Dr Sabine Little
BMus, PGCE, PCHE, CiLT, Med, MA, PhD, SFHEA
School of Education
Director of Education
Senior Lecturer in Educational Studies (Languages Education)
Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
Course Director MA Education, Teaching and Learning
Course Director iPGCE
+44 114 222 8089
Full contact details
School of Education
The Wave
2 Whitham Road
Sheffield
S10 2AH
- Profile
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I am interested in links between language, identity, and belonging, and the role of multilingualism in society. I work both with families, schools, and public spaces such as libraries, to explore what it means to grow up multilingual. I have developed and worked on a number of projects that explore multilingualism and identity as a social justice issue, seeking to push against the deficit model of English as an Additional Language.
I work with teachers teaching in multilingual classrooms at UK and international level, providing continued professional development, and directing the international Postgraduate Certificate in Education, an online distance learning programme, taken by educationalists all over the world. I have led and worked in research projects in Mexico and The Gambia, in each case exploring the role of multilingualism in society from different angles. Technology has a frequent place in both my research and my teaching.
Before joining the School of Education, I worked as a languages teacher, and before that, I trained as an opera singer.
- Research interests
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My main and over-arching research interest is in the field of heritage language learners and identity - I am interested how families who speak multiple languages in the home navigate these languages, and what this means for individual family members' sense of identity and well-being.
Language is an integral part of identity, but is a very personal experience, even within the same family, so my work focuses on helping families and policy-makers understand issues and pressures faced by heritage language families, and to develop holistic support opportunities.
I am keen on developing community-driven research, working with teachers, community organisations, and children to develop research that reflects their experiences and needs. My work on creating and evaluating a Multilingual Children’s Library in Sheffield was awarded the Brenda Eastwood Award for diversity and inclusion.
I am interested in hearing from prospective research students looking to work in the area of multilingualism and identity, especially in research involving children and young people/families, or the role of multilingualism in school contexts.
Recent funded projects:
- Multilingual Education in The Gambia, King’s College London, 2021-2022
- Lost Wor(l)ds: On language, heritage, and forgetting, Economic and Social Research Council (Innovation Knowledge Exchange Fund), 2020-2022
- Communities' languages, identities and belonging in participatory health care interventions in Yucatan, Mexico, Royal Academy of Engineering / Global Challenges Research Fund, 2019-2020
- Children’s Multilingual Reading, Arts and Humanities Research Council, 2018-2020
- Heritage Language Families: Identity and Wellbeing, The British Academy, 2018-2019
- Rivers of Multilingual Reading: Torrent or Trickle?, UK Literacy Association, 2017-2019
- Heritage language literacy support at primary level – are YouTube and Apps the answer?, UK Literacy Association, 2015-2016
- Publications
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Books
- Staff-Student Partnerships in Higher Education. Bloomsbury Academic.
- View this article in WRRO The Sheffield companion to inquiry-based learning. Sheffield: CILASS: The Centre for Inquiry-based Learning in the Arts and Social Sciences.
Journal articles
- ‘The power to SAY what I want to and it gets written down’: Situating children's and adults' voices and silence in participatory research. British Educational Research Journal. View this article in WRRO
- Digital funds of identity: understanding a young child’s plurilingual development through mediagrams. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching. View this article in WRRO
- ‘Half of who you are’: parent and child reflections on the emotional experiences of reversing familial language shift. International Journal of Bilingualism, 27(2), 217-231.
- The multilingual children’s library as physical and metaphorical ‘space’ within the community: practical and emotional considerations. Journal of Librarianship and Information Science.
- ‘Inert benevolence’ towards languages beyond English in the discourses of English primary school teachers. Linguistics and Education. View this article in WRRO
- Prompting heritage-language engagement in English-speaking Maltese families, via a family language programme intervention. First Language.
- Editorial. Literacy, 56(1), 1-2. View this article in WRRO
- Embracing the unpredictable effect of one person: an interview with Professor Keri Facer. Literacy, 56(1), 86-92. View this article in WRRO
- An un/familiar space: children and parents as collaborators in autoethnographic family research. Qualitative Research.
- Rivers of multilingual reading : exploring biliteracy experiences among 8-13-year old heritage language readers. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development.
- Call for Papers for the Special Issue of Literacy: Storytelling in troubled times: multimodal, multilingual and multimedia. Literacy, 54(3), 158-159. View this article in WRRO
- The language of learning : Maltese teachers’ views on bilingual and multilingual primary classrooms. EuroAmerican Journal of Applied Linguistics and Languages, 7(1), 108-123.
- Great Aunt Edna's vase: metaphor use in working with heritage language families. The Family Journal, 27(2), 150-155. View this article in WRRO
- 'Is there an app for that?' Exploring games and apps among heritage language families. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 40(3), 218-229. View this article in WRRO
- Global teachers as global learners : intercultural teacher training in international settings. London Review of Education, 17(1). View this article in WRRO
- Whose heritage? What inheritance?: Conceptualising family language identities. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 23(2), 198-212. View this article in WRRO
- Families’ roles in children’s literacy in the UK throughout the 20th Century. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, 17(4), 551-569. View this article in WRRO
- ‘We are not as they think about us’: exploring Omani EFL learners’ ‘selves’ in digital social spaces. Multicultural Education Review, 9(3), 175-187. View this article in WRRO
- A generational arc: early literacy practices among Pakistani and Indian heritage language families . International Journal of Early Years Education, 25(4), 424-438. View this article in WRRO
- Promoting a collective conscience: Designing a resilient staff-student partnership model for educational development. International Journal for Academic Development , 21(4), 273-285. View this article in WRRO
- Learning trajectories, violence and empowerment amongst adult basic skills learners. International Journal of Research & Method in Education, 37(4), 458-459.
