Understanding Your Refugee and Immigrant Students: An Educational, Cultural, and Linguistic Guide (Michigan Teacher Resource)

Understanding Your Refugee and Immigrant Students is an excellent resource for educators who work with refugees and immigrants. This well-researched volume-including interviews with students from the profiled countries-provides a wealth of information about the specific schooling traditions, practices, circumstances, and expectations that follow these individuals to their new homes in North America and influence their learning experience. The author has focused her research on 18 countries that contribute a majority of refugees and immigrants to the United States: Afghanistan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Honduras, India, Iran, Laos, Liberia, Peru, Somalia, Sudan, and the Ukraine.

Each country profile features: statistics about the country, a historical synopsis, an overview of the county's official education policy, cultural perspectives, and a problem-solution section containing classroom strategies. The linguistic systems of the languages featured are also included for teacher reference.

Also included is information about teacher-student relationships, discipline and class management, and appropriate non-verbal communication. This volume provides invaluable insight into refugee and immigrant students' cultural and educational backgrounds and gives instructors the tools to translate this information into effective classroom strategies.

Jeffra Flaitz is professor of MATESOL at the University of South Florida.