The Team

Dr Jen Aggleton

Jen is a Lecturer in Education at the OU, specialising in literature and literacy. She is the incoming chair of E209 Developing Subject Knowledge for the Primary Years and is also part of the authoring team for the Primary PGCE for Wales. Prior to joining the OU, Jen taught at City, University of London and the University of Cambridge, creating or contributing to courses on Children’s Literature, Children’s Librarianship, and Education. Before moving into academia, Jen spent several years working as a primary school teacher and librarian.

Jen’s research interests centre around young people’s engagements with texts, with particular foci on the affordances of different forms of media, and children’s library services. Her doctoral research used participatory methods to explore children’s engagements with illustrated novels and received a special commendation from UKLA for its development of methodology and contribution to scholarly understanding.

Dr Liz Chamberlain

Liz is a is a Professor of Primary Education (Knowledge Exchange) at the OU and is Associate Head of School, Enterprise and Innovation within the School of Education, Childhood, Youth & Sport.

She is Academic Director for the Leave No Girl Behind project, Strengthening Adolescent Girls' Education (SAGE), in partnership with the NGO, Plan International, working with 13,000 girls in Zimbabwe. She is past Director of The Open University's Children's Research Centre (2017-2020). Liz’s specialism and passion is Primary English; for four years she was the Strategic Consultant on the national writing project Everybody Writes, working closely with both the Book Trust and the National Literacy Trust. Her internationally recognized research focuses on capturing what it means for children to be writers with a focus on developing writers’ experiences of writing both in and out-of-school. Liz's contributions are predicated on her expertise of complex professional contexts exploring the knowledge intersection between educational practice, learner and practitioner, through the lens of literacy education.

Prof Teresa Cremin

Liz is a is a Professor of Primary Education (Knowledge Exchange) at the OU and is Associate Head of School, Enterprise and Innovation within the School of Education, Childhood, Youth & Sport.

Teresa is Professor of Education (Literacy) at the OU. An ex-primary school teacher, then staff development co-ordinator and for 18 years an ITE tutor, Teresa now undertakes teaching, research and consultancy in the UK and abroad. A Fellow of the English Association, the Academy of Social Sciences, and the Royal Society of the Arts, Teresa is a member of the DfE English Hubs Council and the DfE Reading for Pleasure sub-committee. She is a co-editor of the journal Thinking Skills and Creativity and series editor of Learning to Teach Creatively in the Primary School (Routledge).  Teresa is also chair of the Advisory Group of the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Teacher Development Fund, a member of the ESRC Peer Review College, of the IBE-UNESCO network of Early Literacy Experts, a Trustee of the UK Literacy Association and was previously convenor of BERA Special interest Group on creativity. 

Her research focuses mainly on young people’s volitional reading and writing and the relationship between this and their teachers’ literate identities and classroom practices. Teresa is also keen to understand creative pedagogies that offer teachers and younger learners the chance to be imaginatively engaged as learners, exerting their agency and working collaboratively. 

Dr Helen Hendry

Helen is a Senior Lecturer in Education at the OU and part of the Education Studies (primary) undergraduate team. She is Deputy Chair of the ‘Comparative and International Studies in Primary Education’ module and Module Team Chair for a new edition of ‘Learning and Teaching in the Primary Years’. Her career in higher education has included leading the masters module ‘Educational Leadership: exploring strategy’ at the OU, and leading the Education Studies Undergraduate Programme at Bishop Grosseteste University (BGU). She was also responsible for English in primary Initial Teacher Education (ITE) at BGU for seven years. Helen draws on her previous professional experience as a senior leader in schools and an educational advisor for inclusion from birth to five. Her research centres around early reading, ITE and international early childhood development. Helen’s doctoral study charted the experience of trainee teachers learning to teach early reading through a longitudinal collective case study approach. This included consideration of the impact of community and collaboration on the practices of the student teachers and how they created rich reading experiences for pupils. Helen has researched and implemented initiatives designed to enhance pupils’ love of literature including developing a Mercers’ Company funded ‘Reading and Writing for pleasure framework for practice’ based on an extensive review of research and data collection with 6 charitable programmes in London. She also worked with the National Foundation for Educational Research to develop ‘Poetry Train’ with ITE students and poets in collaboration with the Poetry Society. Helen leads the OU and UKLA student teacher reading for pleasure scheme with 20 UK Higher Education institutions. She mentors English leaders on the OU Reading Schools programme.

