The Inner World of the Immigrant Child
Note: This entry fulfills the “Reflection” requirement for the reading of The Inner World of the Immigrant Child. It will also be made avaiable as an APA-formatted paper for submission in class. I may make a few changes before submitting it.
When I was 15, my family moved from suburban Salem, Oregon to a rural corner of the state some 250 miles away. At the time, it seemed like a culture shock, and I was certainly affected by my change of scenery at the time. Really, though I was just an English-speaking kid moving from one (mostly) white school to another (mostly) white school in another part of the state. I didn’t even cross state lines.
Some 25 years later, I work in a school where roughly one third to one half of the students have family roots somewhere besides the United States. Most of those students are either first or second generation Mexican immigrants who have had to adapt to or overcome language and cultural barriers in the school setting. My little trek across the state when I was 15 hardly seems much more than a blip on the radar screen any more.
It is with those eyes that I read The Inner World of the Immigrant Child, by Cristina Igoa. This is a book written by a well-educated and professionally accomplished teacher who was once herself an immigrant child from the Phillipines. In the first half of the book, Dr. Igoa profiles some of her students, and follows them from entry in their class, their progress as struggling immigrant students, and their accomplishments through high school and into adulthood. The counselor in me was most interested in her use of “filmstrips”, or story boards that her children used to tell a story. Very often, these stories conveyed deeper meanings about the children’s perception of their new surroundings. A girl from Hong Kong tells the story of the “Upside Down Morning”, in which nothing around her makes sense and she winds up exhausted after a day of these experiences. A girl from the Phillipines draws a story of a lonely bear, and in the process conveys her own confusion and depression.
Dr. Igoa has the rare opportunity to follow up with these students and talk about their stories through older, more mature eyes. It was through her own PhD program that she was able to reconnect with these students and track the progress that became the material for much of this book.
One theme that weaves through this book almost constantly is the importance of an adult-child connection to the potential success of that student. Ioga indicates that for most of these children, that important adult is the teacher, and not a counselor or administrator in the school. Indeed, it is the rare therapist that is able to track their students into adulthood.
In the second half of this book, Dr. Igoa presents the importance of the Cultural/Academic/Psychological (CAP) dimensions to be addressed in an immigrant child’s development. This three-pronged approach to working with immigrant children is vital to their success, and all three components interact with each other. One way of validating cultural customs and norms can be accomplished by allowing children a setting in which they have previously experienced education. “I learned that my immigrant students learn quickly if they feel ‘at home,’ not only with me but in our room,” she explains. That academic success improves the students’ psychological well-being, which in turn helps them grow stronger cultural roots in their new locale.
One important task that Dr. Igoa presents is that of the classroom teacher understanding the teaching environment in which the immigrant child was raised. Do students from that country normally wait to be called on before they speak? Are they normally punished for what we would consider to be trivial infractions? As an educator in a school with a large immigrant population, this is a factor I hadn’t considered before now. She also includes a chart that teachers can use to track the school environments that a child has experienced since kindergarten.
Dr. Igoa also stresses the importance of the home-school connection in the success of the immigrant student. I believe that this is an important factor for ALL students, but perhaps most so for children who are struggling to make those connections. As an educator, I learned fairly early in my career that many families were more receptive to staff visits at home than if they parents needed to make that trip to school. For a variety of reasons, there are some families that don’t come to school.
Finally, Igoa recognizes that many students come to this country with some strengths already developed. I was most struck by this statement:
These students have three things in their favor: the [sic] fact that many of the schools in their native countries taught them the art of memorization; the fact that many believe that if they put in enough time and effort they will succeed; and the fact that they arrive with curious minds.
It would be fitting to close this journal reflection by commenting on the remarkable career of Dr. Igoa. An immigrant child from the Phillipines herself, she began her career as a teacher of immigrant children. After completing her PhD in Multicultural Education from the University of San Fransisco, she returned to the classroom to teach in a sheltered SLL program. Her unique perspective as a former immigrant child and PhD student allowed her to create the close ties with the students who were profiled in this book, and to follow them through high school and into adulthood. To borrow a line from Yogi Berra, she’s half educator, half professor, and half cultural anthropologist.
February 22nd, 2007 at 7:26 pm
Lovely post as always. I had to read Igoa for my credential program, and it is a beautiful book. It is “behind the times” in technology, but think what you could do with the “filmstrip” concept with some technology.
What you might want to think about too is that you are teaching in an environment where almost all the ELLs have the same home language. Igoa’s classroom, and most of the classes in urban areas have a huge mix of home languages (most districts in California have at least 100 or more home languages). In case you ever move, or your community changes even more, keep in mind that the considerations and issues may change in a mixed 2nd language environment.
Good luck!
February 26th, 2007 at 7:04 pm
[...] Educating the immigant child on Rick Schreiber’s blog. For those who didn’t have to read Igoa’s book on the Inner Life of the Immigrant Child, I highly recommend it, and Rick’s reflections are good too. [...]
March 30th, 2007 at 12:03 am
I enjoyed reading your reflections about my book, the Inner World of the Immigrant Child.
I thought perhaps I would comment on the issue of what the writer says is “technological outdated”. I am not advocating that the reader use filmstrips but that the reader see that the filmstrips were at the time of wriing the book an instrument to gather information and to allow the child a way to break the silence. It worked.
The filmstrips take too long to create and were used only in the “pull out program”,where I could work with one child at a time, but were not used in part 2 of the book when I had to work with an entire classroom of immigrant children.
The idea of the filmstrip was also a way to help the “silent” child break the silence. There is nothing in modern technology today that is comparable to the filmstrip for data collection and for the introverted child who does not want to be seen but wants to express himself or herself.
