Abstract
Social and economic changes are shaped globally by voluntary and involuntary migration patterns. Voluntary migrations are associated with the desire for family unification, economic gain, and the pursuit of educational opportunities; while involuntary migrations include fleeing from civil or political unrest, human rights violations, and war. Contentious discourses about immigration are fueled by arguments about the perceived impact of migrants on the demographics, social well-being, and economics of communities. At the core of anti-immigration rhetoric about “who is included and who should be excluded” are views that privilege one group above another in terms of desirability based on race, culture, and gender. The debates about which languages, values, perspectives, and people who belong in the United States extend beyond the boundaries of society, the door of schools, and the homes of the families served by the school community. Black African refugees have experienced exclusion due to racism and othering in societies shaped by racialized histories. Deficit-oriented discourses about their abilities influence their identities, belonging, and educational outcomes, and shape their educational experiences and social and emotional health. In this address, I will provide a historical chronicling of the experiences of South Sudanese (Dinka) refugees resettling in a hegemonically White community in the upper midwestern United States and examine the issues related to acculturation and education of Black African refugee children. Central to this examination is the need to ascertain the preparedness of preservice teachers to teach Black African refugee children using transformative pedagogies that promote a humanizing view in today's classrooms.
Introduction
Black immigrants from African countries have been identified as being among the fastest growing population in the United States (Capps et al., 2012, p. 2). Groups of Black African refugees have experienced exclusion due to racism and othering in societies shaped by racialized histories. These exclusions due to race influence their interactions with peers, teachers, and in schools. Deficit-oriented discourses about their abilities influence Black African refugee background students’ identities, belonging, and educational outcomes and shape their educational experiences, and social and emotional health. Dominant public narratives about refugees presented in the media depict them as tragic victims in need of a tremendous amount of assistance or as threats to mainstream society. These narratives serve to disempower resettled refugees by ignoring their diverse cultural ways of knowing, agency, sense of control, and identity (Robins, 2003) and frame public perceptions of them (Warren et al., 2023). For example, the Lost Boys from Sudan have been portrayed as “coming from a situation beyond understanding, and as vessels to be filled by US material and culture” (Robins, 2003, p. 29). This is in contrast with how refugee youth see themselves, as found in research by Qin et al. (2015) and colleagues that Sudanese youth who arrived in the United States as unaccompanied minors attributed having strong native cultural roots, and a sense of identity that enabled them to make “good choices,” maintain focus, and avoid negative actions and behaviors.
Thus, I am compelled to give voice to the stories of the South Sudanese who resettled in Fargo, North Dakota because as Margy Burns Knight (2003) aptly expressed: “Each of us has a story to tell about our lives, our memories, and our dreams. Sharing our stories, and listening to each other, help us to understand who we are” (unpaged). My goal is to (1) provide a historical chronicling of the experiences of South Sudanese (Dinka) refugees resettling in a hegemonically White community in the upper midwestern United States and (2) examine the issues related to acculturation and education of Black African involuntary (refugee) students.
History is composed of stories that seek to clarify, enable, or envision experiences that take place. The experiences of individuals subjected to forced displacement differ significantly from those who voluntarily leave their countries of origin. This promotes a need to better understand the diversity of the experiences of those within and across populations with refugee backgrounds (Bartlett et al., 2017; Karam et al., 2021). We, as teachers and researchers, must interrogate hierarchies that prevent students who are marginalized because of their ethnic, racial, or migratory identities from achieving agency in literacy learning.
Testimonials, which are a form of public witnessing of traumatic events, speak to the atrocities of the Sudanese wars. Escape from Slavery (Bok, 2003) is a biography of Francis Bok's true story of being captured as a 7-year-old Dinka boy by Muslim Arabs and sold into slavery to a wealthy Arab farmer for 10 years. It serves as an example of a testimonial that focuses on a contemporary form of slavery experienced by South Sudanese. Taken to North Sudan, Bok was forced to live in a shed near the cattle that he tended. After enduring multiple beatings for attempting to escape, and imprisonment for talking against the government by sharing his experience with fellow South Sudanese refugees during his time in the refugee camp at Khartoum, Bok was eventually resettled in Fargo, North Dakota with the assistance of the United Nations. His story is truly compelling as he describes his experiences and informs readers of the plight of Dinka boys who were forced to be educated as Muslims and then trained as child soldiers to fight against their people in South Sudan.
