Notes
Community organizations: n/a
Key populations: Case study of 2 5-year old newcomer girls in kindergarten
Key recommendations:
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Further explore the different roles and functions of creative and imaginative activities for meaning-making, understanding and communication for young newcomer children.
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Strengthen teacher’s connections and understanding to their newcomer students’ out-of-school lives, home experiences, and cultures.
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Investigate how educators can create enabling environments to support communication of perspectives through play and art-making for young newcomer children and how they can then use that information to be acted upon through engagement in culturally and linguistically responsive and inclusive curricula and pedagogical approaches.
Future research / gaps identified:
Expand study to have a larger and more diverse sample (e.g. different genders, ages, English language abilities).
Integration timeline: not defined
Key findings:
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Both girls’ creative and imaginative processes and products effectively communicated and directly represented personally significant ideas, experiences, and perspectives.
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These creative and imaginative activities also functioned as tools or prompts for conversation and recall of events, and as bridges to connect home and school lives.
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Both girls had a wide range of personally significant experiences, influences, barriers, and complexities connected to their culture, pre- and post-migration experiences, identity, and family.
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Findings also point to the importance of relevant environments, time, materials, opportunities, and experiences, as well as adults that offered supports and prompts, which greatly enhanced each girl’s sustained interest and communication of their perspectives and what was personally significant.