To say that the filmstrip is “technologically outdated” is for me to ask the question, “What technology of today can be used in the place of filmstirps?”
I would like to know. Cristina Igoa, Ed.D.
March 30th, 2007 at 8:44 am
First of all, thank you for replying, Cristina. You gave some great perspective to that part of your book. The filmstrip issue was one that we actually discussed in class. Of course, the first thing we wanted to do was apply new technology to a great idea that was a few years old. I believe my comment in class at the time was that your filmstrip idea has the same therapeutic effect as art therapy. Coming from a counseling perspective, this is a powerful tool to see what’s going on inside a student who is either reluctant to talk, or is not old enough to have the language skills to do so. As big of a tech geek as I am sometimes, a blank sheet of paper and single pencil is the best tool I have.
As for what technology could be used to replace a filmstrip, I think the first answer would be a digital writing slate of some sort, with a very user friendly software interface to go with it. That would be the closest thing that I can think of to technology that mirrors what your filmstrip concept does. My school is pretty wired, but we don’t have anything that closely resembles that idea.
Again, thank you for commenting on this site. You’ve richly contributed to the knowledge in our class by doing so. Do you have a blog? With your ideas, it would be a great resource for the educational community.
March 30th, 2007 at 9:26 pm
If you come up with new technology for the filmstrip idea, I would be interested in knowing about it. But first you will have to understand what all is covered by the original filmstrip tool. The therapeutic effect of art therapy is powerful.
I did have an art table for the children to express themselves when they were stressful and that was therapeutic.
The filmstrip concept is more complex. Let me tell you what all is involved and see if today you can find new technology.
1.The filmstrip stories were exactly as you see them in the book, the children hide themselves behind images of wolves, tigers, lonely bears etc.
2. The children tell their stories on tape.This is done after they have learned to read in English. They have built up vocabulary, they write, they learn to spell, and grammar is included.
3. Their voices are heard, but they are not seen.
4. The children select their own music and ask peers to do the sound effects. They learn collaboration
4.When the strip stories are done and they are satisfied with their artwork, they get the Dukane projector ready for viewing. This projector looks like a television. Filmstrip is inside, the tape cut with music and story in place and the drama of their lives unfolds.
Besides the therapeutic value of this experience (psychological), they express themselves artistically, (here is your art therapy) The added dimensions of this experience is voice sound which reveal their joys sadness, loneliness all the human emotions hidden. The music is expressive of their emotions, peers making sound effects takes away their loneliness, they bond.
For immigrant children who feel disempowered, for those who are fascinated by cartoons, feeling that they know how to “make a cartoon” is very empowering. Drama is included. therefore you have here not only art therapy, academic therapy ( their written stories).Peer bonding and more. You name it. All in a nutshell.
If you can find new technology to do all this, do let me know… looks like a TV, shows their “cartoons”, helps them bond with peers, while at the same time produces the art therapy results and more.
From an international perspective and having lived in many countires, we can learn from them: if it works, leave it alone, change is not necessarily better. I enjoyed the Dukane projector. They’ve rendered it obsolete. another one of the throw away concept of this culture.
But now that the filmstrips are no longer in use, it is a great loss. Old is good, especially when no new tec can replace it. Part 2 of the book shows how I have incoporated all the fimstrip tec ideas in one classroom. But have not yet found a replacement for the Dukane projector.
I do not have a blog. I just happened to open this one and got interested in your work, Rick. I have enjoyed this exchange.Keep up the good work.
Cristina Igoa
April 2nd, 2007 at 11:55 am
Hi Ms. Igoa, that was me talking about the “techonology” earlier. I put it in quotes, partly in an attempt to soften the language (perhaps not successfully). I do not currently have ANY students in the silent period, but I am using other similar methods with newer technologies. First, you have the students use either online/computer based paint and even comic book programs. Most are pretty intuitive and don’t require any knowledge of English. Even if you don’t use the online/computer based drawing programs and have the students use crayons and pencil, you can scan and upload them into slideware programs. Some of these programs will let you add narration.
Here: http://nicholasfifth.edublogs.org/eld/ is what I’ve been able to do with students still using paper and pencil. Since there are very few slide projectors around, this is what I can do with that lesson now (and frankly you inspired me to do this when I saw Rick’s post about your book). I’ve also been doing a lot with podcasting with ELs as you can see from the page. There are a pleathora of slide packages on the internet, this is just a sampling of them: http://mizmercer.edublogs.org/2007/03/31/slide-show-sites
With silent students, I could see pairing them with someone who speaks their home langugage, having them do a story board, scanning the pics, and having their “partner” put the the story together in powerpoint. You can also add narration to PowerPoints. Since my students are being taught PowerPoint this would be feasible in my class.
April 2nd, 2007 at 2:37 pm
I’ve linked this to a discussion that was on David Warlick’s site on paper and other forms of analog communication/writing vs. computer. Here is the first part of the conversation.
April 23rd, 2007 at 11:25 am
Edited by admin:
Thanks for your note, Richard; I will pass along your information to Ms. Igoa. I don’t think it was your intention to advertise on here, but I try to avoid links to commercial sites/enterprises that I’m not purposefully writing about. I do appreciate you coming by, though, and please feel free to leave comments in the future.
June 7th, 2007 at 9:43 am
I have recommended Dr. Igoa’s book to several school districts. Regarding the filmstrips, I wondered if there is a website that describes the technique of creating these filmstrips. I plan to look at the links of the other techniques mentioned above.
Janice Manto, ESL teacher
April 16th, 2008 at 5:04 am
I am considering beginning a master’s degree program. My interest is in developing an expertise in teaching ESL to new comers and more specifically understanding the immigrant child as described by Dr. Igoa. I wondered what master’s program would be appropriate.