Other testimonials of the experiences of the Lost Boys of Sudan are captured in Courageous Journey: Walking the Lost Boys from the Sudan to America (Youres et al., 2008) and A Long Walk to Water (Park, 2010), a fictionalized but true actual depiction of the real-life experiences of Salva Dut, who later founded a non-profit organization entitled Water for South Sudan that dug wells to provide clean water for Dinka and Nuer communities in Sudan. Thus, their stories and those of the countless number of refugees across the world must be honored to understand the nature of the refugee experience (Olguín & Sanders-Smith, 2021).
Historical Context
South Sudanese were resettled in the United States during the 1900s. The Second Sudanese Civil War lasted for 22 years beginning in 1983 and ending in 2005. The war, which started in Southern Sudan, has been designated as one of the longest wars in history. South Sudan became independent from Northern Sudan in 2011, 6 years after the end of the war. Northern Sudanese identify as Arabs and Muslims while the South Sudanese identify as Black, African, and Christian. In the early 2000, Sudanese refugees (25,000) comprised 60 percent of the African refugees resettled to the United States (USCIS, 2004). It is important to note that there were three waves of migration of Sudanese refugees with one starting in the mid-1950s and a second wave in the 1980s. The third wave began in 2013 (Mikal & Woodfield, 2015).
Conflict continues to rage in Sudan with the latest conflict between two military factions, the Rapid Support Forces and the Sudanese armed forces, who are vying for power. According to the International Organization for Migration, 3 million Sudanese were uprooted over a 3-month period in 2023 (Jennings, 2023).
In 2019, more than 44.9 million immigrants resided in the United States and comprised 13.7 percent of the total U.S. population (Batalova et al., 2021). A total of 29,916 individuals were admitted to the United States in 2023, which is a significant decrease in the number of refugees resettled in the United States since 1980 or the beginning of the U.S. resettlement program (Krogstad, 2019). The countries of origin of the largest number of those refugees were from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Burma, and Ukraine. Heterogeneity of immigrants and refugees as well as differences between co-nationals have been noted (Bajaj et al., 2023).
African-born immigrants have higher levels of education and are among the better educated immigrant populations in the United States. Most Black immigrants are likely to either migrate to the United States as refugees or to be granted asylum upon entry to the United States (Capps et al., 2012). However, there is a lack of understanding of the depth and rich background experiences that African-born immigrant students bring to their classrooms and schools (Kiramba et al., 2023; Ndemanu & Jordan, 2018) and parents’ role in supporting their children's academic achievement (Kumi-Yeboah et al., 2018). Some refugee students have limited or interrupted formal education (SIFE) due to war, civil unrest, and migration. They have never attended school prior to migration and/or have limited education in refugee camps. These students have been described as English Language Learners (DeCapua & Marshall, 2010) who need specialized instruction in ESL classrooms.
The premise of my address is that refugee children are not a homogeneous group, so not all refugee students need the same form of literacy instruction. Thus, I assert that from my research and that of other scholars, South Sudanese (Dinkas), because these children are not all the same, need differentiated literacy instruction. Their families differ in their expectations and ability to assist in educating their children despite their shared origin with other refugees from the same country. African, and specifically, South Sudanese (Dinka) refugee students need teachers who both see and teach them.
Personal Connection
My connection to the Dinka Sudanese community began during my time as a member of Gethsemane Episcopal Cathedral in Fargo, North Dakota and lasted during the 26 years that I called Moorhead, MN and Fargo, ND home. Episcopal churches in the Dioceses of Minnesota and North Dakota and Lutheran Social Services of North Dakota worked cooperatively to bring Sudanese refugees to the Fargo/Moorhead community. As Daniel described in his own journey to Fargo, Sudanese refugees arrived in the cold and snowy area of Fargo, a region very different from the tropical climate in their homeland. In fact, the state of North Dakota has been designated as the second coldest state in the continental United States with January temperatures averaging 2 degrees Fahrenheit. Some local churches assisted in the resettlement of the Sudanese with preschool educational programs and the search for employment, as well as, in providing them with needed clothing, housing, and transportation.
It was through my involvement in the outreach efforts of my church that I became acquainted with several Sudanese families and more acutely aware of the educational needs and challenges faced by their children in adjusting to schools in the Fargo/Moorhead area. As a literacy teacher educator at a university in the area, I was motivated by a desire to better understand their plight and to respond to their educational needs with a particular focus on the literacy needs of the children.
