Immigrant Children in the United States
“School classrooms frequently become sites of cultural conflict between immigrant pupils and native born teachers, who attached little value to cultural diversity and sought to transform immigrant children into “little citizens” by forbidding them to speak their native language”
“Urban school systems sought to educate children in English as rapidly as possible and discouraged the use of native languages.”
“With today’s higher valuation of multiculturalism, immigrant children find it somewhat easier to retain elements of their home culture. In a mobile, interconnected world, immigrants can not only retain ties to their home society but also consider that society part of their global community.”
“Many immigrant children felt themselves caught between two worlds.”
History of Educational Desegregation
Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, declared racial segregation in schools unconstitutional even if facilities and resources were equal. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, and the Emergency School Aid Act aimed at advancing equal rights and supporting desegregation. In the 1970s, federal investments slowed and funds were restricted. This restricted and limited funds for transporting students and teachers. Following 1972, more restrictions were imposed on federal education funds, which specifically impacted efforts aimed to desegregate schools. With the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021 and 2023, desegregation efforts were mainly canceled through the discontinuation of funds. Schools resorted to utilizing “school improvement funds.”
Research shows that there is an increasing trend of resegregation in schools. Some schools are more segregated than before desegregation plans were put in place.
Immigrant Life at the turn of the 20th Century
In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, the United States had a great influx of immigrants from around the world. Immigrant children were living and attending school in overcrowded conditions. “In New York City in 1905 as many as 125 children were admitted to one school in a single day, resulting in classes of 60 or even 70 students. Space was in such short supply that a hospital ship was deployed as a school. Many schools operated in two four-hour shifts.” (Mintz p. 203) Yet many immigrant children did not attend schools as they were expected, and felt an obligation to work to help support their family.
Video: Immigrant Workers & the American Dream
Immigrant Children Today
“Today the number of immigrant children is at an all-time high. A fifth of all young people in the United States are the children of immigrants – either immigrants themselves or the U.S.-born children of immigrant parents.” (Mintz p. 354) While years ago immigrant children were forced to assimilate to life in the United States, fortunately in recent years there is less pressure to do so. Today, immigrant children are strongly encouraged to maintain their cultural traditions.
Video: What it’s Like to be the Child of Immigrants
Schools Should Promote and Highlight Diversity
“Diversity in the classroom is the understanding that each student brings unique experiences, ideas and strengths to the school” https://www.positiveaction.net/diversity-education
“Students from low-income backgrounds and students of color are less likely than higher-income and white peers to have access to the learning experiences and opportunities that prepare them for college and career success. Isolation and its consequences have the potential to result in detrimental effects on the lives of individual students and may have lasting consequences for our democracy.”
Research shows that students, educators, and communities benefit from racial and socioeconomic diversity in schools. Even though research emphasizes the benefits, achieving greater diversity has slowed down. When schools lack diversity, they also often lack critical resources, further creating opportunity gaps. Increasing school diversity can increase academic achievement/success, create empathy for others, facilitate understanding for students of different backgrounds, and positively improve the cultural climate.
Importance of Learning Languages
In comparison with other developed countries, the United States is the only one that does not place a heavy priority on language learning. In the United States, approximately only one in five k-12 students are enrolled in a world language class. While in Europe, 92% of students learn at least one other language in school. In African schools, students are taught in their first language as well as English, French, Dutch, or Portuguese. In order to thrive in our interconnected world individuals need to place an emphasis on learning a second or third language.
Out of the ten benefits listed to learning another language there were three that should be highlighted.
- Build Deeper Connections with More People
- Treasure Other Cultures
- Children who have studied an additional language like and respect the culture associated with that language, as well as demonstrate higher levels of empathy and tolerance
- Expand Your Perspective
Retrieved from: https://www.languageconnectsfoundation.org/connect-with-language/the-benefits-of-learning-languages
References
Mintz, S. (2004). Huck’s Raft: A History of American Childhood. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Chapter 10-17.
U.S. Department of Education. (2023). The State of School Diversity in the United States. Retrieved from https://www2.ed.gov/rschstat/eval/resources/diversity.pdf.
Team,
I enjoyed your side exhibit on immigrant childhood. Mintz talked about how immigrant children tended to work harder to prove themselves and to ensure they didn’t let their parents down. I think this is true of all immigrant children throughout American history. They immigrated for the American Dream, assimilated, and worked harder than those born here to succeed. We read how Irish immigrants lived in small, cramped, multigenerational homes. We still see that with immigrants today. We also read how immigrant children work through a deficit due to parents having a hard time finding work to support families or because they don’t speak the English language well enough to navigate American Society. Immigrant children are often thrust into an adult world with more responsibilities than their native-born peers. I find it interesting that this construct hasn’t changed much, but we still have difficulties helping immigrant children and families succeed in the U.S. There is always this sense of “other” even though the immigration process has been the same since the United States was founded.
