Language and Learning in Multilingual Classrooms

A Practical Approach

Elizabeth Coelho

• Publisher: Multilingual Matters
• Year: 2012
• ISBN:
  9781847697226
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

This book is a research-based practical guide for educators who work with students whose linguistic and cultural background is different from their own. Illustrated with many practical examples of classroom activities, projects, and teaching strategies, the book is also an introduction to immigrant education for school administrators and educational planners in communities or regions that are in the process of developing plans and programs for newcomer students. Although the focus is on first-generation immigrant children, many of the recommended approaches and instructional strategies described in this book can be used or adapted for use with second-generation children and historical linguistic and cultural minorities, such as children from Aboriginal communities in North America or children of Roma background in Europe.

Section 1

Getting Started

1 The New Arrival

2 First Days and Beyond

1 The New Arrival

Introduction

This chapter provides background information about students of diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds, and outlines some of the reasons for their presence in classrooms in post-industrial countries. In some of these countries, such as Spain, immigration is a relatively recent phenomenon, and teachers need to adapt quickly to a new reality. In other countries, such as Canada, linguistic and cultural diversity, present since the earliest settlements of Aboriginal peoples and fuelled by several centuries of immigration, have helped to shape a national identity; nevertheless, many smaller towns and rural communities have only recently begun directly to experience and respond to the impact of immigration in schools.

You will gain some understanding of the experiences and needs of immigrant and minority students as they adjust to a new cultural and educational environment at the same time as they are learning a new language for school. The chapter ends with some ideas about the role of the school in a community that is being transformed by the arrival of new residents from all over the world.

Who Are The New Immigrants?

Immigration has been an essential feature of North American development since the 15th century. For hundreds of years the majority of immigrants to Canada were from Europe, especially from Great Britain and France, and various measures were in place to discourage immigration from other parts of the world. However, perhaps as a result of the rise in their standard of living since the end of the Second World War, fewer Europeans now feel the need to emigrate in order to improve their lives. In the 1960s barriers were removed for prospective immigrants from other parts of the world, and a ‘points system’ based on the individual’s education and skills is now used to select applicants from other countries to fill labour market gaps in Canada. As a result, the ethnic composition of the immigrant population has changed dramatically. Today, most immigrants to Canada are from countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, and have neither English nor French as their first language.

Immigration policies in Canada generally focus on adult newcomers and the contributions they can make to their new country. Many of those adults bring their children with them, or send for them within a year or two. Today about 20% of immigrants to Canada are under the age of 15. These children all not only have the right to attend school, but are obliged to do so; indeed, in the Canadian province of Ontario, the destination province of most newcomers to Canada, students must attend school until the age of 18, and have the right to stay until the age of 21.

In Europe, large-scale immigration is a more recent phenomenon. Until relatively recently, most European countries were source countries of immigration to the Americas. Now the situation is reversed, and many European countries are experiencing a dramatic increase in immigration. Many of the newcomers are from former colonies: for example, most immigrants to Spain are from Latin America. Others are from other European Union countries and, therefore, have the right to live and work in any other member country. In Spain there are also increasing numbers of newcomers from Africa and Asia. In Spain, about 13% of immigrants are under the age of 15.

Why Do They Come?

People leave their homelands because they can imagine a better future for themselves, and especially for their children. Starting a new life in a new country requires courage, initiative, and imagination.

What makes them leave their own countries?

Reasons for leaving the homeland, or ‘push factors’, are many and complex, varying from country to country and from decade to decade. Push factors include poor social and economic conditions, lack of educational or career opportunity, war or civil conflict, and political or religious oppression and other human rights abuses. Teachers can often see the effects of events around the world in the composition of their classes. For example, recent newcomers in Toronto schools include children from Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as children of Karan background from Myanmar, who have been living in refugee camps in Thailand.

What makes them choose to come here?

From the perspective of host countries in Europe and North America, immigrants come to renew the workforce and expand the economy. In countries such as Spain and Canada, an aging population and negative population growth have led to shortages of professionals and skilled workers in fields such as health and technology. Immigrants also come to work as cleaners, kitchen workers, hospital orderlies and assistants, construction workers, machine operators in factories, agricultural workers, and carers of children or elderly people – jobs that many people in Spain and Canada, and in most other post-industrial countries, are no longer willing to do. Many immigrants work in these jobs even though they have professional skills or advanced training, in the hope of finding work more in their own fields later on.

Some countries recognise the importance of immigration as a stimulus to the economy and have developed mechanisms that enable them to recruit and select prospective immigrants according to various criteria. There is also an infrastructure of settlement services, including language classes, to assist new immigrant workers and families as they adjust to their new environment.