In her book entitled Race-ing Fargo: Refugee, Citizenship, and the Transformation of Small Cities, Jennifer Erickson (2020) provides an ethnographic and historical chronicle of the issues of refugee resettlement, belonging, and race in Fargo, North Dakota from the 1980s until 2020.
Race-ing means analyzing a history of race alongside contemporary approaches to diversity; for example, how refugee resettlement disrupted the discourse and (mis)recognition of race in terms of physical attributes (white/nonwhite), language (English/not English), religion (Christian/not Christian), nation (us/them), and sociality (nice/not nice). Race-ing acknowledges the toxic social construct of race that continues to be a primary and decisive way of coding difference and self-worth (Amin, 2012, pp. 3–4). Regardless of social or legal status or cultural status, migrants and minorities are coded as “not white” and therefore, “out of place in an otherwise shared commons” (Amin, p. 4). Over the period of her research, Erickson found that the South Sudanese used “spiritual, social, political, and digital technologies of citizenship through participating in online forums, face-to-face campaigning for national and local politicians, and involvement in the New Sudanese Community Association, a social organization that was part of a transnational political association.” The New Sudanese Association’s efforts were focused on protecting the rights and resources of South Sudanese in Fargo. The forms of citizenship (i.e., spiritual, social, political and digital technologies) of the Sudanese gained respect for them both in Fargo and in South Sudan (Erickson, 2020, p. 201). Erickson said that despite all of the “citizenship technologies” of the Sudanese, they could not be separated from their Blackness in a white city, and by their presence continued to challenge conceptions of who belonged in Fargo. (p. 201)
During the 1980s, between 100 and 250 refugees were resettled per year by Lutheran Social Services. The number of refugees resettled in the area increased two-fold to 572 in 1992, which resulted in resistance by Fargoans, who were predominantly White, to the resettlement of refugees and negative attitudes about refugees became more intense. Despite vocal opposition, Lutheran Social Services continued to resettle refugees in the city. Consequently, from 1997 through 2015 an average of 400 refugees were settled in Fargo. Local school administrators in Fargo were opposed to the resettlement of refugees because they believed that they were not being informed about the true number of refugees resettling in the area, which prevented them from doing the planning necessary to accommodate the number of students being resettled.
In 2001, 800 South Sudanese resettled in Fargo and among them were 40 Lost Boys and Lost Girls. Dinkas, which comprised the largest ethnic group in South Sudan, represented the majority of Sudanese who resettled in Fargo, although a small number of the Nuer, with a history of ethnic conflict with Dinkas, settled in Fargo. Other South Sudanese groups that settled in Fargo were identified as Kuku, Anjuak, Zande, Acholi, Latuka, Didinga, Bari, and Madi. English was the principal language spoken by the Sudanese who resided in the Fargo/Moorhead area and has been identified as the primary language spoken among formally educated Sudanese. Arabic or Juba Arabic, a creole form or Arabic, are also forms of language spoken by South Sudanese.
There were variations in the education and experiences of the South Sudanese because of the atrocities of war, including time spent in refugee camps, and recruitment of children to serve in the Northern Sudanese army. Despite the major differences between the South Sudanese who arrived in Fargo, they had three things in common. The first commonality identified by Erickson was “their blackness in a white city in a country where skin color shapes access to power, authority, safety, and everyday life” (p. 184). The second major commonality among the South Sudanese was their Christianity, which reflected their resistance against Islamization and Arabization by Northern Sudanese, and the last was their employment in low-wage jobs in factories, in health care facilities as aides, or in hotels as workers.
Introduction to Fargo
To help contextualize my talk, I must describe the local community and state in which the South Sudanese were resettled. Fargo, ND is located on the eastern edge of the Great Plains and in the Red River Valley, where the Red River runs north into Manitoba, Canada. The Red River forms the border between North Dakota and Minnesota. Fargo is bordered on the east by the state of Minnesota. Moorhead, MN is the largest city in northwestern Minnesota and the closest Minnesota city to Fargo. The Fargo-Moorhead metropolitan area includes Dilworth, MN, Moorhead, MN, Fargo, and West Fargo, ND. According to the 2022 U.S. Census, the area currently has a population of over 258,663 individuals.
