.

Prior to working in higher education, Marnie worked as a Headteacher in two junior schools in Hampshire. She is also the Chair of Governors for a large Infant School in the New Forest.

Marnie’s research interests lie principally in the field of sociolinguistics. She is particularly interested in early foreign language teaching and learning and exploring the influence of social contexts and policy on the beliefs and practices of teachers. She is active within her discipline, is a member of a number of national professional associations for language learning and teaching and has co-convened and contributed to conferences focusing on early foreign language learning.

Areas of expertise

- Supporting teacher development through action research and evidence-based practice

- School leadership

- Primary Foreign Languages

Publications

Pagden, L. and Seymour, M. (2018) Primary Foreign Languages in England: The impact of externally funded training on teachers’ ability to translate police into practice. Paper presented at Early Language Learning Conference 2018 - Reykjavik

Seymour, M. (2016) Primary Foreign Languages in England: Congruence and Dissonance in Teachers’ Beliefs and Practices. Paper presented at International Conference of Education, Research and Innovation (ICERI 2016), Seville.

Seymour, M. (2016) Undergraduate Primary Trainee Teachers ‘Facing their Fears’ in Primary Languages. Paper presented at RILLT conference, University of Winchester.

Seymour, M. (2016)Patchworking and Semiotics as tools for ‘storying’ the development of student teacher beliefs and practices in PFL. Paper accepted for BAAL Creativity in Languages Research Conference.

Seymour, M. (2014) Creative, Contextual and Purposeful FL learning. Paper presented at New Horizons Languages Conference, University of Winchester.

Seymour, M. and Witt, S. (2014) La Chasse à l’Ours: A Journey Exploring Teacher Trainees’ Attitudes to Primary Foreign Language Teaching. Francophonie file:///C:/Users/Marnie/Documents/Research/Seymour%20and%20Witt/Francophonie/La%20Chasse%20a%20l'ours%20Francophonie%20article%20May%202014.pdf

Return to the Staff Directory

Research interests

Marnie's research interests lie principally in the field of sociolinguistics. She is particularly interested in early foreign language teaching and learning and exploring the influence of social contexts and policy on the beliefs and practices of teachers.

She is active within her discipline area both within and outside the University. She co-convenes the University of Winchester’s biennial Research Informed Language Learning and Teaching (RILLT) conference.

Marnie is an active member of the Association for Language Learning (ALL) and co-convenes an ALL Primary hub, supporting the development of Primary Foreign Languages (PFL) across the sector for local teachers. This hub meets termly to ensure the dissemination of research findings and good practice as a mechanism for supporting local teachers and subject coordinators. She is also a member of the Research in Primary Languages (RiPL) network.