- View this article in WRRO 'The confidence to do things that I know nothing about’ – skills development through extra-curricular inquiry activity. Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education(3).
- Designing for inquiry-based learning with the Learning Activity Management System.. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 25, 238-251.
- View this article in WRRO A learning development team: three developers, one pedagogy. Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education(1), 1-16.
- Inquiry‐based learning and technology—supporting institutional TEL within one pedagogical context. British Journal of Educational Technology, 39(3), 422-432.
- Beyond Roots and Wings: Co-constructing a framework for heritage language children's liminal and limbotic identities. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development.
- Understanding parents’ pragmatic and emotional attachments to “their” language in multilingual family contexts: exploring self-assessment options for family well-being. International Journal of Multilingualism.
- The role of the developer in institutional change. Proceedings of the International Conference on Networked Learning, 6, 245-252.
- "Before You Know Where You Are, You Have a Sequence". Proceedings of the International Conference on Networked Learning, 6, 237-244.
Chapters
- Social media and the use of technology in home language maintenance In Schalley AC & Eisenchlas SA (Ed.), Handbook of Home Language Maintenance and Development: Social and Affective Factors (pp. 257-273). De Gruyter Mouton View this article in WRRO
- Beyond words, Migration, Education and Translation (pp. 161-173). Routledge
- View this article in WRRO Drawn in all directions: Heritage language families’ use of technology In Mascheroni G, Ponte C & Jorge A (Ed.), Digital Parenting: The Challenges for Families in the Digital Age (pp. 61-68). Goteborg: Nordicom.
- Assessment for Autonomy, Assessment for Learning, and Learner Motivation: Fostering Learner Identities In Tsagari D (Ed.), Classroom-based Assessment in L2 Contexts
- Perspectives on staff-student partnership in learning, research and educational enhancement In Little S (Ed.), Staff-Student Partnerships in Higher Education (pp. 1-16). London: Continuum.
- Collaborating for Staff-Student Partnerships: Experiences and Observations In Little S (Ed.), Staff-Student Partnerships in Higher Education (pp. 215-226). London: Continuum.
- "Oily Rag" or "Winged Messenger", Applied E-Learning and E-Teaching in Higher Education (pp. 1-17). IGI Global
- Linking collaboration to learner autonomy: peer cognizance in action In Lamb T & Jimenez-Raya M (Ed.), Pedagogy for autonomy in modern languages education: theory, practice, and teacher education Dublin: Authentik.
- Supporting a dispersed community: CoP development in the Caribbean In Kimble C & Hildreth P (Ed.), Communities of Practice: Creating Learning Environments for Educators (Volume 2) (pp. 105-124). Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing.
- Identitätsbildung im Fremdsprachenunterricht (‘Creation of identity in the foreign language classroom’) In Jung U (Ed.), Praktische Handreichung für Fremdsprachenlehrer (pp. 381-385). Frankfurt: Peter Lang.
- "Oily Rag" or "Winged Messenger", Applied E-Learning and E-Teaching in Higher Education IGI Global
Conference proceedings papers
- 113 Podium Mexico: Communication challenges and sociocultural experiences in bilingual context: Health outcomes' (mis) perceptions in a rural Maya community in Mexico. American Journal of Human Biology, Vol. 33(S1) (pp e23593-e23593). Virtual, 29 March 2021 - 29 March 2021. View this article in WRRO
- Networked learning in the Caribbean: A case study from a developing world. Proceedings of the International Conference on e-Learning, ICEL, Vol. 2006-January (pp 267-275)
Datasets
- Research group
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#supervisionaries - stories of brilliant doctoral supervision
Sabine is an inspirational supervisor and mentor. She takes a personal interest in her students and is always ready to share her skills, knowledge and expertise. We share a passion for education, language and communication, and our discussions are always thoroughly enriching. She believes in me and is always encouraging me to pursue various opportunities throughout the course of my PhD journey, thus enabling me to grow on both a professional and personal level. Her guidance and constructive feedback are invaluable as she has a knack for “pushing just the right buttons,” empowering me to refine my ideas and to develop my own strengths and personal attributes.
- Teaching interests
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Following my early career as a language teacher (German and French) in secondary school, I have taught across many of the programmes within the School of Education, ranging from the BA in Education, Culture and Childhood to the PGCE and iPGCE, multiple MA Programmes, including the Caribbean and Malta Programmes, and the EdD programme.
I enjoy working with students across all levels of study, and I gain particular pleasure from facilitating students to follow their interests - luckily, most programmes in the School of Education are designed to encourage the focus on emerging interests, and I think it is a privilege to work with students as they discover an aspect of education they feel strongly about and wish to pursue further.
I direct the iPGCE and the MA Applied Professional Studies in Education (online), both of which attract students working in international contexts.
- Professional activities and memberships
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- Referee for multiple academic journals, including "Innovation in Learning and Teaching", "Journal of Early Childhood Research", "Language Matters", "International Journal of Educational Research" and others
- Consultant for ELINET (European Literacy Policy Network) – advising on final project outputs
- Membership of Research Networks: “Social and Affective Factors in Home Language Maintenance and Development” and "Learner Autonomy"
- Invited expert reviewer for Luxembourg National Research Fund (FNR)