Nielson_Samaj Final conference notes
Download as DOCX, PDF1 like222 views
This document discusses the challenges faced by Bhutanese refugee students in U.S. educational institutions and emphasizes the importance of understanding their cultural backgrounds and experiences. It highlights the concept of 'samaj,' or community, as central to their identity and education, while also addressing gaps in meeting their educational needs. Recommendations are provided for instructors to adapt their teaching strategies to better support Bhutanese students and enhance the learning experience in multicultural classrooms.
Nielson_Samaj Final conference notes
- 1. 1 Conference Notes Overview First we look at some past research, To understandsamajwe need to look at why and how Bhutanese people becamerefugees. We will then look at Samajin Bhutaneseculturehow thisenters into students’personaland academic lives Finally, implicationswill be offered for instructorswho teach Bhutanese students. Slide One Increased Enrollment World Education Services 2012, English language learners enrolled in community colleges increased from 10,224in 2004 to 29, 603 in 2010. -Education Week reported in 2011 from 1997-98to the 2008-09 school year, the number of English-language learners enrolled in public schools increased from 3.5 million to 5.3 million, or by 51 percent The greatest change in many community college curriculums the increase in classes for ELL students. Research islacking which addresses students personal and cultural experiences according to Stasinopoulous (2006) as much of the research deals with social, economic, and ethnic backgrounds. MState At (MState) about 20% of student population is ELLs who have a wide range of needs and many are refugees. One of the largest ELL populations are Bhutanese students Only school experience they have had is in a refugee camp.
- 2. 2 These studentsare oftenmisunderstood I’ve heard comments about the students such “They are just so quiet” or “I like the Nepali students but they cheat a lot”we need to move beyond those overgeneralizations if we want to reach these students. Todo this, we need to know something about our students experiences, cultural backgrounds and why they are in the United States SLIDE TWO The Nepali-Bhutanese from the southern part of Nepal, often referred to as the “People of the South” (Maxym, 2010). Also, according to Maxym (2010)“The community is very tightly knit, and people remain closely connected throughout the life cycle” (p. 1). 1980sa number of governmentactionsdirectedtowardthe people In 1989 the policy of “one nation, one people” required all Bhutanese people to observe the Buddhist culture and relinquish their own (Shrestha, 2011). They refused and lost their citizenship rights. In 1992, the government forced the people to leave Bhutan, moved them to south-eastern Nepal into seven United Nations High Commission Refugee Camps. (as shown on this map) Additionally, Nepal and Bhutan denied people citizenship rights, people marked as “the other” according to Shrestha Over 105,000Bhutanese have lived in refugee camps. Every student interviewed wanted to tell me their story about life as a refugee. On the handoutyou have thesection labeled“A Refugee’s Life” with some of these stories. Almost all of our Bhutanese students at MState lived in a refugee camp
- 3. 3 Refugee families lost everything: their land, their home, their livelihood but The one thing they were able to preserve and hold onto was samaj. SLIDE THREE This cultural translation looks at the role of samajin the personal and academic lives of Bhutanese students It’s based on a number of in- depth interviews with Bhutanese students, observation of cultural scenes, and participant observation. On the handout there arealso statementsreferring to samaj Samajis defined in Bhutanesecultureasthe community All interviewees told me samaj was the most important thing in their lives-one stated, “If you don’t have community, you have nothing.” When Bhutanese come to the United States they encounter problems of integrating into a new place, holding onto their identities, and succeeding in the U.S. Samaj helps to solve those problems because Samajthe community looks out for everyone, cares about everyone, and leaves no one behind. In maintaining that sense of community people are able to: preserve culture and traditions, emphasize education, take care of and help each other. Therefore, Samajcommunity is survival. SLIDE FOUR Samajhelpsto preserve culture andtraditions It is the very essence of culture that Bhutanese people refused refugee to relinquish and placed in refugee camps. Preserving culture means preserving the past by making sure the stories about the camps and the history of Bhutanese people is told to the younger people.
