Alex’s recent research work focuses on the role of Welsh in the new curriculum for Wales, and more specifically, the concept of a ‘language continuum’ and how this concept could be applied in the context of English-medium schools in order to help realise the Welsh Government’s target of achieving a million Welsh speakers by 2050.
Recently, Alex’s research was cited by experts in the field of language and policy planning in a report to Comann nam Pàrant Dùn Èideann, a network of parents, teachers and other stakeholders with an interest in developing Gaelic medium education. He was also a member of the Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) Advisory Board for Rapid evidence assessment: Effective second language teaching approaches and methods, a report to inform the Welsh Government’s planning of Welsh language provision for learners aged 3-16 in the new curriculum.
In 2018 Alex joined the Corpws Cenedlaethol Cymraeg Cyfoes (CorCenCC) research team as a co-investigator. CorCenCC is a substantial research project funded by the ESRC/AHRC to create the first corpus of its type. Alex’s mian contribution is to the work of the WP4 team which is responsible for developing a series of bespoke pedagogic tools to be used within and outside Welsh classes.
As well as being invited to attend the Welsh Government’s Teaching Welsh Effectively symposium in the summer of 2018, Alex held a research symposium called Welsh in English-medium Education the same year with a fellow PhD student from Bangor University. This symposium, funded by the Coleg Cymraeg Cenedlaethol, brought together researchers, educators and other key stakeholders to discuss the latest research findings in field of Welsh second language education, as well as effective second language teaching in the European context.
Alex is a member of the Language Research Centre (LRC) and its offshoot Applied Linguistics and Welsh (ALaW) at Swansea University. He is also a member of the UCML Early Career Academics Special Interest Group.