Tim Leigh
Deputy Head of Department
My profile
Biography
I joined Manchester Metropoitan University in 2015, and currently work as a Senior Lecturer in the University’s Language Centre. My main interest is within English Language Teaching (ELT) and Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL). Prior to joining Man Met, I spent a number of years working overseas: teaching and managing language courses and programmes in the Far East, the Middle East, and Europe.
Words of wisdom
For students new to Higher Education, the shift to independent learning aligns with the old teaching proverb: ‘The teacher can show you the door, but the student must walk through it’. I think it is very important for students to undertand that learning starts in the classroom but continues outside of the class. In my courses, I will show you a range of activities and skills to further your learner training and autonomy.
Academic and professional qualifications
MA Applied Linguistics and TESOL
PG Cert TEAP (Teaching English for Academic Purposes)
PG Cert LTHE (Learing and Teaching in Higher Education)
Cambridge DELTA
Cambridge CELTA
Cambridge CELT-YL
LLB (Hons)
Practioner roles
I am the Course Director for the level 5 professional TESOL qualifcation, Trinity College Cert TESOL (https://www.trinitycollege.com/qualifications/teaching-english/certtesol). This is currently embedded into the BA TESOL routes.
Projects
Since 2018, I have co-ordinated Free English Language Programmes for Refugees and Aslyum Seekers. A partnership between the University’s Language Centre and the charity, Refuaid (https://refuaid.org/)
Teaching
Why do I teach?
I have always loved being in the classroom. I enjoy meeting new students and helping them achieve their goals. I also love the fact that students from different cultures can come together and share their ideas and experiences.
How I’ll teach you
In my classes, I aim to ensure students feel comfortable in the classroom and have the freedom and confidence to express their ideas and opinions.
In addition, from my experiences with international students, my teaching focuses on classes being student-led and student-centred. This means classes are aimed at the real-life needs of the students rather than just following a prescribed textbook.
Why study…
TESOL provides you with the ability to change people’s lives for the better. Whether it is to help someone pass an exam, improve their employment prospects, or better integrate them into a community, the ability to teach someone a new langauge is unparalleled in terms of job satisfaction and motivation.
Research outputs
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Journal articles
Leigh, T.J., Kozbial, S. (2017) 'The long road to UK higher education: Using Exploratory Practice as a tool to improve academic language and skills for lower level language learners.' Cambridge English Research Notes, (68) pp. 55-62.
Leigh, T.J. (2015) 'Social Networking for EAP students.' International Student Experience Journal, 3(2)
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Conference papers
Leigh, T., Johnson, F. (2020) 'Levelling the Playing Field: A Genre Analysis of Online Search Language and Behaviour in UK Higher Education.' In Proceedings: CHIIR '20: Conference on Human Information Interaction and Retrieval. Vancouver, Canada, 14/3/2020 - 18/3/2020. Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), pp. 323-327.