Amber Price, ELL teacher in USA: I could really relate to every word she was saying. What makes the job difficult for an ELL teacher and for all the teachers of newly arrived migrant students is the diverse backgrounds and extremely diverse previous academic schooling of the students. While some are extremely skilled and come from very academic families, others have never been to school before and have to start with learning how to hold a pen, write their name, write the letters, sit at a desk in school. Another thing is that you have to teach so much more than academic skills. Sometimes you have to teach basic life skills and you have to teach the parents and give them information about rights and duties, networks and services and benefits etc. The second video was extremely inspiring and very useful. As a teacher of newly arrived migrant students there is so much you have to consider. The students can suffer from anxiety, anger, depression etc… But the most wonderful thing is watching a student with a very difficult background grow into a wonderful young person.

I loved this  tree-exercise:

My Padlet comment: As I have shared with you before, I have only newly arrived immigrant students in my class. It is a special class for only immigrant students and it is called Instruction Preparing for Basic Education (valmistava opetus). So you could say it is the parallel model that is used. The students stay in my class for one school-year and after that they should understand and speak enough Finnish to be integrated into normal classes. This is of course not always the case. In special circumstances the period in my class can be extended or the student can be moved to a special class if they have problems with learning that are not due to the language. This is normal practice in primary schools as well as secondary schools in Finland. However there are some regional differences; in very small towns where there are none or very few migrant students the migrant students are integrated into normal classes immediately, but with extra support.

My Padlet comment: In Finland the migrant children usually start in a class that is only for migrants still trying to learn the language (Instruction preparing for basic education). I teach such a class in a primary school. The students learn Finnish and parts of other subjects, like math in my class. For physical education, arts, music and hand-craft they are integrated into a regular class according to their age from the beginning.This helps to make friends and adapt and hear the language of the majority spoken by peers. In my class they mainly study the Finnish language. However if a child is strong in math and goes to a regular class for the math lessons, I still have math occasionally with these students too, just to make sure that they understand all the terminology in Finnish. The same goes for natural science and so on... The students also receive extra lessons with a special-needs teacher and with me if needed. They also have two lessons a week in their mother tongue. All students in my class have individual learning plans. The time in my class is usually restricted to one year. After that the student is transferred into a regular class but continues to get extra lessons in Finnish and extra lessons with a special-needs teacher if they need it.

My padlet comment: I have ONLY recently arrived migrant students in my class, so in my class the students are used to everyone being different. Of course we still do all the rituals above when a new student arrives. 

My padlet comment: I think the most important thing for me to do as a teacher of migrants and refugees, apart from making the students feel welcome and safe, is to give them some structure in their day, in their life, as many don't have that. Structures and rules also make them feel safe. I disagree with Raimo Salo from Finland on his view of teachers not acting as social workers and psychologists. Of course there are professionals who do these jobs. However, all situations and students are different and being a teacher is not only about passing on information, it's about seeing the student as a whole human beeing and listening to him / her and accepting them as a person. Last year I had a student, 16 year old refugee, who refused to talk to any psychologists although everyone tried to make him do that. He'd talk to me because he felt I was the only one who had shown to really care and listen.

 

Erika mentions in particular the book “The More-Than-Just-Surviving Handbook: ELL for Every Classroom Teacher” as a useful place to get started. Finally, Wolfgang presents examples of very interesting practical resources that will support you in your further planning of classroom activities. There are shortend links shown directly in the video or you can access all mentioned resources directly

My Padlet comment: All my students are immigrants and often don't have any language in common neither with me nor with each other. But one thing I'm going to try out next year is to start each day with a silent smiling circle.

 

My Padlet comment: papunet.net for communicating with pictures, moped.fi for example instructions and different kinds of forms in arab, somali, etc. 

 

 

My Padlet comment: In Finland it's common for migrant children to take sports lessons together with the other children who speak Finnish as their mother tongue because it is seen as a great way to integrate them. However I do have one very bad experience with sports for refugee students. Last year when the school year was finishing and it was already summer I suddenly decided to go outside with my students ( afghan and iraqi boys about 16-17 years old)to play football. Two other teachers also with students of the same age and origin decided to follow me. After we had played about 5 minutes a huge group fight broke out. There I was, in the middle of 50 boys formidably trying to kill one another. I went home with blod all over my clothes.