I agree with your section on including diversity in classrooms and learning second languages. I think we are really polarized in today’s society–I definitely thought the section on students being discouraged, which could lead to students being “highly vulnerable to the lure of demagogues” (Mintz, 2004, p 234) applies today. The way to combat that us vs. them mentality is through diversity. When children are in diverse classrooms, they learn about other cultures and backgrounds. I’ve lived all over the U.S and Europe, and I’ve had my kids in highly segregated schools and highly diverse schools. I honestly didn’t feel comfortable leaving my son in the highly segregated school he was in in Kindergarten and 1st grade because that’s not what American Society looks like, and I didn’t want him to get caught up in the us vs. them mentality. We moved so I could put him in a more diverse school. I do wish we started teaching foreign language at a younger age. My children have German classes in school here, but I don’t think they are very intensive. We live in Germany, but they just teach the students basic vocabulary. It would be nice if American schools put more emphasis on learning a foreign language. It’s frustrating that we almost add it in as an afterthought instead of a requirement.
Thank you for sharing your exhibit!
Carrie
The focus put on immigrant children and culture acceptance was a really interesting topic. The importance behind embracing cultures outside one’s own is very educational and creates a deeper global acceptance. Explaining why diversity is crucial in all aspects of life was a great way to tie in lesson commentary.
Great job on your side exhibit!
It is so interesting to contrast the school experience of my grandpa who was the son of immigrants from Slovakia at the turn of the century vs the children of immigrants that I have in my class now. My grandfather did not know any English prior to going to school (in Pittsburgh in the late 1930’s). When he came back from his first day of Kindergarten and reported not understanding a single word to my great-grandmother, her response was that she felt shame and realized she needed to teach him English (and learn it herself) ASAP. It was insightful to read in Mintz’s book that this experience was not out of the ordinary for children in this time period. Assimilation was the norm. In my school today, there are ESOL programs, translation services we can use for parent phone calls and conferences, and a large emphasis on representation. That being said, I often wonder about the “shame” component. I seek to include and celebrate my students and their families as much as possible, but I wonder if that is enough to overcome the remnants of a deeply assimilationist education system. Just in my own classroom, I find that my students over the years whose parents are immigrants but speak English seem to more openly share about their culture than students whose parents do not speak English. Thanks for your thought-provoking exhibit!
Great job on your side exhibit! I really enjoyed reading/listening to your artifacts. When I read from Mintz that “A fifth of all young people in the United States are the children of immigrants – either immigrants themselves or the U.S.-born children of immigrant parents.” I was so struck by that fact! So I was glad to see it pointed out in your side exhibit. I was also thinking about- keeping that statistic in mind- it’s a little confounding to me the lack of presence of foreign languages in school.And When I was abroad a few years ago, I remember when I realized that- wow- almost everywhere I’m going in Europe people can speak English, but very few Americans here can speak any other languages. I wish it was more emphasized in schools! I for one took Spanish from grades 5-12 (my spanish now has really fallen unfortunately), but I think many schools don’t even offer languages. My school for example I teach at a school in Philadelphia, and we don’t even offer any foreign languages.
This year I have one student who’s parents don’t speak English, and teh school has a translating software we can use to communicate with them- but I’ve never been trained on it, so I don’t understand how to use it! It’s a shame and I feel awful that I’ve never communicated directly with these parents- I call his Uncle who speaks english and relays the information. But this just speaks to why this exhibit touched on such an important topic!
Thank you for the interesting and timely side exhibit.
Michael Rain, in his TED Talk, talks about immigrants “who carry this kinship for the countries we grew up in, for the countries of origin…” Keeping the ties or “kinship” to our countries and cultures of origin can be valuable. This frames who we are. I mentioned in a previous post, that I love the image of a patchwork quilt. Each culture looks different with their own unique pattern. Putting all the patterned squares together makes a beautiful quilt.
I do wish that we placed more emphasis on languages in our country. Every child should learn a language beyond English starting in elementary school. Our school system is backward for neglecting this. I do believe that it is important for immigrants to learn English–they are living in an English-speaking country and are at a disadvantage when they cannot communicate. If I lived in another country, I should learn that language. Trying to erase original languages and ONLY speak English is ridiculous and very sad. It seems that both perspectives are arrogant–we don’t have to learn other languages and historically we have wanted people who come here to eliminate their original language and only speak English.
I think that the U.S. would be much better off is language was focused on! Considering that students in the U.S. can barely read/write in English and are struggling in Math and Science, I think we have a long way to go! According to this website, we list 51st in literacy, with the ability to access education as 1st in the world. I think the fruit is ripe for the taking, but until there is a radical change in education our our culture writ large, language is far from the priority and is a great pipe dream, like the Green New Deal.
