Academic Profile : Faculty

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Assoc Prof Seetha Lakshmi
Associate Professor, National Institute of Education - Asian Languages & Cultures
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Dr Seetha Lakshmi is an Associate Professor and Assistant Head,/ALC (Tamil) of the Asian Languages and Cultures Academic Group at the National Institute of Education, Singapore. Appointed as a trainer in 1997, she has led in the teaching and research, primarily on Standard Spoken Tamil, Curriculum Review and Innovative Pedagogy at NIE.

Her earlier stints were at Tamil Murasu Newspaper as the Sub-Editor (1991-1992) and as Teacher for Tamil language at Mei Chin Secondary School (1993-1997). Dr Seetha was the Coordinator of the Tamil Studies at the Special Training programme (Mother Tongue) in 1997-1999; Head of Tamil Language and Culture Division and Assistant Head, ALC (Tamil) at the Asian Languages and Cultures Academic Group between 2002-July 2007. She is currently the Programme Leader for Practicum, Timetable, Diploma, Degree and Higher Degree at divisional level (Tamil Language). She also provides counselling service to trainee teachers, especially female trainees.
Dr Seetha served as a Visiting Scholar at the Penn State University, Pennsylvania, USA., (01 September 2015 - 30 September 2015), San Jose State University, California, USA., (01 October 2015 - 31 October 2015) and University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong (11 November 2015 - 10 December 2015) as part of her Academic Leave.
Dr Seetha, has successfully led five educational research projects as the Principal Investigator. She also involved in nearly five projects as Co-Principal Investigator and three projects as Collaborator with other academic researchers. She has published her research papers in nearly 40 conference proceedings and her research articles in national and international research journals.

To-date, Dr Seetha has sole authored nearly 15 books and monographs including three creative literary and translated books. She has delivered keynote / special / plenary / valedictorian addresses at more than 20 conferences held locally and internationally; she has presented in nearly 60 conference and seminar papers locally and in 14 other countries.

Dr Seetha Lakshmi has been providing consultancy to Government and Private organisations on Tamil Language, Tamil Curriculum, Tamil Pedagogy and translation in Singapore and overseas. Dr Seetha has served as the advisor of the Tamil Language Society (2002-2007), National Institute of Education and initiated the highly recognised Inter-School Tamil Drama Competition, ‘Chinnajchiru maedai’ on developing Spoken Tamil among the 10-year-old Tamil Language students in Primary schools.

She has supervised as Main / Co Supervisor for one MA (Visual & Performing Arts, 2008), Ten MEd (course work in Tamil Language) students and currently supervising two PhD students. She has received many awards for her Teaching, Research and Volunteer Services in Tamil Language, Tamil Pedagogy and Academic Research.
Dr Seetha's areas of expertise include Curriculum Planning and Review, Media and Language, Second Language Pedagogy, Sociolinguistics, Standard Spoken Tamil, Teaching Literature, Child Language and Literacy, Teaching Tamil as a Second/Heritage Language
 
  • Leisure Reading in Two Languages: Reading Habits and Preferences of Bilingual Children in Singapore
  • CORE 3 Research Programme: Baseline Investigation of Mother Tongue Pedagogies in Singapore's Primary and Secondary Classrooms (C3MT)
  • Singapore primary and secondary students' perceptions, challenges and attainment in Chinese and Tamil composition writing: A comparative study on computer-based and paper-and-pen-based writing
  • An Evaluative Study on the Mother Tongue Support Programme for Mid-Primary Students
  • Growth in Bilingual & Biliteracy Proficiency: Environmental, Individual & Experiential Factors (GIBBER)
  • SingaKids Pic2Speak: Multilingual AI Tutor ' Uplifting Singapore's Bilingual Edge
  • Deepening The Dialogic Discourse and Thinking of NTU Students Through Student-Led Book Clubs on Children's Literature: Strengthening Prevailing Practices
  • Research Study of the Effectiveness of MLLPC and TLLPC Programmes
Awards
• 2021 Received Thiruvalluvar Award for the Contribution to the Tamil Language and Community by the Tamil Language, Cultural Society
• 2020 MOE Education Award for the service at the School Advisory Board, Northland Primary School
• 2019 ALC ALC Contribution Award for the contribution to Research, Teaching and Service (Tamil Language and Culture Division), ALC AG
• 2019 Received Service Vetran Award for the recognition of service to the Education from Thamizhaga Institute of Educational Research and Advancement
• 2017 MOE Service to Education Award for the service at the School Advisory Board, Northland Primary School
• 2017 Received the ALC Research Research Champion Award 2016 (Tamil Language), ALC AG, NIE
• 2015 Received the NFED (India) Life Time Achievement Award for Research in Tamil Language & Literature
• 2014 Received the NIE Excellence in Teaching Commendation Award
• 2013 Received the NTU Long Service Award (15 years)
• 2011 Received the Mustafa Tamil Trust-Tanjore Tamil University ‘s Karigaalan Award for authoring the research book entitled, Standard Spoken Tamil and Pedagogy (Seetha lakshmi; Vanithamani Saravanan) for the Best Tamil book published in Singapore in 2009
• 2009 Best Tamil book published in Singapore
• 2008 Received the NTU Long Service Award (10 years)
• 1997 Received the Second Prize at the SPH-NAC; Short Story Writing Competition (Tamil Language) Category
• 1995 Received the Golden Point Award, SPH-NAC; Short Story Writing Competition (Tamil Language) Category