Erickson's (2020) description of the White people of Fargo during the 20th century provides insight into the environment in which Sudanese families found themselves. She described them as “especially friendly and hardworking Americans who were bolstered by the perception of their productivity in supporting the healthy economy of the small city that Fargo was considered to be” (p. 10). With the arrival and resettlement of the increasing numbers of refugees, race began to shape “whites’ perceptions about belonging, work, and friendliness” (p. 10) and their understandings of citizenship. White people and friendliness were seen as a “mechanism for them to maintain power, privilege, and status” (p. 10).
Deficit orientations are evident in the discourse pertaining to language and literacy practices of refugee children and youth about how knowledge is constructed and valued in their homes and communities (Wilder & Axelrod, 2019). To change the focus on being a refugee as the single most important part of their identities, Newcomer and colleagues (2021) and others (Strekalova-Hughes & Wang, 2019; Ward & Warren, 2020) promote the use of the term “refugee background students” and not refugees to emphasize the multifaceted aspects of their lives. In an editorial volume of the Journal of Literacy Research focused on problems associated with labels, Bauer et al. (2022) also caution literacy educators and researchers about the use of a label such as refugee in educational contexts because of “the impact that it has on the literacy learning experiences and the lifelong humanity of these students” (p. 3).
Countering these perceptions is dependent on the use of asset discourses defined by Shapiro and McDonald (2017) as discourses that emphasize the resources and strategies that students from refugee backgrounds employ toward the goals both inside and outside of educational settings (p. 81). Assets can be identified in the oral and written narratives of refugee students, and in the examples from their lived experiences. The content of these narratives reflects their ethnic and cultural practices or their pre-migration and post-migration challenges and experiences.
There are two deficit discourses frequently used to describe African refugee children and parents, that I would like to interrogate. They are that:
The linguistic abilities of African refugee children (South Sudanese/Dinkas) limit their success in U.S. classrooms. South Sudanese/Dinka parents are not involved in school or engaged in the literacy development of their children at home.
Deficit Discourse 1: The Linguistic Abilities of African Refugee Children (Dinkas) Limit Their Success in U.S. Classrooms
A deficit view of Dinka children, their families, and their language and literacy is present in most of the research involving them (Fleer et al., 2019). However, Black African immigrant (voluntary and involuntary) children and youth bring a wealth of knowledge related to their cultural ways of knowing to their education (Balogun, 2011), but this is not known to educational policy makers and U.S. teachers (Kiramba & Oloo, 2019). While many Black South Sudanese refugees’ first schooling experience was in refugee camps due to limited access to schooling in Sudan, children and youth in refugee camps are more likely to be literate in English than in Dinka.
In interviews with Sudanese leaders in Fargo, I learned that many South Sudanese students come to U.S. schools knowing two or more languages: Arabic, their tribal language, and some English. The exception is children from rural Sudan who have not attended school. Those South Sudanese children who learned Arabic before coming to the United States are better able to learn English and perform better in school than those who know only their tribal language (Walker-Dalhouse & Dalhouse, 2009).
South Sudanese children, like other immigrant and refugee children, play a vital role in families by serving as literacy brokers and cultural brokers for their parents (Perry, 2008). Family storytelling represents students’ funds of knowledge (Gonzalez et al., 2006) and some stories serve as cultural anchors for students as they navigate across their culture and that of their new environment (Newcomer et al., 2021). Strekalova-Hughes and Wang (2019) found that South Sudanese children from refugee backgrounds who resettled in western New York internalized storytelling as culturally and linguistically sustaining literacy practices. The stories were told in unique ways such as in remembering and repeated storytelling, using narrative structure, and with performance nuances. However, the forms of storytelling used were not valued in the school environment.
The language and literacy challenges that the students face do not represent a lack of intelligence but are reflective of the mismatch between their home or culture and school language and literacy practices. As a parent in my research noted, The teachers’ expectations of our Sudanese children are low because they are refugees and refugees are seen as not being too smart … because they don’t speak English well and do not understand concepts explained by the teachers as quickly as the students who grew up speaking English. (Walker-Dalhouse & Dalhouse, 2009, p. 332)
English language development for All ELLs, not only ELL students from refugee backgrounds, benefit from intensive daily instruction in English combined with content learning (August & Shanahan, 2006; Reddick & Dryden-Peterson, 2021). This will provide the needed support for meeting their language needs and promote greater engagement in learning. It is very important that while students are developing proficiency in English their existing linguistic repertories are valued and seen as the connecting links to their identities, families, and communities. Sarroub et al. (2007) reinforce this belief by stating that teachers can help refugee students “embrace school literacy by embracing the multiple literacies students already practice by making across-text and across content connections” (p. 679).
