Eric.ed.gov – From the Mouths of Experts: Relationship-Building Advice from Immigrant & Refugee Families

As the population of English language learners (ELLs) in schools increases, school leaders seek to build more culturally and linguistically sustaining school communities. Often, the first step in these efforts is to intentionally invite ELLs and their families to school-based events with the hope of involving parents in their children’s formal education. School leaders might partner with teachers to organize family math nights, arrange transportation to teacher-parent conferences, or hire a translator to make the school newsletter linguistically accessible. Yet, educators frequently end up frustrated that immigrant and refugee (IR) families do not show up for these events or that these events seem to have little effect on the academic outcomes of ELLs in their schools. This article shares how teachers worked with the Natural Helpers to develop projects to help connect with, build relationships with, and learn from IR families in their schools. Projects that supported intentional collaborative family engagement included story circles, living room conversations, and multilingual story sharing.