Laurent Cammarata, PhD

Area of Study / Keywords

Immersion bilingual education foreign language education content-based instruction curriculum development teacher education professional development

About

I currently hold an academic position as Full Professor of Education at the Faculté Saint-Jean, University of Alberta. Formerly a language teacher, I have been a teacher educator for almost twenty years, specializing in the preparation and ongoing professional development of K-12 teachers in French immersion and Francophone minority settings. Over the years, my research has examined 1) K-12 teachers' experience of learning about and implementing content-based instruction (CBI) in diverse educational contexts and implications for teacher education and professional development, 2) the potential of curricular models specifically designed to help K-12 teachers optimize the integration of content, language, and literacy in instruction, and 3) the nature of immersion/bilingual teachers' knowledge base and its influence on their ability to simultaneously teach content, language, and academic literacy skills. More recently, my research has focused on issues related to student retention in French immersion programs and Francophone schools in minority contexts in Canada. My work has been published in well-respected scientific journals and has received numerous academic awards, including the Paul Pimsleur Award for Research in Foreign Language Education (2013), the Stephen A. Freeman Award for Best Published Article (2018), the Alberta Teachers' Association Educational Research Award (2018), and the Judy Gibson Award of Excellence in French Second Language Education (2024).  I have also gained extensive editorial experience over the past decade by 1) publishing two edited volumes, Content-Based Foreign Language Teaching: Curriculum and Pedagogy for Developing Advanced Thinking and Literacy Skills (Routledge, 2016) and Teacher development for immersion and content-based instruction (John Benjamins Current Topics, 2020), 2) guest editing two special issues of the Journal of Immersion and Content-Based Language Education (JICB, 2018-2022) and another currently in preparation on emerging issues in content-based minority language education (2025, forthcoming), and 3) serving as co-editor-in-chief of the Journal of Immersion and Content-Based Language Education (JICB, John Benjamins) from January 2019 to December 2024.

Research

Google Scholar profile & ResearchGate profile