Literacy is associated with cultural practice, power, and ideology (Gee, 1996). Understanding the relationship between school literacy practices and the literacy values and practices of families is important (Hannon, 1995). If this relationship is not understood, refugees can be marginalized in communities and view themselves as powerless (Walker-Dalhouse & Dalhouse, 2009).
Deficit Discourse 2: Sudanese Parents Are not Involved in Schools or Engaged in the Literacy Development of Their Children at Home
Resettled refugee families value education for their children and recognize the value associated with literacy (Atwell et al., 2009; Sarr & Mosselson, 2010). At the time, when the South Sudanese migrated to Fargo, some parents were unable to provide the support for their children required by U.S. schools in reading. However, South Sudanese parents’ cultural expectations of their children require them to be respectful to adults, obey rules, and to listen rather than talk too much or socialize (Dachyshyn & Kirova, 2011).
Sudanese parents’ expectations are often not understood by teachers and school leaders, thus contributing to misperceptions and a greater need for communication between teachers and schools about parents’ expectations and values. Understanding parents’ expectations for school achievement of refugee students is fundamental to meeting their academic needs.
School performance and the well-being of these students are associated with positive family, community, and school relationships (Suarez-Orozco et al., 2010). Negative social factors adversely affect the academic achievement of immigrants and refugees (Li, 2008; Sarr & Mosselson, 2010). In discussions with a group of immigrant and refugee adults and youth including Sudanese refugees, Ye et al. (2017) identified social challenges that they or their children would face in PK-12 schools in the United States, which included difficult cultural transitions, bullying, the lack of the availability of materials translated into their native language, low teacher expectations for their children, and unrealistic expectations of parental involvement. Yet, South Sudanese youth have been found to possess educational resilience and experience successful educational outcomes in spite of the adversities encountered in their lives (Wang et al., 1994). In an investigation of the educational resilience of Sudanese unaccompanied minors residing in foster care, Rana and colleagues (2011) demonstrate that the students identified “getting an education as their primary goal” (p. 2081) and attributed their success overcoming the challenges faced in U.S. schools to their personal attributes (i.e., motivation, and focus on goals, aptitude, resourcefulness), relationships (with foster parents, and some of their teachers and school staff, peers, and relationships and expectations of their biological parents), and community support (from the resettlement agency Lutheran Social Services of Michigan).
Refugee parents need support to help them have a greater understanding of U.S. schools and how to engage in these schools. In an ethnographic study in which Koyama and Bakuza (2017) examined interactions between refugee parents in the United States, they found that the parents in one Northeastern school engaged in space making, a process in which transnational migrants make spaces for themselves within, between, and outside of existing policies, practices, assumptions, and expectations (Das Gupta, 2006). With the assistance of community organizations, resettlement agencies, and community refugee leaders, they were able to reposition themselves as being capable parents, educators, and decision makers with knowledge and authority which led to documented changes in school decision making policies and opened spaces for parent engagement (Koyama & Bakuza, 2017).
Nevertheless, building relationships with refugee families across differences in language, culture, and other forms of diversity has been recognized as difficult. However, the benefits for the social and emotional health of the students and their academic achievement are clear (Dryden-Peterson, 2018). All of the comments in a second study involving interviews with Sudanese parents (Walker-Dalhouse & Dalhouse, 2009) support the need for better communication and a stronger relationship between school and the homes of refugee students. The Sudanese parents have shared goals of seeing their children become literate in English and being successful in school. They want to support teachers and school personnel in their efforts. To achieve these outcomes, direct communication about Sudanese children's progress, behavior, and academic needs, and school practices that inform parents and support their efforts must be a priority for teachers at all levels (Walker-Dalhouse & Dalhouse, 2009).
The depth of African-born immigrant and refugee parents’ marginalization in schools is great and information about African children is rarely examined in educational research (Kiramba et al., 2023). It is in the context of U.S. schools that ethnic minorities and immigrants have been found to experience a greater risk of lower social, psychological, and academic adjustments in comparison to their native-born counterparts (Kamya, 1997; Lokhande & Reichle, 2019). Now, I would like to turn my focus to the issue of what it means to be prepared to teach Black African (Dinka) refugee children and youth with refugee backgrounds.