The Future of Immigration in Canada

We all know that within a few years, 100 percent of Canada’s labour market growth will be attributable to immigration rather than natural growth in our population. We also know that, with an aging population, we need newcomers to ensure that we have the workers and, indeed, taxpayers, but more importantly, citizens of the future. And we also recognise that Canada has deeply grounded in its history this tradition of diversity, of pluralism, that is part of the reason for the dynamism of this country…

But we can and must do better when it comes to immigration because over the past 20 years the data tells us that newcomers to Canada have not been doing as well economically. They are, as a whole, falling behind. Immigrants to Canada with university degrees are twice as likely to be unemployed as native born Canadians with university degrees. Newcomers used to generate higher incomes in a short period of time than the average Canadian income, and that’s no longer the case. And we know that hundreds of thousands of new Canadians are stuck in survival jobs. Underemployed, highly trained professionals who find themselves locked out of their chosen profession in Canada and often struggling because of the Canadian experience paradox… No Canadian experience so you don’t get a job. If you can’t get a job, you can’t get Canadian experience… These are challenges that we need to address.

Hon. Jason Kenney, Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, speaking at the Economic Club of Canada in Toronto, June 9, 2010. Reproduced with the permission of the Minister of Public Works and Government Services, Canada, 2012.

(http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/department/media/speeches/2010/2010-06-09.asp)

In other countries, such as Spain, immigration is more recent, and various levels of government, while recognizing the need to respond to the needs of newcomer families and children, are finding it difficult to do so in a time of severe economic crisis.

Public opinion in countries that receive new immigrants is often based on the assumption that immigration represents a cost and a burden to the host society. However, the costs associated with the reception and resettlement of immigrants must be weighed against the economic benefits. For example, Canada’s investment in these ready-to-go workers, in the form of resettlement services and language training, has to be weighed against the costs to other countries of raising and educating them from birth. In fact, Canada’s high standard of living is being subsidised by immigration from other countries – mostly poorer countries that cannot afford to lose valuable human resources.

For those immigrants who make a deliberate choice to emigrate from their home country, generally for economic reasons, the choice of a particular country to emigrate to depends on its ‘pull factors’. For example, the pull factors that draw immigrants to Canada include its active immigration programme, economic opportunity, the availability of services such as health and education, its multiculturalism policy, and its international reputation as a safe, peace-loving country where human rights and social, political, and religious freedoms are protected. Spain has many of the same pull factors. In addition, proximity makes Spain attractive to newcomers from other European Union countries as well as North Africa, while Spanish-speaking immigrants from Latin America are attracted to a country where they can speak their own language and with which they share some history.

How Do They Come?

Across Europe there are currently very different approaches to the admission and resettlement of immigrants, for the assessment of refugee claims, for the control of ‘illegal’ or undocumented immigrants, and the flow of immigrants across borders.

Even in countries with a long history of immigration, such as Canada, policies and procedures are regularly re-examined and revised in order to provide a balance between pragmatism (benefits to Canada) and altruism (humane considerations such as family reunification and asylum for refugees). Canada is regarded around the world as a country that has been successful in integrating ‘New Canadians’ from very diverse linguistic and ethnocultural backgrounds, and countries in Europe often look to Canada for examples of how to develop a modern approach to immigration.

Canada’s five-year plan for immigration includes the following major categories for admission to the country:

• Most immigrants to Canada apply through the points system, a process which often takes several years. These immigrants have time to prepare for the transition and have their documents and financial affairs in order. They arrive in Canada as permanent residents and enjoy most of the rights of Canadian citizens.

• Once established, immigrants are allowed to sponsor close relatives, including children and spouses, who may arrive several years later. Although the support of family members who are already established can be invaluable, family reunification can also be a difficult process; for example, in situations where children have been separated from one or both parents for a number of years.

• Other newcomers arrive as refugees. These newcomers are accepted because they meet certain criteria established by the United Nations’ 1951 Geneva Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol. Convention Refugees are persons with a well-founded fear of persecution based on race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group. They may be resettled in Canada with government assistance, or through the sponsorship of a community group in Canada. Refugee claimants (known as asylum seekers in the UK) usually arrive without having made a prior application, and begin the process of making a claim for refugee status on arrival. This process may take years and can cause great anxiety and feelings of insecurity.

• Other workers arrive on temporary work and residence permits to take up seasonal work, such as fruit picking, or on temporary assignments with diplomatic missions or multinational corporations.

• A small percentage of new immigrants are admitted to Canada as investors, entrepreneurs or self-employed persons. They must meet stringent financial requirements and demonstrate that they have the funds, skills, and experience required to maintain a business in Canada.

• University and secondary school students are admitted on student visas on payment of fees to private or public educational institutions in Canada. Most international students under the age of 18 arrive alone and may live in a home stay or alone. They often experience great loneliness and homesickness, and are often under great pressure to do well and to finish their studies as quickly as possible.

Undocumented Immigrants

In Canada, as in many countries, there are also undocumented immigrants who arrive as tourists, or clandestinely, and then disappear into an underground labour market. They may have paid large sums to unscruplous ‘agents’ who often do not deliver the jobs that were promised.

Undocumented immigrants often end up in jobs where they earn less than the minimum wage, have poor working conditions, and receive no social benefits. Sometimes their children do not attend school for fear that the parents’ status in the country be discovered.

In many school districts, schools do not ‘police’ immigration o...

Table of contents

• Coverpage
• Titlepage
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Section 1: Getting Started
• Section 2: Planning: A Whole-School Approach
• Section 3: In the Classroom
• Afterword
• Index