Katharyn Cullen, Seymour College
assistant head of junior school
Katharyn Cullen enthusiastically leads the delivery of academic excellence and rigour across the curriculum at Seymour College in Adelaide, through significant pedagogical and philosophical change, particularly around the area of language and linguistics.
Cullen has improved vocabulary learning, reading, writing, and spelling, not just at Seymour College, but also across leading independent schools in Australia, by committing herself to engaging in and contributing to professional associations that supporting teaching practices which explicitly embed linguistic knowledge into classroom learning. She provides classroom-based demonstrations, collaborative and one-on-one support sessions, and leads and facilitates professional development, both within the school and with other schools nationwide, to improve teachers’ knowledge of language and linguistics. She also provides support in designing innovative approaches to literacy. She designs school-wide approaches to spelling, underpinned by the four cornerstones of linguistics and the most up-to-date research.