Teaching and Teacher Preparation
Preservice teachers (PSTs) have been found to have limited knowledge about immigration (Fitchett & Salas, 2010) and negative beliefs about migrant learners (Devine, 2005). With few opportunities in their teacher preparation courses and field experiences to focus on their needs (Kovinthan, 2019), they experience anxieties about teaching migrant students (Hanna, 2023). Thus, “attention to the beliefs of teachers and teacher candidates can inform educational practice in ways that prevailing research agendas have not and cannot” (Pajares, 1992, p. 329). Beliefs are formed early and tend to self-perpetuate, persevering even against contradictions caused by reason, time, schooling, or experience (Florio-Ruane & Lensmire, 1990).
Disparaging beliefs about Sudanese refugees influence the perspectives of these students about their relationships with teachers. In interviews with Sudanese/South Sudanese youth in Australia, Macaulay (2023) found that their perceptions of their teachers were mostly negative. The youth attributed their feelings to low teacher expectations, disproportionate disciplinary actions, and various forms of racial discrimination.
Warren (2018) believes that teacher candidates need empathy to have a greater understanding of the children they will teach, their families, and communities, and to be better prepared to teach in culturally responsive ways. Warren proposed using a model in which PSTs engage in perspective taking, in which one engages in the act of taking the social perspectives of others as a means of knowing and reasoning to prepare them to teach in culturally responsive and humanizing ways. The use of drama-based informal learning opportunities that incorporate creative activities in art, music, and drama has also been proposed as another means to both inform PSTs about the experiences of refugees and promote a readiness for teaching refugee background students.
Little research has been conducted with the teachers who work with students from refugee backgrounds (Newcomer et al., 2021; Roxas, 2011). Culturally responsive teaching and humanizing pedagogical frameworks should be used in examining the background experiences of refugee students and to guide researchers in analyzing the experiences of refugee students. Culturally sustaining pedagogy, an extension of culturally responsive pedagogy, recognizes the fluid dynamics of culture and promotes a consistent critical view of pedagogical practices that are multilingual and multicultural in nature (Paris & Alim, 2014, 2017). Academic achievement, cultural competence, and critical competence are the central components of culturally responsive teaching (Ladson-Billings, 1995).
Humanizing pedagogy, which is based on Freire's (1970) work, has similar tenets to culturally responsive frameworks. Both frameworks (1) recognize the sociopolitical contexts that impact the lives of teachers and students; (2) examine the impact of the perspectives, beliefs, and cultural practices of teachers and students on instruction and student learning; and (3) emphasize the importance of engaging in partnership with families to learn about and use student's funds of knowledge as resources for teaching and learning.
PSTs not only need knowledge about diverse learners, their families, and community environments (Cochran-Smith, 2004; Villegas & Lucas, 2002), but they must also have the dispositions to teach with concern for diversity, equity, and respect for their differences (Lee & Herner-Patnode, 2010; Truscott & Stenhouse, 2022). The literature pertaining to the preparation of PSTs to meet the academic and social needs of refugee children (Kovinthan, 2016) is lacking. Teachers must learn about the assets that the students bring to the classroom and recognize the cultural and linguistic knowledge that students possess (DeNicolo et al., 2015). As Kovinthan (2016) noted, “teachers and future teachers who do not know a family's experience prior to arrival in a new country cannot guess how those experiences affect the child's and parent's reactions to school” (p. 285). Meaningful and inclusive classroom environments that employ culturally responsive, trauma-informed, and asset-based instruction are necessary to begin to meet the educational needs of refugee students who have experienced forced migration (Burke & Field, 2023). The lack of a culturally responsive curriculum that focuses on academic achievement, cultural competence, and critical competence has been found to have a major impact on the quality of the school experiences of both refugee and immigrant students (Bajaj et al., 2017; Bajaj & Barlett, 2017; Ndemanu & Jordan, 2018).
