The Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures at King’s College London is pleased to invite language educators to join us in our upcoming workshop, dedicated to exploring emergent practices and innovation in the teaching of modern languages.

This is the third in a series of workshops bringing together language educators at school and university level, with the aim of building sustainable relationships that will enable us to enhance our teaching practices and enrich the learning experiences of our students.

At this event, we are focussing on assessment. Over the course of the day, across a series of panels, we will explore different aspects of what role assessment plays in language learning, as well as focusing on practical questions about designing assessment.

The event will take place in hybrid format, with remote access facilitated via Microsoft Teams. Participation is free, but advance registration is required. Please sign up here.

Programme

Time	Title of Panel
12h30--	Registration
13h00	Sandwich lunch
14:00-14h45	Rethinking assessment: case studies
14h45-15h15	Round table: reflections on assessment from both sides
15h15-15h30	Coffee and biscuits
15h30-17h00	Workshop: using AI to create differentiated activities
17h00	Closing Remarks
17h00-18h00	Reception

 

About our speakers

Tanya Linaker is Team Leader/Senior Lecturer in Russian Language Education at the King's Language Centre. She has an MA in Russian Studies from SSEES, University College London and an MA in Applied Linguistics from Birkbeck University. She has taught Russian at King’s College London since 2002. As Team Leader, she is responsible for managing the Slavic and Middle Eastern language courses offered by the King's Language Centre (LC). Tanya is the Departmental Education Lead, Diversity and Inclusion Lead and Staff Development Lead for the Language Centre. Before joining the LC, she taught at Northumbria University, Defence School of Languages and the Foreign Commonwealth Office. Tanya has won research, development and diversity and inclusion grants. She is passionate about creating inclusive learning communities, bridging the gap between schools and universities and developing young people’s interest in learning foreign languages. She was nominated for a King’s Widening Participation Award. Recently she has led two EDI project focussed on Decolonising the Curriculum.

She will be talking about 'Curriculum Decolonizing—from Box Ticking to Policy Making'.

Sara Davidson is Head of German and Director of SCITT at Oundle School. Originally from the North of England, Sara read German (with Russian) at the University of Edinburgh and then completed her teacher training at Manchester University in the 90s. She then went onto complete her MEd at Birmingham University. She was Head of Modern Languages at two independent schools and has a wealth of experience teaching GCSE, IGCSE, A-level and Pre-U. During her five-year tenure as Chair of ISMLA (the Independent Schools’ Modern Languages Association) she was heavily involved in language teaching and learning initiatives at government level, including working closely with Ofqual and being invited to roundtable meetings with the Schools’ Minister. She has also worked as Senior Consultant for BBC Languages and was awarded the German Teacher Award 2014 by the German Embassy in London. Since 2017 she has been heavily involved in teacher training and is now ‘Director of SCITTs’ at Oundle School, leading the National Modern Languages and National Maths & Physics SCITT programmes and collaborating with state and independent schools. She acts as Internal Moderator for a SCITT and also as NASBTT’s Associate Consultant for Secondary Languages.

She will be talking about how she has changed the way she gives feedback in the German classroom.

Laura Clarke is based in King's Academy at KCL, where she is an Assessment Advisor for the Faculty of Arts and Humanities. In this role she collaborates with departments to establish robust and transparent assessment processes. Her work focuses on ensuring a diverse and meaningful range of assessment opportunities that foster authentic skill development whilst supporting ongoing evaluation to enhance sustainable assessment and feedback practices. With fifteen years of teaching experience, she previously worked as an Associate Professor of English at the City University of New York (CUNY). In this role, she taught academic writing as part of the First-Year Experience, along with literature and media courses in the Liberal Arts Programme. Additionally, she led faculty professional development initiatives on Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) and Writing in the Disciplines (WID), a U.S -based approach that integrates purposeful and frequent writing throughout students’ academic journeys. Before joining King’s Academy, she was an Academic Developer at the University of Sussex, where she designed Sussex’s Assessment Equivalencies Framework. This framework, now integral to assessment design and course validation, ensures fairness, consistency, and comparability across diverse assessment methods.

She will be talking about how to approach designing assessment.

Emily Long is a Teacher of IB German at International School Rheintal, Buchs SG, Switzerland teaching across all three programmes PYP, MYP and DP. Formerly she worked at Oundle School, Northamptonshire as Head of German for 9 years. Emily began her teacher career after a short spell in industry working for Beiersdorf. She has a BA in German with Spanish from the University of Warwick, and later competed her PGCE in KS2-KS5 MFL Teaching and MEd in Professional Studies at the University of Exeter. Emily has worked in both state and independent schools, focusing on raising attainment, increasing the uptake of German and helping with transition teaching. She has also been involved with initial teacher training and SCITT programmes working with new teachers. Since moving to Switzerland she has competed her NPQ in Senior Leadership and more recently qualified as a German Expert Mentor with the Goethe Institute. Emily is passionate about raising the profile of German as a Foreign Language across the UK and beyond.

Bettina D’Cruz is Teacher of German at Bradfield College. Originally from the South of Germany, Bettina read German and English at Ludwig Maximilians Universität in Munich and then completed a master’s degree in modern German literature at Birkbeck College in London. She has 25 years of experience in different independent schools as Head of Modern Languages and German as well as examiner and has taught German from beginners to GCSE, IGCSE, A-level and the International Baccalaureate, including IB Literature for native speakers. She has been involved in teacher training and has most recently completed a teacher training course at the Goethe Institute.