Source: https://wisevoter.com/country-rankings/literacy-rate-by-country/#united-states-of-america
I’m interested in the portion about immigrant children being compelled to assimilate to “American” culture. Yesterday was the anniversary of Executive Order 9066, which was the order that allowed for Japanese internment in the USA. I still think that this aspect of American history is overlooked, and swept under the rug. The fact that there were internment camps in this country not even 100 years ago is shocking. Of course, for Japanese children at the time, a connection to Japanese culture or their own Japanese heritage was enough to be literally taken away from American culture.
Hi Group D,
I appreciate your approach to your side exhibit for this week. It was good to look deeper into life as an immigrant child in the past and present. The thing from your exhibit that really spoke to me, however, was the portion on the US’s lack of foreign language education. This has long been sad to me. Most children in the US speak only English despite the fact that we also have a large population of people whose first language is Spanish. And the US doesn’t have an “official” language. It would be nice to see a second language added as part of the curriculum from kindergarten onward. The younger a child is, the better they’ll retain that information. It would be a huge benefit to everyone.
I agree, Kristi.
My child was in one school district that had Spanish every day and now she is in another where it’s just once per week.
I wish more time were devoted to language learning in K-6 classrooms. It’s not worth much unless it’s part of the every day class schedule.
Hi Karen, Melissa, Kelcey, and Megan! Your exhibit is engaging and inspiring. I appreciate your focus on immigrant children in the U.S. and your thoughtful selections of artifacts. I absolutely loved watching Michael Rain’s TED Talk “What it’s like to be the child of immigrants” and enjoyed his warmth and sense of humor in telling his story and sharing his work.
Just to have this in our conversation, here’s a link to Rain’s website: https://www.michaelra.in/
And here’s a link to ENODI: https://www.enodi.co/
I can imagine some of you are wondering about fufu, so I want to share this link to a fufu recipe: https://www.africanbites.com/fufu-recipe/
On the topic of learning other languages, I enjoyed reading the list of 10 ten benefits in “The Benefits of Learning Languages.” These benefits are very attractive! I’d love to share a personal story about a benefit I experienced because of my reading knowledge of French. Years ago, my husband and I were hiking in the Pyrenees, and the trail guide pamphlet we had was in French. I had a hunch we had gotten off the trail (at a high altitude), and when I read the description in the guide, I knew we had to stop and find our way back to the trail. Things weren’t matching up, and we were not prepared to camp overnight. I was so thankful to realize that we needed to change our direction.
For those of you who are fluent in another language, isn’t it pleasure to be able to think in that language?!
Thanks for your wonderful exhibit!
Just this morning I read a Penn State Today article by Isabella Macon titled “Liberal Arts alumna blends passion for storytelling, cultures into culinary arts” about Gabrielle Chappel. Here’s a brief excerpt that fits so well with the topic of learning languages being beneficial …
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“Spanish is like the first language of the kitchen, especially in New York City,” Chappel said. “Listening to someone tell their story in their native language, and they feel comfortable opening up to you because you can understand what they are saying, is a vulnerable and powerful concept.”
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Source: https://www.psu.edu/news/liberal-arts/story/liberal-arts-alumna-blends-passion-storytelling-cultures-culinary-arts/?utm_audience=Staff&
I enjoyed reading your side exhibit, group! This brings up a few thoughts for me as I am a bit scatter-brained reading this post – apologies for separate topics.
My first thought is that reading your post made me think of a side note reference to Mintz. Mintz talks about the pressure that immigrant children put on themselves to prove that they are just as good as the next pupil. Mintz also talks about the pressure of immigrant children to make their parents proud. I am wondering if this is still the case today? I feel like two factors make this true: geographical location and age group. I think every child wants to make their parents proud and prove themselves. However, times have changed and unfortunately I think it is more prevalent in high school rather than elementary school.
My second thought is that reading your post made me think of how important it is for culture and diversity. I wonder how many schools talk about culture and diversity compared to how many schools both talk about it and implement it in their curriculum. What I mean by “talking about it” is exactly that. They “say” that they advocate for culture and diversity but it ends there and there is no follow through in the classrooms with curriculum that the students are exposed to. Where I currently work, we have culture/diversity curriculum posters hanging up throughout the classroom. We also have a plethora of books that I put out for the students to opt to read during transitions or down-time.
My third thought is what is each school’s definition of diversity/culture? Are some districts biased due to the geographical location as well as the student population and only focus on the specific ethnic backgrounds for diversity/culture? Are some schools only teaching the required History class and that counts as their curriculum for diversity/culture?