Asset-based mindsets about student achievement can be developed by amassing pre-migration information obtained from parent home visits (Ndemanu & Jordan, 2018; Paulick et al., 2022). Such visits can be effective practices for promoting positive teacher relationships and changing educators’ deficit-based perceptions of diverse cultural, linguistic, and minority backgrounds and support culturally responsive/culturally sustaining pedagogies (McKnight et al., 2022; Paulick et al., 2022). Teacher educators must prepare PSTs to teach students about the histories and cultures of refugee students (McCall & Vang, 2012). Exposing preservice teachers to multicultural literature is another way to create cross-cultural awareness of diversity issues, and to provide them with opportunities to utilize these materials and social justice pedagogy to develop their own and their students’ critical thinking skills. It can also reduce the linguistic and cultural differences between majority of teachers and the diverse students in their classrooms (Han, 2013).
Multiple multicultural courses, field experiences, and the infusing of content on diversity in the teacher preparation curriculum and the experiences noted above can prepare students to develop multicultural understandings and prepare students for diversity (Alvarez-Romero et al., 2021, Kolano & King, 2015; Walker-Dalhouse & Dalhouse, 2009). Creating learning opportunities outside of the formal school setting is another effective way to learn about and from students with refugee backgrounds. I investigated PSTs’ knowledge of refugees before and after their participation in a field experience teaching reading to K-6 Sudanese refugee students in a community-based reading clinic embedded in a literacy methods course experience with Sudanese refugee background students (Walker-Dalhouse & Dalhouse, 2013). The goals of the Sudanese Reading Clinic held in the basement of the local Episcopal church were to (1) help PSTs to develop a sociocultural stance toward assessing and interpreting the reading performance of elementary age refugee background students, (2) use assessment data in instructional planning to address the literacy needs of refugee background students, and (3) to employ research-based instructional strategies in improving the reading and writing skills of refugee background students.
The PSTs reported that the clinic experience increased their knowledge of self, students, and community refugees’ needs. On the Knowledge dimension of an assessment of culturally relevant beliefs by Love and Kruger (2005), pre-post scores for PSTs exposed to the clinic experience were significantly higher after their clinical experience compared to a control group who did not participate in the clinic experience, p > 0.05 (Walker-Dalhouse & Dalhouse, 2013).
Transformative Literacy Instruction
Faculties of education could facilitate effective community partnerships with organizations that work with refugee families and children and the school system and propose holistic curricula which include refugee experiences. Moreover, “PSTs could gain skills and knowledge in supporting refugee students, identify refugee background students’ needs, communicate in creative ways, and overcome deficit beliefs about refugee students” (Vitsou & Papadopoulou, 2023) and learn to promote student agency (Karem et. al, 2021). According to noted educator James Banks (2003), transformative education is needed to empower minoritized students. An essential step that faculties of education could take in transforming literacy instruction is to facilitate effective community partnerships with organizations that work with refugee families and children and the school system and propose holistic curricula which include refugee experiences. I propose that researchers transform literacy instruction by learning about the families of the children with whom they work and explore the use of different knowledge systems and practices used by Dinka children and families and incorporate cultural concepts into the children's learning of concepts. This will dispel perceptions of a lack of parental involvement in their children's education by (1) drawing on funds of knowledge (Fleer et al., 2019; Gonzalez et al., 2006) and (2) incorporating parents’ ways of knowing and doing in teaching their children. The model of teaching, identified by Fleer et al. (2019) as Transformative pedagogy focused on “capturing the idea of relational and responsive teaching approaches in contexts of cultural diversity that take into account how children experience learning at home” (p. 1066). After observing Dinka preschool children in play groups and their parents, they found that at the core of teaching Dinka children was (1) understanding their cultural beliefs of belonging to a collective community; (2) showing respect for elders by being reflective; (3) watching and actively listening, and (4) showing, telling, and experiencing everyday life experiences rather than teaching them to their children.
The researchers also identified four pedagogical approaches that were used by Dinka parents in working with their young children. The four approaches form the basis of what the authors define as transformative pedagogies: (1) observation pedagogy, (2) physically helping pedagogy, (3) verbally helping pedagogy, and (4) embedded (scientific) narratives pedagogy.
Thus, I believe that to transform literacy instruction for African/Sudanese (Dinka) students with refugee backgrounds educators must:
Establish community partnerships with organizations that work with refugee families and children to provide literacy opportunities in school and in after school programs. Work with school systems to propose holistic curricula which includes content and the experiences of students with refugee backgrounds. Incorporate Dinka family values as reflected in their home teaching practices such as showing, telling, and experiencing everyday life experiences rather than teaching them to their children. Incorporate personal stories of refugee students navigating pre- and post-migration personal and social challenges to address the effects of trauma.
