About
Research
Email: annalise.gordon@stmarys.ac.uk
Tel: 020 8240 4053
Biography
Anna Lise Gordon is Professor of Education in the School of Education at St Mary’s University. As former Director of the Institute of Education at the University, she received the Inspirational Leader Award at St Mary’s in 2019. Anna Lise now works part-rime with a range of postgraduate students, and also on research projects and wider University initiatives. For example, she was the University lead for an Office for Students funded project, entitled 'Mind the Gaps! First in Family Students and Students without Family Support: Managing Transitions and Mental Health', a collaborative project between St Mary's University, University of West London, King's College and Maudsley Learning. Anna Lise has also recently completed a research project on child bereavement awareness training as part of Initial Teacher Education, supported by a BERA Small Grants Award. Her main research interests centre on wellbeing in schools for both teachers and pupils, including a recent UKRI-funded project entitled ‘Wellbeing Leads – Who cares?’ in collaboration with Maudsley Learning.
Anna Lise was awarded a prestigious National Teaching Fellowship in 2012 and is also a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Anna Lise was a joint winner of the St Henry Walpole Prize for Teaching and Learning, awarded by St Mary’s, in December 2009 for an innovative approach to cross-curricular learning with PGCE students, and again in 2013 for an initiative to nurture resilience of students across a range of academic programmes.
Anna Lise joined St Mary’s in 1998 as senior lecturer in education for modern languages. She completed her MA in Education (Leading Innovation and Change) in 2008 at the University of Surrey and her research project focused on specialist modern languages support for trainee teachers in primary schools. In 2016, Anna Lise completed a Doctorate in Education programme with Nottingham Trent University, focusing on resilience of early career teachers. She holds a coaching qualification from the Institute of Leadership and Management, and co-leads the University Mentoring Scheme. She has considerable experience as an external examiner for secondary ITT provision at a number of universities.
Previously, Anna Lise taught modern languages in schools in London and Surrey and was a Local Authority Advisory Teacher and Consultant for modern languages for several years. She has also written educational materials for 11-16 year olds learning French and German in schools.
Anna Lise was President of the Association for Language Learning 2016-2018 and continues as a trustee and an active member of the professional association. She is also on the executive committee of the University Council for Languages.
Research
Areas of research supervision
- Teacher resilience and wellbeing
- Professional development for teachers
- Wellbeing of children and young adults
- Character educator
- Bereavement in schools
Research profile
Examples of presentations:
- September 2021 Panel member at Westminster Education Forum policy conference: Priorities for initial teacher training
- July 2020 British Council Global Education Exchange Webinar: Challenges of remote teaching and teacher resilience (Panel member)
- July 2020 Bishop Grosseteste University mentor conference. Presentation: In changing times, a time to change! Focus on teacher wellbeing
- December 2019 Inside Government: National teacher training and Recruitment conference (Conference Chair)
- November 2019, 2nd International Conference on Well-being in Education Systems in Locarno, Switzerland. Presentation: Teachers’ well-being, self-actualisation and job satisfaction: exploring the realities of early career teachers’ experiences through creative writing
- September 2019, DfE Teachers’ Network Event. Presentation: Teacher Resilience
- January 2019, Faith in Action conference at Newman Catholic College, London. Workshop: Applying Educational Research
- July 2018 Developing a mentoring culture in school conference with St Mary’s, Roehampton and Kingston Universities. Presentation: Conditions count
- May 2018 British Academy conference: The Leathes report at 100 - reassessing a vision for languages (Symposium panel member)• March 2018 Association for Language Learning conference: Major Talk – Thriving as a languages teacher!
- July 2017 CLIL conference at Sheffield Hallam University, Presentation: Developing resilient learners through CLIL
- June 2017, Inside Government conference, Manchester. Presentation: Evaluating the next steps for development in MFL education
- April 2017, Westminster Briefing conference, Presentation: The Future of Modern Languages• March 2017, Language World conference, Poster presentation: Being a head of MFL
- November 2016 UCET conference, Birmingham: Presentation – Resilience of early career teachers
- September 2016 British Education Educational Research Association conference, Leeds: Presentation – Teacher identity, well-being and resilience in teacher education
- March 2016 Association for Language Learning conference: Major talk – Being a resilient team
- September 2015 British Education Educational Research Association conference, Belfast: Presentation – Teacher identity, well-being and resilience in teacher education
- May 2013 Higher Education Academy ‘Storyville’ conference: Poster presentation
- May 2013 Engaging with Methodology conference, University of Brighton: Presentation – Using bricolage as a research methodology
Publications include
- Gordon, A.L., (2023) Early career teaching and resilience. In: Tierney, R.J., Rizvi, F., Erkican, K. (Eds.), International Encyclopedia of Education, vol. 5. Elsevier, pp. 153–160.
- Gordon, A. L. (2023). Grief matters: Exploring the impact of bereavement & grief on learning for All. British Educational Research Association.
- Gordon, A. (2020) Educate – Mentor – Nurture: Improving the Transition from Initial Teacher Training to Qualified Teacher Status and Beyond, Journal of Education for Teachers, Vol. 46(5).
- Gordon, A. (2020) creative approaches to nurturing resilience of trainee teachers, Impact – Journal of The Chartered College of teaching, Issue 9, Summer 2020.
- Gordon, A. (2019) Teachers’ well-being, self-actualisation and job satisfaction: exploring the realities of early career teachers’ experiences through creative writing, in L. Castelli, J. Marcionetti, A. Plata, & A. Ambrosetti (Eds.) Well-being in Education Systems, SUPSI Conference Abstract Book, pp 133 – 137.
- Jones, J. and Gordon, A.L. (2019) Flourishing as a MFL teacher: MFL teachers who choose to stay, Association for Language Learning.
- Lead co-author of ‘The Head of Languages Handbook’ (Association for Language Learning, 2017)
- ‘The resilient MFL team’ chapter in ‘Success Stories for Secondary Foreign Language Classrooms: Models from London School Partnerships with Universites’ (Trentham Books, 2016) ed. Christie, C. and Conlon, C.
- ‘The Mirror in the Suitcase’ chapter in ‘For the Love of Learning’ book (2013) ed. Bilham, T., London: Palgrave Macmillan
- ‘Resilience for early career teachers – does it matter?’ chapter in ‘Rethinking the Curriculum’ book (2013) ed. James, M., Renowden, J. and West-Burnham, J. Brown Dog Books.
- ‘Metaphors for engaging with bricolage’ article in R.Ed (Research in Education), University of Brighton journal, September 2013, Vol. 5 No. 2.
- ‘I’m a subject-specialist – get me out of here!’ article in Professional Development Today journal, Issue 14.2, Sept 2011.
- Equipe Nouvelle 1, 2 and 3 Student's Book (2004) Daniele Bourdais, Sue Finnie, Anna Lise Gordon (Oxford University Press) (+ accompanying resources).