Dr Fiona Henry

Helen is a Lecturer in Education at the OU.  She leads the Master’s in Education, Leadership and Management pathway and contributes to the Inclusive Practice pathway. Prior to this, Helen led the Education Studies Undergraduate Programme at Bishop Grosseteste University and was responsible for English in Primary Initial Teacher Education (ITE) for seven years. Helen draws on her previous professional experience as a senior leader in schools and an educational advisor for inclusion from birth to five. Her research centres around early reading, ITE and international early childhood development. Helen’s doctoral study charted the experience of trainee teachers learning to teach early reading through a longitudinal collective case study approach. This included consideration of the impact of community and collaboration on the practices of the student teachers and how they created rich reading experiences for pupils. Helen has implemented and evaluated initiatives designed to enhance pupils’ love of literature including work with the National Foundation for Educational Research to develop ‘Poetry Train’ with ITE students and poets in collaboration with the Poetry Society. Helen has also worked closely with the UKLA, librarians and authors to develop a reading and writing for pleasure pedagogy with student teachers.

Ms Stephanie Hilder

Stephanie has worked within primary education for over twenty years as a teacher, senior leader, consultant or advisor for English. She continues to work very closely with colleagues who are school-based and has a particular interest in the junction where theory meets practice through collaboration and continuing professional development. Stephanie has facilitated school-based action research projects for groups collaborating on aspects of writing, reading, and phonics, including leading an OU/UKLA Teachers Reading Group (TRG) for two years before joining the Open university Reading for Pleasure (RfP) team. As a long-standing member of the United Kingdom Literacy Association (UKLA), Stephanie is proud to serve on the editorial board of English 4-11, a magazine aimed at primary colleagues, and which highlights the work of teachers developing practice in classrooms.

Having first discovered her vocation for teaching as a volunteer tutor for women in the West Midlands with little or no English, Stephanie is committed to tackling social and educational disadvantage and believes passionately in the power of books and language for increasing access and opportunity.

Stephanie joined the Open University as a part time lecturer in RfP in September 2021. The whole school team, led by Teresa Cremin, works with groups of primary schools and English Hubs across the country over the course of a year. The programme supports schools to develop a culture of reading for pleasure to advantage all children but with particular emphasis on the pupils who are disadvantaged through their lack of interest in, opportunity or commitment to, reading for enjoyment. A programme of support for subject leaders as well as whole school training, develops teacher subject knowledge and pedagogy for RfP, based on the research by Teresa and others (2014), and provides a structure and guidance for rapid and sustainable change. At the same time as joining the Open University, Stephanie is delighted to have also become a member of the Centre for Literacy and Social Justice.

Prof Natalia Kucirkova

Professor of Early Childhood Education and Development at the University of Stavanger, Norway and Professor of Reading and Children’s Development at The Open University, UK. Natalia’s research concerns innovative ways of supporting children’s book reading, digital literacy, and exploring the role of personalisation in the early years. Her research takes place collaboratively across academia, commercial and third sectors. She co-edits the Bloomsbury Book Series Children’s Reading and Writing on Screen and the journal Literacy published by Wiley. She has co-developed an award-winning MOOC “Childhood in the Digital Age”, an app for children’s story-making “Our Story” and professional development course for teachers “Children’s Reading on Screen”. She is author of Digital Personalization in Early Childhood (Bloomsbury) and How and Why to Read and Create Children's Digital Books (UCL Press) and currently blogs for Huffington Post and Psychology Today.

Dr Sarah Jane Mukherjee

Sarah is a Research Associate at the OU.  Sarah’s research experience has centred on using linguistics to explore young children’s oral language particularly in and about play and reading for pleasure.  Sarah’s doctoral work explored children’s meaning making in classroom role-play and the learning opportunities that this playful context affords.   Interested in the power of reading for pleasure for children, Sarah has contributed to evaluations of different RfP initiatives. She is a member of the Research Group PALS (Play and Learning Scholars Around the world) and worked on the LEGO Foundation funded cross-cultural study into children’s and mothers’ conceptions of play and learning with 600 participants in five different countries.

