School of Education

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Catherine Gripton

Assistant Professor in Primary Eduction, Faculty of Social Sciences

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Biography

Dr Catherine Gripton joined the University of Nottingham in August 2018 as an Assistant Professor in Primary Education. She supervises MA and PhD students and teaches on primary teacher education courses within the School of Education. She has worked in Higher Education since 2004 and gained professional recognition from Advance HE (formerly the Higher Education Academy) as a Senior Fellow in 2011.

Before and alongside working in Higher Education, Catherine was a teacher in four primary schools in Nottingham City and Nottinghamshire. She has been a class teacher for all year groups Nursery to Year 2 and became an Advanced Skills Teacher in May 2003 for early years and mathematics.

As well as being a member of ATM, BSRLM, EECERA, Early Education, AMET, MA and the Chartered College of Teaching, Catherine is a member of the Early Childhood Mathematics Group and joint MA/ATM primary and early years group. Catherine has worked extensively in mathematics professional development, undertaking external consultancy for regional maths hubs, teaching schools, research schools NCETM, DfE and educational suppliers.

Expertise Summary

Catherine's expertise and interests include:

  • early years practice and pedagogy
  • early childhood mathematics
  • primary mathematics
  • children's perspectives in education

Catherine's doctoral research explored 5-7 year old children's lived experiences of 'ability' in case study classrooms.

Research Summary

Catherine's main areas of research interest are children's perspectives in education and early childhood mathematics.

She is particularly interested in: early childhood mathematics (including early counting and patterning as well as children's perspectives).

Catherine is currently part of the research team for the UoN EQuaLLS project, researching quality and equity in primary mathematics professional development (funded by Wellcome), and impact accelerator research into spatial reasoning in early childhood mathematics (funded by ESRC through the University of Surrey).

Selected Publications

Catherine is a member of the Centre for Research in Mathematics Education. Her research supervision areas include:

  • early childhood education
  • children's perspectives on education
  • early and primary mathematics education

She is particularly interested in supervising students engaging in participatory research with young children and research into aspects of early childhood mathematics education.

Past Research

Catherine has previously researched holistic learning in early childhood education including developing early communication and the 'planning for possibilities' approach. Her doctoral research focussed on children's lived experience of 'ability' in schools (including 'ability' grouping).

School of Education

University of Nottingham
Jubilee Campus
Wollaton Road
Nottingham, NG8 1BB

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