Biography
Mike has a BA in French and Spanish from the University of Leicester and an MA in Applied Linguistics and Communication from Birkbeck. His dissertation focused on a corpus analysis of maiden speeches given by newly elected Members of Parliament in the House of Commons in 2017. He also holds a PGCE in Post-Compulsory Education and Training from the University of Greenwich and studied for the Cambridge DELTA at UCL.
He has previously taught EFL and EAP in Pamplona in Spain and in the UK in a variety of institutions including Bromley College of Further and Higher Education, the University of Surrey and University College London. He has also written materials for General English courses for National Geographic Learning and Macmillan, and was involved in two projects creating resources for ESOL learners in the UK for the British Council (ESOL Nexus) and BBC Learning English (English My Way Learning Circles).
He is interested in how corpora and corpus analysis tools can be used to inform teaching and teaching materials, in addition to investigating how language is used in context. In his spare time he likes to swim and look after his dog Bodie, a dark black cavapoo.