My interest in education stems from my mother, a primary-school teacher for over 30 years. But it was my sister, also a teacher, who urged me to take education papers as an undergraduate leading to my BA major in Education at the University of Auckland, and then my MA in Education. The birth of my first child sparked my passion for child development.
In 1994, I received a US Fulbright Scholar award and moved to the US to take up a PhD at the University of California, Berkeley. I joined the Brown/Campione Research Group working on the late Ann Brown’s Fostering a Community of Learners project there. I moved back to NZ in 1999 and took up a position in the Centre for Child and Family Research and lectured in Education at the University of Auckland, eventually becoming the Centre’s Director.

Currently, I lecture in the School of Education and Social Practice. I have wide experience in conducting research and evaluation projects, working with children, young people and their families across education, developmental psychology, health and welfare, using qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods approaches. Through my research and teaching, my aim is to contribute to an understanding of the developmental underpinnings of teaching and learning, in particular, in relation to early childhood and the primary school years. I currently work part time.



Distinctions/Honours:
1996 - Regents Fellowship for Graduate Study, University of California, Berkeley
1994 - Fulbright Scholar to United States of America
1994 University of Auckland Doctoral Scholarship
1992 Senior Scholarship in Education
1992 University of Auckland Graduate Scholarship

Responsibilities:

Course Director EDUC 115, EDUC 221, EDUC 742

Director, Centre for Child and Family Research

Committee/Professional groups/Services:

Community On Sustainability Research Network

Teaching and Learning Quality Commitee


Qualifications:
PhD (Berkeley); MA (First Class Hons) Auckland

Areas of Expertise:

• cognitive and conceptual development;
• children's thinking about the natural world
• child-adult and family interactions
• informal/everyday contexts for learning
• sustainability
• genre theory and dialogic pedagogy;
• transition to school;
• qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods approaches,
• program evaluation.