Dr Lucy Rodriguez Leon

Lucy is a Lecturer in Early Childhood a The Open University. Her career began in early childhood practice where she worked with young children and families in a state-maintained nursery school and children’s centre. She also facilitated professional development programmes in early childhood practice and taught on a school centred Early Years Initial Teacher Training program.  

Lucy has a specialist interest in early childhood literacy. Her doctoral research explored 3-4-year-olds’ experiences of the various alphabetic and multimodal texts they encounter in their play and everyday lives in home, preschool and community settings. The study evidenced the broad scope of young children’s activity with text and rendered visible the children’s agency and intrinsic motivation to engage with literacy in personally meaningful ways.  

Lucy is co-convenor of the Literacy in Early Education SIG at the United Kingdom Literacy Association, where she works closely with other early years organisations to engage with policy makers and promote and advocate broad and holistic approaches to early literacy curricula.  

Dr Kimberly Safford

Kimberly is a Senior Lecturer in Education Studies (Primary).   She is the educational consultant for Climate Change All Change (cc-ac.org), a creative partnership of primary schools and designers, for the V&A Museum of Childhood. In Climate Change All Change, children and professionals co-create solutions to the climate crisis through design and storytelling.  Kimberly co-edited Learning and Teaching Around the World: Comparative and International Studies in Primary Education (Routledge 2018). Since 2013 she has worked with the Forum for African Women Educationalists (FAWE) and Plan International in Sierra Leone on the Learning Assistant programme, a school-based pathway into teaching for women in rural communities. She has researched the challenges and opportunities of English as the language of school instruction in Ghana and India, in a British Council research project

Kimberly’s recent evaluations include Cheltenham Literature Festival’s Reading Teachers = Reading Pupils programme and Hackney Learning Trust’s Daily Supported Reading and Destination Reader programmes. In Teaching Grammar and Testing Grammar in the English Primary School (2016) Kimberly investigated the impact on teachers and teaching of statutory SPAG test, a knowledge transfer research project with Roehampton and Oxford Brookes universities, funded by UKLA.

Dr Claire Saunders

Claire is Director of PRAXIS, the Scholarship and Innovation Centre in the Faculty for Education, Wellbeing and Language Studies at the OU. She is also an Education Staff Tutor as part of the Primary and Early Childhood team. Whilst her research is mainly in the area of HE pedagogy, she retains a strong interest in literacy from her previous career as a primary school teacher and has previously published on the relationship between children’s reading and their writing and on developing children as writers. She is currently working as part of the Reading for Pleasure team.

Dr Dana Therova

Dana is an Affiliated Researcher at The Open University. Her main research interest is in the field of applied linguistics, primarily in utilising the methodology of corpus linguistics for the investigation of various aspects of academic writing and how this research can inform pedagogical practices. Her expertise is also in drawing on corpus-driven approaches for the exploration of other discourse genres, such as research interviews. Recently, she has developed an interest in combining corpus-assisted approaches with Systemic Functional Linguistic for the exploration of picture books.

Dr Alison Twiner

Alison is a Research Associate at the OU and University of Cambridge. Her background is in Psychology and she locates her work at the intersection of Psychology and Education. Alison’s work contributes to new sociocultural research around re-theorising meaning-making trajectories as considered through close attention to interactions and exchanges which are intended, and those that are instantiated. Such a view is rendered salient by a dialogic view of educational interactions as a process. Alison is a member of the British Educational Research Association, and European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction.

Alison’s research focuses on the educational use of different tools – including digital technologies, dialogue, and dance (and indeed the combination of these). Through her research Alison seeks to understand how pedagogic use of such tools can offer learners different routes and opportunities to contextualise their understandings and make meanings so that learning can be meaningful, engaging and relevant for all.