- 4. 4 One cultural tradition is dasara. Here a student describes how the community celebrates dasara (victory of good over evil), “we all get together, families get together and we get blessed from senior of the family, my dad to my grandpa, I go to my Dad’s house, my brother come too…we all celebrate together, basically a festival of blessings.” Diwali, another celebration is (celebration of light over darkness) (This image showsthe lightingofmany candlesduringthe celebration) In Bhutanese culture people respect each other by not using a person’s first name , so for example a young man is bhai or brother, a young female is bini. An older man is grandpa and an older woman is hajurama or grandma. . In Bhutan, students referred to male teachers as sir, female teachers “Miss or Ma’am, married-Madam.” Instructors at MState often tell students to use their first names, Bhutanese student will use Mr., Miss, in front of the name or call us teacher. Because it is wrong, even embarrassing, to refer to a teacher by their first name. SamajValuesEducation Bhutanese people believe education is the “third eye through which you can peep at the world” and “every child should be educated.” Education is a community effort, for example In the camps Students did not dare skip a day of school because if seen by a community memberthey would be scolded, their parents told, and punished in school the next day. Bhutanese parents help their adult children with education as one student explains: “I used to live with parents and they help me a lot, they cooked, they give me money to pay for school…they pay for education.” In return, children teach parents words in English, help them understand laws, or serve as interpreters
- 5. 5 The quest for knowledge is so strong, many Bhutanese students work full time while enrolled full-time. One in particular, was working two jobs, managing a new business, while he completed his degree in Network Security and Administration. (Here is a photoofthat studentcelebrating with his family ) SamajHelpsOthers Helping others is expected of community members help each other during celebrations as well as funerals. With work that needs to be done or helping pay for something. This extends to the classroom Bhutanese students (unless they have attended school in the U.S.)are not lectured to about the evils of plagiarism. Their previous learning experience was copying exactly what the teacher wrote on the board. Here teacher is sharing knowledge and creating new knowledge for students. When a student helps another with homework or an assignment they, too, are sharing knowledge to create new knowledge. When new families come to Fargo the community helps money, food, getting around the city and other things.-----Bhutanese are always there for one another (In thisimage the communitywelcomesnew communitymembers with a celebration at Trollwood Park in Fargo,ND.) Parents help their adult children, who live in the same home with them, they cook for them, and help them financially so when parents get older children will do the same for them. According to one interviewee, “If your parents give you education, they raise you, they give you food, they give you money-you have to take care of them when they get old, you need to, that is your responsibility. SLIDE FIVE Nearly all the interviewees expressed concerns about their education at the college, here is what one had to say:
- 6. 6 “She told me I was doing good and I was not, and then I have to submit final draft but I didn’t know. I thought it was like my country I write it once and turn it in and I did not get good explanation with that and I did not submit final draft and I fail the class. “ Clearly, we are not meeting our students’ needs, perhaps because many do not know who their students are and what their needs are. Know Your Students Literary theorist, Kenneth Burke emphasized the importance of identifying with one’s audience. Toidentify with people, you must know who your audience is. While instructors may not regard their students as their audience, they are. If instructors take the time to learn something about students’ personal experiences and cultural backgrounds this can help increase understanding and make learning more meaningful. MeaningfulLearning According to Gassama “Students view meaningless instruction as a lack of concern on the side of the teacher” The more instructors know about students’ experiences; the more they can draw upon those experiences and become more effective teachers. Teaching should be guided not by how one likes to teach, but rather by what helps with students learn. SLIDE SIX When teaching Bhutanese students remember that life as refugee was terrible: there was a lack of food, and work was hard. Here is one account, “back in the refugee camp, it used to be very horrible life, lucky to get education, in the refugee camp we had no food to eat, we had to work hard to get food.”
- 7. 7 Their schooling is very differentfrom oursin regardsto how they learn School was very structured and disciplined. Some students walked miles to school each day. The days were long, students copied down notes from the blackboard, and memorized them for 2-3 cumulative exams. Students did not engage in group discussion or respond to questions. They were not entertained by the wonders of technology, here is one description: “We do not have reading materials like projector or what not, teachers they write everything on the board and they tell you write it down and we take exams…exams are cumulative…midterm exam will be all 10 chapters and final is all 15 chapters so you got to remember the whole book to pass your exam.” Discipline is harsh When students did not remember something or failed an exam they were beaten, one student describes this “Youget beat with bhata…a big, big stick made of bamboo and if you don’t remember everything they physically beat you up.” Beaton their back, hands, calves-not uncommon for a student to be beat 5-6 times for one incident. SLIDE SEVEN Clearly, manyofus need to changehow we are teaching-itis essential. When it comesto classroom policies, know what students’ previous learning experiences were like. For example, Bhutanese students who copy from one another are doing what they have learned through samaj, tohelp each other. They are also sharing knowledge with one another Many students have only had one experience with education prior to relocating in the U.S. and that was in a refugee camp.
- 8. 8 Make sure policies about things such as plagiarism are clearly spelled and explained so students understand them-never assume they do. Bhutanese studentsdo not expect teachersto be nice to them. However, many studentsdo believea teachershould be honestwith them. We should realize writing is difficult for many Bhutanese students who are learning a language along with grammar and vocabulary. They need constructive criticism to improve, not to be told “everything is fine just do some editing” Because instructors who tries to be nice and are do not honestly tell a student they are doing poorly, does more harm than good. No student wants to go through a semester long class thinking everything is fine only to fail Choose materialsfor teaching thatstudents from other cultures can relate to. Students who have never had any experience with things native speakers have, cannot relate to it. For example in one class we looked at the recent earthquake in Nepal, the people of Guatemala, and the genocide of the Conglolese. In both of the speech classes last semester, I had many ELLs. I allow students to choose their own topics for speeches Many of the language learners talked about what a location their country was like, a cultural food, or tradition for the informative speeches and topics such as immigration issues, media impressions of Islam and The Dream Act were explored in persuasive speeches Following this, native speaking students asked them many questions When the native speaking students spoke, the situation was similar with ELLs asking questions. Here, students were learning from each other and I was learning from my students. Since many studentslack experiencein group discussion: need to know how to get involved, types of questions to ask, how to state an opinion, and assume different group roles.
- 9. 9 With individualpresentations, students will often speak too fast or not loud enough. Some worry others in the classroom will not understand what they are saying. Talk to a student after a presentation if possible, tell them what they did well, and offer specific suggestions for improvement with pronunciation, fluency, speech rate, eye contact and other things. ELL populations continue to grow in community colleges so we, as instructors, must adapt to meet the needs of students who have a burning desire to learn. There is so much to look forward to. A multitude of student experiences are waiting to be explored by everyone. In a multicultural classroom, instructors will learn from their students, students will learn from each other, and learning overall can, and will be more meaningful for everyone. .