Abstract
This chapter discusses ways of understanding and supporting immigrant children and families. Sociocultural theory and a funds of knowledge framework are introduced to provide pertinent guidelines for early childhood education leadership who is working with immigrant children and families. Looking deeply at the experiences and challenges of immigrant children and families, this chapter proposes that leaders need to ask new questions about the complex realities of immigrants in the U.S. schools in order to respond more effectively to their needs and provide more equitable education for all children. Recommended practices include employing the lens of culturally responsive teaching. It challenges deficit views and negative labels against immigrant children and families, invites early childhood education leadership to rethink curriculum and assessment, and explores ways of empowering immigrant families and communities.
TopIntroduction
Recent statistics reported that one in four children under the age of six in the United States are immigrants or come from immigrant families (Woods, Hanson, Saxton, & Simms, 2016). This number is projected to increase continually and by 2040, one in three children in the U.S. will be growing up in an immigrant household (Todorova, Suárez-Orozco, & Suárez-Orozco, 2009). An increasing number of studies attest that working with immigrant children and their families is one of the most challenging tasks for today’s early childhood teachers in the United States due to lack of proper preparations for such rapid change of demographics in contemporary early childhood education settings (Adair, 2009; Stires & Genishi, 2008; Tobin, Arzubiaga, & Adair, 2013).
The existing literature notes that unmet needs of immigrant families are elevated by a mismatch between the diversity of the student body and the predominantly European American and monolingual composition of the teaching force, which creates a growing disparity and a cultural gap that immigrant families have experienced in the U.S. schools (Adair, 2015; Endo, 2012; Goodwin, 2002; Kwon, Suh, Bang, Jung, & Moon, 2009; Tobin et al., 2013; Souto-Manning, 2013, 2016). In addition, although many immigrant children have limited English proficiency and struggle to adapt to a new culture, most teachers are monolingual, with limited experiences learning a foreign language or experiencing a foreign culture (Zhao, 2010). Due to these gaps between teachers and children, teachers may not be aware of the special needs of immigrant children or may choose to adopt a “color-blind’ approach in the misguided notion that such behavior is appropriate and fair (Cochran-Smith, 2000). Thus, how to teach immigrant children presents a tremendous challenge to teachers.
Research also indicates that teacher education programs that prepare teachers to provide young immigrant children with a sophisticated range of learning experiences are difficult to find, and teachers believe that they have not been properly prepared to teach culturally and linguistically diverse children (Adair, 2015; Daniel & Friedman, 2005). Under these circumstances, teacher education that prepares teachers to practice culturally responsive pedagogy has been emphasized by many scholars (Gay, 2002, 2010; Ladson-Billings, 1995b, 2001, 2014; Nieto, 2000; Souto-Manning, 2013, 2016; Walker-Dalhouse, 2005; Yuan & Jiang, 2019).
Key Terms in this Chapter
Early Childhood Education Leadership: Early childhood educators and professionals who demonstrate leadership in every role within the early childhood education field to engage, question, reflect, and transform not only their schools and programs, but also themselves as a leader.
Funds of Knowledge: The historically accumulated and culturally developed bodies of knowledge, information, skills and strategies, which underlie household and individual functioning, development, learning, and well-being.
Empathy: The ability to understand and identify with another person’s feelings, situations, or experiences, which leads to create a more accepting and respectful community.
Emergent Bilinguals: A term that indicates culturally and linguistically diverse individuals who are becoming dynamic bilinguals. This term is suggested to use for those individuals, rejecting the deficit-oriented terms such as LEP (Limited English Proficiency), ELLs (English Language Learners), or ESL (English as a Second Language) students.
Immigrants: People born in a country other than the United States and intend to live permanently in the United States. Second generation immigrants are children born in the United States to immigrant parents; these children are US citizens. The term immigrant children can refer to both US-born and foreign-born children.
Empowerment: A social-action process through which individual (or group) who lacks power gain greater control, self-efficacy, knowledge, and competence related to their desired actions and outcomes. In the education field, empowerment is the development process of learners’ knowledge, skills, and abilities to enable them to control and develop their own learning.
Equity: The principles of fairness and justice in allocating resources, opportunities, treatment, and success for all students, promoting the possibility of equality of results for every student.
Culturally Responsive Teaching: A term that describes how teachers value and use the cultural characteristics, experiences, and perspectives of culturally diverse students as conduits for promoting their academic achievement. This term is synonymous with culturally relevant pedagogy and culturally sustaining pedagogy.