Dr Charalampia Karagianni

I am a Senior Lecturer in Education and the Course Leader for the PGCE in Further Education and Skills Sector. I teach on the BA in Education Studies and the EdD.
I gained my PhD in Education and Professional Practice from King’s College London. I did my Master’s in Education and BA in Greek Language and Literacy at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.
I have taught in and led a variety of courses related to Education studies over the last seven years, aiming at providing equal opportunities and outstanding experience to all of my students regardless of their educational background.

My research interests reside in teacher education, teacher cognition, additional language pedagogy and teaching, learning and assessment in the post-compulsory education and training sector. I am passionate about supporting preservice and in-service teachers with the development of the professional knowledge base needed to provide outstanding learning experiences to all learners regardless of their linguistic, cultural and social backgrounds.
In my PhD thesis, I investigated the pedagogical principles and practices that mainstream teachers working in Greek junior secondary schools employ to teach the curriculum subject Greek to children from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds. I adopted a case study approach and qualitative data collection methods to shed light on teachers' actual teaching practices and the reasoning behind these practices. I also analysed the national curriculum to reveal the political assumptions regarding how mainstream teachers are expected to teach their subject area in multicultural and multilingual classrooms. This investigation led me to suggest principles needed to underline the national curriculum and teacher education programmes to prepare teachers for the classroom reality.
In the last five years, I have led and collaborated on a range of action research projects, which supported the teacher education staff and students with the development of their pedagogical knowledge and skills. In the last academic year, I was involved in a project following the Japanese method of 'Lesson Study' and focused on creative teaching practices. Other projects were related to supporting ESOL students with the development of their language skills and effectively adopting flipped learning approaches in adult classrooms.
I am involved in the British-funded STEM-Power and MGEMS projects aiming to investigate gender equality in Indonesia and Vietnam.

Technology and Education Research Methodology Assessment and Feedback Behaviour Management Community, family and children The Learning Environment