Text as Windows and Mirrors
Children's literature that addresses the sociopolitical aspects of displacement should also be an integral part of the curriculum, although the cultural depth and the sociopolitical aspect of displacement are often lacking in picture books about the flight of refugees (Strekalova-Hughes, 2019). To help guide teachers in selecting books about refugees, Strekalova-Hughes and Peterman (2020) recommend that teachers engage in critical self-reflection designed to investigate their personal beliefs about refugees including the meaning of the term, their experiences with them, and the impact they have on their interpretation of stories about them. It is also essential that teachers examine the messages they want to convey to their students with the books they use and through books. Thoughtfully selected texts increase students’ understanding and questioning of the messages (Tschida et al., 2014).
More complexity should be incorporated into the representation of refugees in children's literature about refugees (Ward & Warren, 2020). While books depicting their journey to safety and resettlement in a new place are a good beginning point for exploring the global issue of the refugee experience, they advocate for a more nuanced look into the crisis. Educators are cautioned about overemphasizing the dangers associated with the journey of refugees and their resettlement experiences and point out that overemphasizing them can lead to distortions of their experiences and create potentially biased representations of their lives. Ward and Warren (2020) recommend interrogating texts to the extent to which they help students to have an informed and non-stereotypical view of the issue by engaging students in critical conversation about these issues that may be sociopolitical in nature and focus on issues that they are facing during resettlement (Vasquez et al., 2019). Teachers can also include witnessing the testimonies of trauma experienced by refugee students (Dutro, 2019). Pedagogies of testimony and critical witness or “interrogating the systemic oppressions implicated in their (students) lived experiences and interpreting these experiences” (p. xiii) are pedagogies used in responding to trauma in literacy classrooms (Dutro, 2019).
Lastly, the issue of belonginess should be examined in books about South Sudanese children. Karam et al. (2019) recommend using a critical literacy lens to investigate the way in which the journeys and resettlement experiences of Sudanese/South Sudanese children were depicted in three contemporary children's literature for middle school students. In the books used the authors found (1) opportunities for disrupting common perceptions or stereotypes of refugee children and interrogating multiple viewpoints about feelings of belonging in a resettled country and (2) ambivalence about ties to their home country and to respond to questions related to social-political dimensions of refugees (i.e., permanent refugee resettlement, admissions, and status of refugees) that can lead to social justice issues. Identity text can also be used as an intervention tool to increase self-awareness, build trust, enhance belonginess, and create an awareness of a shared humanity (Zaidi & El Chaar, 2022).
Texts to assist refugee background students in responding to issues of trauma must be included. This can be achieved by incorporating into the classroom authentic cultural reasons for reading and writing related to their families’ experiences as refugees. Building upon the ethnic values, artifacts, and cultural practices of Sudanese families, bringing them into the school curriculum (i.e., storytelling; Perry, 2008), tapping into their concerns about present and past political, social, and economic issues in their home country, and discussing issues related to acculturation in the United States are ways to promote literacy and to address trauma.
Schools must prioritize refugee background students’ “personal histories and current needs” (Sarr & Mosselson, 2010) and their heritage to humanize their educational experiences and promote student engagement (Salazar, 2013). Teachers must move beyond acknowledging the existence of racism in society and must be purposeful in the methods and materials used in their classrooms (Phillips et al., 2019) to combat it. School policies must be implemented to ensure that Sudanese and other refugee background children's parents are welcomed and assisted in their efforts to be involved in their children's education.
In conclusion, we as researchers have responsibilities to interrogate hierarchies about all individuals with refugee backgrounds, but particularly those with African refugee backgrounds, by examining
the unique experiences of unaccompanied refugee minors (i.e., Sudanese) (Qin et al., 2015); the educational experiences of refugee and immigrant ELL students with interrupted formal education (SIFE) (Hos, 2020); the language of refugee children and ways to support their literacy development (MacLeod et al., 2020); and how to prepare preservice teachers to work with refugee children and families (Kolano & Sanczyk, 2022).
It is essential that we bear witness to the stories of those who are not quite like us by making a space for everyone and the stories that are yet to be told.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: The author received financial support from the Otto Bremer Foundation for the research conducted in the Sudanese Reading Clinic. No financial assistance was received for the authorship and/or publication of this article.