Complementary Schools for Multilingual, Minority Ethnic Children in the UK: Policies and practices

Li Wei

Applied Linguistics & Communication

Birkbeck College

li.wei@bbk.ac.uk

Acknowledgement

“Investigating multilingualism in complementary schools in four communities” (ESRC, RES-000-23-1180): Angela Creese, Taskin Baraç, Arvind Bhatt, Adrian Blackledge, Shahela Hamid, Li Wei, Vally Lytra, Peter Martin, Chao-jung Wu, and Dilek Yağcıoğlu-Ali

History of CSs, including types and purposes of CSs

Policies regarding CSs Policies of CSs themselves Pedagogical, socio-cultural practices in CSs Issues for research and policy considerations

Terminology

Community Supplementary Heritage (Language) Complementary – voluntary organisations set up by

minority ethnic communities to provide education of their children outside the regular day school context. They complement, rather than replace, “mainstream” schooling.

The content of the teaching is “cultural” (language), not covering the full range of curriculum subjects.

History

Informal reports of home schooling for Black and other immigrant children in 50s

First “schools” were private collectives of families, providing literacy teaching.

1950s “Black” schools To tackle perceived underachievement of Black

children Taught by Black teachers – the role model issue Generally seen as a response to the failing of the

mainstream education system of minority ethnic children

Continued till today but on a much smaller scale, focussing on recent immigrants

Often associated with churches and community organisations

1970s Muslim schools Gender issue and sex education Beginning of Faith schools (for non-Christian

faiths) – equality issue

Huge public debate: i) truly democratic society should allow all types of schools to exist; ii) there has to be a common standard/norm for all schools; iii) if mainstream schools fully meet the needs of minority ethnic children, there would be no need for CSs

1997, official recognition of two Muslim schools (voluntary aided)

The vast majority of CSs are language and culture schools/classes

Over 2,000, varying in size and purpose

Key social network for the community Under-explored in terms of research

Policies regarding CSs

Who’s responsible for them? ContinYou: National Resource Centre for

Supplementary Education (England) “Community learning organisation”, a charity,

partially funded by the DCSF and by the Paul Hamlyn Foundation

No formal registration or inspection No funding going to CSs directly No formal teacher training programme

for CSs

CILT: National Centre for Languages The Language focus/bias Limited funding for activities

Individual communities have orgnisations for their own schools, but no national organisation for the schools across different communities

Problems: no sharing of good practice; fighting for the same, limited resource

CSs’ own policies

Purpose of CSs: language (esp. literacy) and cultural teaching

An alternative version of Monolingual ideology – OLON or OLAT

No recognition of Multilingual identities of the children

Do provide an important site for social interaction within the community

Typical set-up

Physical location varies Restrictions of use in rented premises A mixture of social service and

education Parents run, parents teach, parents pay

Practices

Language as Culture and Language as Heritage Textbooks usually imported from “home” countries;

contents not always appropriate for children in Britain Teachers share little social experience with the

children While insisting on the children speaking the ethnic

languages, they switch to English for explanation and classroom management – “translation as explanation method” (implications – power relations)

Pedagogical, socio-cultural issues

Whole class teaching; teacher centred; often gender segregated

Set textbooks Translation Nationalism through symbolic teaching – folk tales,

anthems, traditional drafts, dance and music, celebration of festivals

Tendency to teach standard, national languages only (linguistic hierarchies)

Contrasting versions of same historical events

How do the children respond?

The children normally have a good receptive ability in the ethnic languages and many can also speak the languages fluently when they want to

Most of them don’t read or write in the ethnic languages

They value CSs as an important social network, with peers of similar social background

In the meantime, they are a new generation of British citizens

They are multilingual and multicultural and want to be regarded as such!

They contest the various monolingual and unicultural identities imposed on them, by the wider society and by their own communities

They reject the monolingual ideologies in the classroom, some of the traditional pedagogical approaches, and some of the cultural contents of the teaching

Issues for research and policy

The role of CSs in identity development and community cohesion for the ethnic minority children

How are CSs connected with the “mainstream” education?

Public awareness of CSs; mainstream school teachers’ awareness

How mainstream school teachers react to their pupils attending alternative schooling.

How do the CSs themselves respond to changes in British society and globalisation (technology, economy, social changes in “home countries”)?

In terms of teaching and learning, what can CSs and mainstream schools learn from each other – many “underachieving” minority ethnic pupils are “high achievers” in CSs.

At the heart of debate over identity, community cohesion, citizenship, Britishness, globalisation

Thank you!

li.wei@bbk.ac.uk