Weaving Multiple Literacies: Somali Children and their Teachers in the Context of School Culture

Teaching Somali Children: What Perceived Challenges Do Somali Students Face in the Public School System?

“…Thus, indicating that parental involvement and close monitoring are important for academic success. Masny's (1999) research supports Bigelow's findings. She found that Somalis gain their strength in group membership and group activity in such a way that even working alone or living alone is uncommon in the Somali culture.…”

“…The vast majority of people are ethnic Somalis who practice Islam and speak dialects of Somali (Putman, 1993). Their society is clan based with most families having many children and including extended family members in the household (Masny, 1999). Oral language is the main form of communication with no written language until 1972 (Crabb, 1996).…”

“…Most of the studies that I looked at pointed to a close link between language and identity as well as indicated that students who had acquired good English language skills achieved at higher levels academically and socially. Masny (1999) wrote about how school-based literacy practices are often less accessible to non-mainstream children since their personal and community literacies, related to their home culture and with their characteristic values and ways of making sense, are seldom represented in the culture of the school. These differences between home socialization and school expectations can often contribute to school failure as well as have a negative effect on the children's identity formation.…”

“…I have chosen articles that relate to the Somali educational experiences because like Masny (1999) I believe that literacies (oral and written forms) are interwoven with religion, gender, race, culture, identity, ideology and power. Gee (1991) states "literate behaviors incorporate ways of talking, reading, writing, and valuing, that is, ways of being in the world.…”

Gardening with grandparents: an early engagement with the science curriculum

“…In their action research study, 'teacher ethnographers' in Arizona, USA, researched children's home and community learning and invited parents and other relatives into the classroom to demonstrate their skills in activities linked to the curriculum. Similar connections with family members as educators have been built in multilingual early years classrooms in London (Kenner, 2000), with Somali families in Canada (Masny and Ghahremani-Ghajar, 1999), and with Maori communities in New Zealand (Glynn and Berryman, 2003), all with beneficial results for children's learning. The approach of building links between home and school has been recommended to educational practitioners in a number of countries by, amongst others, Valdés (1996) and Zentella (2005) in the US, Whitehead (2004) in the UK, and Cairney (2002) in Australia.…”