Greetings, everyone! Anchal and I are international students from India who arrived here in the fall. Both of us hold master’s degrees in zoology and have experience teaching elementary science classes in our home country. We are not employed as school teachers and initially felt uncertain about which topic to choose for our project. During our first semester, we were assigned an action project where we had to dedicate time to volunteering. Through this assignment, we discovered the Regina Immigrant Women Centre (RIWC) and have been actively involved with them since. As graduate students, RIWC has allowed us to lead literacy classes for refugee immigrants from countries such as Ukraine, China, and Afghanistan. To our surprise, we encountered refugees who hold permanent residency here but struggle with English proficiency due to their mastery of their regional language. RIWC is dedicated to assisting new immigrants in settling into their new lives here and aiding them in finding employment. Currently, we are conducting English classes for them via Google Class room.
Analysis:
When analyzing an orientation session for new immigrants, it is critical to comprehend the particular demands and difficulties they confront. Upon arrival, immigrants face a multitude of challenges, ranging from adjusting to strange surroundings to obtaining necessary services and negotiating local traditions. Disregarding these requirements may result in feelings of loneliness, annoyance, and reduced efficiency. While participating in volunteering, we met numerous refugees facing language barriers. Abdullah and Rabia are two of them, assigned to us for English literacy classes. They have undergraduate degrees from their country but struggle to find jobs. They moved here last year, but in the settling months, they found difficulty finding jobs. Job employment and language learning are crucial for them at that point. However, this is a minimum of a nine-week course and was created in such a way that each student will feel more excited to finish each training session to progress to the next advanced class. Since all of the students are at similar learning levels, they feel comfortable asking the instructor whatever they want to know. They may express themselves freely in group discussions and debates, which makes it possible for students to initiate speaking in front of others while having fun in the classroom. They learn and remember new vocabulary terms by working through puzzles and quizzes. The environment is designed to be friendly and engaging, ensuring they don’t feel nervous. Watching English movies with subtitles improves both their receptive and productive skills. We have included some musical songs in the course that they can listen to of their choice with subtitles, and we have given them exercises to sing along with the singer. Through this, they practice speaking English and try to improve their listening skills as well. Since English is not their first language, it can be challenging to sing at the same pace as the singer; yet, by doing this exercise, they can get better at speaking and listening as well as gain a better understanding of Western language and culture. For the next level of training, we start their training with some fundamental grammar courses as soon as they start participating in the above-mentioned activities, which will improve their language skills on a professional level.
Design:
Through a variety of engaging activities and opportunities for hands-on learning, participants can actively work towards mastering the skills and knowledge outlined in the workshop’s objectives. Ultimately, students will learn how to create resumes in the second phase, and after this, they will get an assessment According to their performance in formative and summative examinations, and based on their performance, they move on to the next learning step of the training. In the third step, one-on-one sessions were used to practice interviews. These classes give refugees a chance to fully engage with a new culture. They now have the opportunity to enroll in several educational courses and more after learning the fundamentals, setting the foundation for their future. There would be one compulsion for the students throughout their coaching period: they have to participate. They must participate so that they can learn, and the best part about this course is that it is free, as the Google sites are freely accessible. Only one must have a personal device and proper access to the internet.
Here is a template of ADDIE model. Please click on the link. Thankyou!!
https://us.docworkspace.com/d/sILSIy_XhAdqopa4G
Thank you for sharing, Jasvinder. It is really cool to see how you are making our assignment applicable to your current work. I am a teacher so I only have experience with using asynch/synch work with kids. I think your participants at RIWC will be very greatful for the tools and activities you are providing them. I look forward to seeing your developed module.
Thankyou so much Amber! I am also experiencing new things with them. I will share in my next blogs. Thanks!
Firstly, thank you for volunteering your time to provide such an important service for newcomers. It is disheartening that this type of support is not provided by our federal and provincial governments. From what I gathered reading your course profile it is being offered in a synchronous environment. Is there any provision for students to work at their own pace? For example if a student is having a tough time with early material do they keep moving on with the larger group, or do they stay back to perfect their skills? Either way you are doing an excellent job filling this gap in our social services.
Thank you for your kind words and for recognizing the importance of support for newcomers. RIWC is providing valuable resources such as translator and worksheets to aid immigrants, some dedicated learners try to solve these and others not. Now I am taking one on one weekly classes so that they can learn with their own speed. Thankyou!
Your educational, professional, and volunteering backgrounds are so interesting (for both of you)! Thank you for what you are doing for our new residents – it’s so important, and I’m sure you’re really making a difference in their lives. It sounds like you are already doing a fantastic job in engaging the students, making them feel comfortable (especially if you can get them to sing – well done!) I’m impressed you’ve been able to do this with Google Classroom. I look forward to seeing how your course develops throughout this class.
Thankyou so much Lauren for your motivational words, we are really hopeful for this course and helping the immigrants here. As we are also new here still we are trying to serve as much as we can. Thankyou!
Hey Jaswinder,
I believe that the best thing to do in this world is to help people who are in need and you are doing the same. As we are also immigrants here, we know that survival in a new country is not easy and it becomes more difficult when there is a communication barrier. So, you are doing a great job by teaching the English language to refugees here. Definitely, your efforts are going to make a difference in their lives. also, I believe it is a challenging task for you to teach a new language to people from different countries.