Abdallah, Wagdi Gabreldar Mahil (2021) The stories of four Sudanese English as additional language children : an ethnographic home-based study. PhD thesis, University of Warwick.

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Abstract

Based on an ethnographic and activity-based methodology, this home-based study examines the school experiences and the language use of four English as additional language Sudanese children aged 5-8 years old. The study provides insights into these young children’s use of their first language and English, so gives a fuller and richer picture of bilingual children’s learning.

The study reveals some of the ways young children experience in their early years as they begin to learn the language required for formal schooling. It highlights how the researcher has become able to see the tension between the children masking their linguistic identity at certain points, and not opening up/resisting questioning about this, and the complexity of their actual identities. It also shows the complexity of family situations with regard to linguistic diversity and identity. Moreover, it demonstrates the reciprocity of the relationship between the children and the researcher, and between the researcher and the families. The researcher was labelled as a teacher, support worker, and adult family friend due to the richness of the data collected for a whole year.

The picture that emerges fills in the detail missing from the current over-generalised view of bilingual children in the early years and provides important new perspectives to a growing body of literature on young bilinguals. English as additional language (EAL) research has targeted e.g., teachers, classrooms, policy, and assessment; however, little research has tried to elicit views from children themselves. Thus, the study’s findings are of relevance to all teachers, early childhood practitioners and early years policymakers operating in multilingual environments.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Subjects:	L Education > LB Theory and practice of education > LB1501 Primary Education P Language and Literature > P Philology. Linguistics P Language and Literature > PE English
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH):	English language -- Study and teaching -- Foreign speakers, English language -- Study and teaching -- Sudan, Children -- Language, Bilingualism in children
Official Date:	December 2021
Dates:	Date Event December 2021 UNSPECIFIED
Institution:	University of Warwick
Theses Department:	Centre for Applied Linguistics
Thesis Type:	PhD
Publication Status:	Unpublished
Supervisor(s)/Advisor:	Pinter, Annamaria ; McConachy, Troy, 1980-
Format of File:	pdf
Extent:	xiii, 309 pages : illustrations
Language:	eng

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