Associate Professor Michael Carey is a quantitative researcher in the field of education, specialising in English language and literacy. He has over 20 years’ experience in developing mixed methods designs in Education research, including design, delivery and evaluation of education programs to determine impact and transformation as measurable and evidenced outcomes. He has taught and conducted research within applied linguistics in the fields of Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL), speech science (perception and pronunciation modification), academic writing, language testing and assessment, and preparation for the International English Language Testing System (IELTS).
Michael has published curriculum materials on IELTS preparation and journal articles on placement testing and high-stakes testing. He has won several competitive research grants within the field of language testing and for international development projects aimed at building the capacity of English teachers in Indonesia. For his work in Indonesia he has been awarded an Office of Learning and Teaching Citation for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning as a member of the IPG "For stimulating systemic educational reform in Indonesian Papua through a unique, outcome-driven teacher education program for students within an Australian university".
His teaching role at USC includes undergraduate and post-graduate language and literacy courses and research methods in education. In 2014 he was awarded a Commonwealth Office of Learning and Teaching Citation for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning (Individual Citation) “For excellence in developing curricula, resources and services that improve the English language skills and knowledge of pre-service teachers, colleagues and the wider student cohort”. He also supervises a number of Masters and PhD research students in various fields of linguistics.
Professional Social Media
Research areas
- language and literacy in English language education
- teaching English to speakers of other languages (TESOL)
- language acquisition
- language proficiency testing and assessment
- grammar and discourse style in written texts
- pronunciation instruction
PHD Supervision completions
As principal supervisor
- Ibrahim, Abed (2015). Teaching and Learning of English in Libyan Universities: A case study investigating the English language teaching knowledge of Libyan pre-service teachers of English in Libya.
- Sweeting, Arizio (2021). From "Cinderella" to "Sleeping Beauty": Taking pronunciation instruction on the CELTA course beyond “listen and repeat”.
- Bytheway, Julie (2021). Connecting to Figure Out How to Teach ESOL: A Grounded Theory
- Fiharsono, Albertus (2021). Culturally-Based Learning Needs of Indigenous Students of Indonesian Papua.
- Szocs, Stefan (2022). A neural and behavioural analysis of speaking test rater familiarity while rating English pronunciation intelligibility.
As co-supervisor
- Nataprawira, Halim. (2018). Recognising the sociolinguistic reality of spoken Indonesian: a corpus and usage analysis of a middle diglossic variant.
- Gardiner, Michael. (2019). Understanding value in the market and social research context.
- Smith, Anthony. (2020). Assessing the practice competence of undergraduate students in paramedicine in Australia and New Zealand: A grounded Theory Study
Teaching areas
- English Language and Literacy
- Second Language Acquisition and Learning
- Language testing and assessment
- Interlanguage Phonology
- Language, Culture and Second Language Learning
Associate Professor Michael Carey is an applied linguist and English language teacher educator with an interest in raising awareness and acceptance of non-mainstream forms of English language spoken and written discourse: international and transcultural English voices. He is knowledgeable on topics such as the Australian English accent, other varieties of accented English, English language and literacy education, testing and assessment. He is highly-cited for his research investigating English speaking test rater bias in high stakes international speaking tests and Australian tests of language and literacy such as NAPLAN.