Anastasia Wickham, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
About
Anastasia Wickham, Ph.D. is an assistant professor of English and serves as the English Education coordinator. The English Education program provides high-quality preparation to enable candidates to successfully undertake the challenges of the teaching profession upon graduation. As program coordinator, Wickham is available to help students navigate the program. Before moving into this role, she taught both middle school and high school. These experiences, combined with her passion for English education and her ongoing efforts to remain current in the field, allow her to support students in reaching their professional teaching goals.
Education and Certifications
Anastasia Wickham completed her Ph.D. at the University of Oklahoma. Her dissertation, We Can’t Dance Every Day: New Teachers Seeking Balance, studied new teachers’ transitions into their roles in secondary English Language Arts. The five thematic chapters centered on balancing academics and student relationships, classroom management, curricular goals, student needs, and life and work.
After receiving her Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics, Wickham followed up with a Master of Education focusing on bridging the gap between conventions in students’ first languages and English composition. She taught English as a foreign language at a private high school and tutored international students in higher education.
As a middle school English teacher and reading specialist, Wickham worked with struggling readers and developed a teaching philosophy based on the promotion of reading for pleasure, the use of literature to activate empathy and critical thinking, and the empowerment of student voice in composition.
Honors and Awards
Outstanding Service Award
University of Central Oklahoma
College of Liberal Arts
2019
New Faculty Member of the Year
University of Central Oklahoma
College of Liberal Arts
2017
Research, Published Work, and Scholarly Activities
Recent Publications:
“Teaching in Multilingual Schools”
English Journal
July 2018
“Villainous or vindicated: Postmodern characterization of women in YA fairy tales”
Children’s and YA Literature and Culture: Broadening Critical Boundaries
Summer 2018
“It’s all in your head: Portraying schizophrenia in YA literature”
Journal of Popular Culture
February 2018
Professional and Community Involvement
English Language Arts Advisory Group
State Department of Education
American Association of University Professors, UCO
President-elect
Sponsor, National Council of Teachers of English UCO Student Affiliate
Co-Sponsor, Kappa Delta Pi International Honor Society in Education, UCO
Oklahoma Council of Teachers of English,
Geraldine Burns Award Coordinator
Classes Taught
- English Composition
- Composition and Language for Teachers
- English/Language Arts Methods
- Young Adult Literature
- Teaching Shakespeare
- Fundamentals of Literature
- English Grammar and Usage
- Linguistics
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