Dr Petra Vackova

Petra is a PhD researcher at the School of Education of the Open University. Petra's research focuses on social justice, visual arts, early-years and posthuman education.  Her doctoral research is a new materialist ethnographic study that explores how social inclusion and exclusion is made and lived around artmaking activities in three different early-years settings in a disadvantaged community in the Czech Republic. Petra employs feminist new materialist theories to provide richer understanding of processes of social inclusion and exclusion around artmaking while arguing for relational and response-able approach to just education. Petra co-organizes a WELS Posthumanist Research Support group at the Open University and she is also a member of the British Educational Research Association, and the European Educational Research Association. Petra has been awarded the 2020 WELS Postgraduate Research student prize for research excellence and she was one of the recipients of the 2018 BERA Master Dissertation Highly Commended Award for her work she completed as a part of a Master of Research in Education study also at the Open University prior to her PhD.

Dr Namitra Batra

Namrita is an affiliated researcher at the Open University. Her doctoral research focused on the home and school literacy practices of children in a resource-poor, rural village in India. This was a ‘traditional’ ethnography that involved participant observation of children’s practices for extended periods of time and explored how these practices held personal and cultural meaning for the children. Namrita’s research interests include children’s play and literacy practices, literacy pedagogy and curriculum, and teacher professional development, and she wishes to use sociocultural concepts for her work. She also has over 10 years of experience of working with state schooling in India which encompassed content development for children and teachers, educational research, and teacher training.

Debbie Thomas

Debbie is Lead School Improvement Advisor English for, ‘Achieving for Children’. She also continues to support work with the Open University and UKLA to run Teacher Reading Groups, promoting ‘teachers as readers’ research and pedagogy, and is a lecturer in ‘Reading for Pleasure’.

Debbie has a degree in English and Primary Education and has a post graduate diploma in reading and action research, which mirror her passion for children’s literature and ensuring all pupils achieve well in this subject. She has over 20 years’ experience as a teacher and consultant, specialising in English. This includes extensive experience of supporting a wide range of schools and settings with all aspects of teaching, leading and inspecting English and assessment. Her areas of expertise span strategic leadership of all phases of English, the design and delivery of CPD, leading strategic reviews of practice and the implementation of assessment and effective practice.

Kelly Ashley

Kelly joined the Open University as a Lecturer in Reading for Pleasure in September 2022. She has worked in primary education in both the US and the UK for nearly 25 years as a teacher, leader, author and freelance consultant.

Kelly's research interests are the intersection between communication and reader identity. Her first book, Word Power: Amplifying vocabulary instruction, was published in 2019 offering practical, research-informed strategies to amplify communication in the primary classroom. She is enjoying her part-time role as Lecturer in Reading for Pleasure with the OU, supporting the more than 100 Teacher Reading Group leaders to share reading for pleasure pedagogy and practice. She is also a programme facilitator and mentor for the OU's Reading Schools Programme: Building a culture of reading. As part of her wider work outside of her OU role, Kelly has supported the development of several large-scale projects, including the South Sudan ‘text message curriculum’ project (with the Curriculum Foundation, 2020-2021); the Boston Reading Project (with L.E.A.D. Teaching School Hub, 2019-2021); the Powerful Words project (across the East Cambridgeshire and Fenlands opportunity area, 2018-2020) and the Real Writing project (with Elevate MAT, 2017-2019).

Kelly believes in the power of collaboration, coaching and mentoring and enjoys opportunities to work in close partnership with teachers and other professionals, ensuring that everyone feels valued and empowered to succeed. Kelly is a long-standing member of the United Kingdom Literacy Association (UKLA) and is proud to serve as a regional representative for Yorkshire.

Samantha Hulston

Samantha is a PhD researcher at the University of Cambridge and has worked as a research assistant on several literacy projects at the OU. The OU research projects have been concerned with understanding more about how children and young people engage with and talk about texts so as to develop a love of reading. Samantha has a specific interest in the embodied meaning making of young children. Accordingly, her doctoral research has been focused on the meaning-making practices of young children within reception and nursery classroom settings. This research has been focused on how young children can use small world play as a form of extended and embodied reading, using the manipulation of objects to enter into and engage with storyworlds after adult-led shared readings. This research was motivated by Samantha’s previous experience as an early primary teacher where she observed the playful and creative meaning-making practices of young children.