Professor Wasyl Cajkler

I taught for fifteen years in secondary and tertiary education in the UK France and Nepal before joining the University in 1990. The principal focus of my work is teacher education with specific reference to the needs of English to Speakers of Other Languages and Modern Language teachers. My contributions to the work of the School of Education have involved the development of a range of teacher education programmes for example the distance learning MA in Applied Linguistics and TESOL and the MAIE International Education as well as PGCE Secondary with Modern Languages.

I am a Principal Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and former Head of the School of Education (2018-19) before beginning to reduce my working hours as a transition towards full retirement at some point in the not too far distance in 2022. I am a founder member of the Association for Language Awareness a contributor and reviewer for Language Awareness Journal and Language and Education. I am also a member of the World Association for Lesson Studies (WALS) at which I have been a frequent speaker.

In the past my research interests lay primarily in the training of teachers to teach Modern Languages and English as an additional language. This led to exploration of many education policy issues including the National Literacy Strategy and the teaching and learning of grammar.

In recent years initial teacher preparation and teacher development have taken centre stage through projects that involve lesson study (Cajkler Wood Norton and Pedder 2013 2015; Cajkler and Wood 2016) in both University and school-led initial teacher education.

Recent research projects

British Council funded project: Resilience and beyond: facilitating learning and well-being in the refugee language classroom - (2020-21) with Professor Rogerson-Revell Aleks Palanacs Sarah Hunt and Gabi Witthaus.

Lesson study to facilitate the teaching of mental health (2018-19 with Sarah Adams) Lesson Study investigating the learning of trainee teachers collaborating with Dr Phil Wood (2012-2014) (funded by Society for Educational Studies).

Lesson Study investigating learning with international post-graduate students collaborating with Dr Phil Wood (2012-2013) (funded by Higher Education Academy).

Palanac, A., Hunt, S., Rogerson-Revell, P., Cajkler, W. and Witthaus, G. (2023) Beyond resilience: Facilitating learning and wellbeing in the refugee language classroom. British Council. Available online: doi.org/10.57884/6SN8-AF69

Rogerson-Revell, P., Norton, J., Xu, H., Baldry, F., Stanford, J. and Cajkler, W. (2024) Enhancing pre-service English language teachers' professional knowledge, skills and confidence through peer microteaching lesson study (PMLS). British Council. Available online: doi.org/10.57884/2EXB AG89

Wood, P., Larssen, D.L.S, Helgevold, N. and Cajkler, W. (eds) (2020) Lesson Study in Initial Teacher Education: principles and practices. Bingley, Emerald.

Wood, P. and Cajkler, W. (2018) Lesson study: A collaborative approach to scholarship for teaching and learning in higher education, Journal of Further and Higher Education, 42(3), 313-326.

Cajkler, W. and  Wood, P. (2016) Lesson Study and Pedagogic Literacy in Initial Teacher Education: Challenging Reductive Models, British Journal of Educational Studies, 64(4), 503-521.

Cajkler, W.  and Wood, P.  (2016) Adapting 'lesson study' to investigate classroom pedagogy in initial teacher education: what student-teachers think, Cambridge Journal of Education, 46(1), 1-18. (doi.org/10.1080/0305764X.2015.1009363)

Cajkler , W. and Wood, P.  (2016) Mentors and student-teachers 'lesson studying' in initial teacher education, International Journal for Lesson and Learning Studies, 5(2), 1-18.

Wood, P. and Cajkler, W. (2016) A participatory approach to Lesson Study in higher education. International Journal for Lesson and Learning Studies, 5(1), 4-18.

Cajkler, W.; Wood, P.; Norton, J.; Pedder, D. and Xu, H. (2015) Teacher perspectives about lesson study in secondary school departments: a collaborative vehicle for professional learning and practice development. Research Papers Education 30(2), 192-213 (doi.org/10.1080/02671522.2014.887139).

Cajkler, W. Wood, P. Norton, J. and Pedder, D. (2014) Lesson study as a vehicle for collaborative teacher learning in a secondary school. Professional Development in Education, 40(4), 511-529.  (doi.org/10.1080/19415257.2013.866975).

Cajkler W., Wood P., Norton J. and Pedder D. (2013) Lesson Study: towards a collaborative approach to learning in Initial Teacher Education? Cambridge Journal of Education 43(4), 537-554.

Cajkler, W. and Hall, B. (2012) Languages in primary classrooms: a study of new teacher capability and practice, Language Awareness, 21 (1-2), 15-32.

Cajkler, W. and Hall, B. (2012) Multilingual Primary Classrooms:  An Investigation of First Year  Teachers' Learning and Responsive Teaching, European Journal of Teacher Education, 35(2), 213-228.

Please note that capacity for supervision is now very limited due to my imminent retirement plans but my areas of interest include:

Lesson study for pedagogic development (two current doctoral students are engaged in lesson study research).

Teacher education and second language learning

Teacher education and induction in relation to English as an additional language. 

I teach on three Masters-level programmes: PGCE Modern Languages International PGCE (iPGCE) MA International Education in the following modules:

ED7303 Modern Languages Teaching Learning and Assessment for Learning in the Secondary School

ED7304 Critical Issues in Modern Language Teaching

ED7310 Contemporary Issues in Education

ED7320 Dissertation

Association for Language Awareness (founder member)

CLIE: Committee for Linguistics in Education (Association for Language Awareness delegate)

World Association for Lesson Study (WALS)

Founding Chair of Lesson Study Research Group (LSRG) at the University of Leicester School of Education (2011-2018)

Distinguished Teaching Fellow of the University of Leicester: Pro-Vice Chancellor recommendation (2022)

Principal Fellow Higher Education Academy (PFHEA)

B.A. (Hons) (Wales)

MSc. Teaching English (Aston)

PGCE/Dip TESOL (Manchester)

PhD (Leicester)