Refugees

nanna8

Well do you do anything about the situation other than virtue signalling ? Words are cheap.

Absolutely. Hands up: who intends giving up a spare room in their home for an immigrant? If not, what do you intend to do instead?

Yes, Mollygo, I think it's important that it should be expected (not compulsory - there might be reasons for traumatised people to want to avoid lessons for a while) that all immigrant families should learn English. In some cultures it might be thought that women are not going to be going out of the house enough for it to be necessary, but as we know, that shouldn't be the case if people are living here and taking part in society. I have a friend who has been involved with going into a Syrian family's home and teaching the whole family English. The mother is now confident enough to go out and meet other people, with my friend's support, and will no doubt be able to find work before long, as her husband has already done.

Children, particularly little ones, are like sponges and will soak up language very quickly. One of my DGC was one of only 5 native English speakers in P1, but the others caught up very quickly, and now they are in P5 and all speaking English perfectly well. Some of them are teaching their parents too.

The Taliban have stopped afghans from leaving the country???

Wheniwasyourage that’s a good point about getting them to learn English including the women.
When I was working in Liverpool I found the children learned quite quickly and the men learned out of necessity so they could work. I helped at a group for Muslim immigrant families mainly working with young mothers, because even after a few years in the UK, they still mostly talked to each other in their native language at home and didn’t work do had no need or incentive to learn English. Once offered the opportunity, most were keen to learn, though some of the older women didn’t see any need. When I think, those ‘older women would be the age I am now.

Brilliant piece of writing. Definitely Bottom to Top for me. 3nanny6, I think France and Germany are getting involved with rescuing refugees too.

Well do you do anything about the situation other than virtue signalling ? Words are cheap.

Thank you JaneJudge! Another new interesting road to explore x

100% bottom to top.
Though where I live on the south coast, there's an awful lot of silent
( and not-so-silent ) top to bottomers.

AlanaV your post shocked me. I’ll just pick one bit out “ In other countries (such as France) schools insist that children wishing to join the education system from other countries must be taught the language before they can join the school. This often involves (for English speakers) private lessons paid for by the parents. Quite right too ! ”. What should pay with ? Fleeing a war torn country with the clothes they stand up in ?
Don’t believe what you’re saying about French schools either.

Plus yes it’s more work forteachers, (so our government should prioritise increasing staffing levels in schools rather than coming up with nonsensical initiatives like teaching Latin.). BUT young children learn a new language incredibly fast so if they sit in a classroom safe and warm and are bewildered for a while that’s got to be better than staying where they were.

Bottom to top.

4allweknow, I think the fence you're referring to is actually on the border between Greece (not Germany) and Turkey.

I think it would be a good idea for there to be a bit more effort put into trying to spread refugees (from wherever) around the country a bit more - we have room in parts of Scotland, and are in need of young people to balance the population a bit better. Also, I think that there should be more emphasis on getting them to learn English, including the women, of course, and how to live in Britain rather than just dumping them and letting them get on with it. It used to be the case that immigrants to the USA had English classes arranged for them. Has anyone read The Education of Hyman Kaplan by Leonard Q Ross?

My thoughts exactly ALANaV.

Oh ! I see jane has done a better answer

Cambia

Whitewavemark2 where did you find that? I would like a copy to stick on my wall and to give to my mum who is constantly complaining about migrants!!

On twitter but try Googling the authors name

Where did you read that 4allweknow? I have never heard such a thing. However, one reason Turkey has so many refugees is because the EU pays them a very large sum of money to keep them there.

Interesting what you say Goldencity about the Africans at Caen. The last time we used that crossing there were really only a few of them about at the port. We stopped using the Calais crossings due to the number of migrants on the motorways.
We no longer use the main car parks in Ouistreham by the port so we now mainly go to eat at Le Phare which has parking outside or we drive round to the hotel with a restaurant and a car park behind it.

AlanaV we live in Sw France and there is no necessity for the children of Brits to speak French before going to school - are you saying that other nationalities need to have the little ones speaking French before they are allowed to go to school?

I believe there is no border between Germany and Turkey and if you look online you will see worldwide that Turkey tops the list of number of refugees hosted, followed by Colombia, Pakistan, Uganda and then Germany . This is from the UNCHR( united nations commission on human rights ).
I see tables in the Times or the Sunday Times regularly showing a list of countries hosting refugees and showing what percentage. The UK is well down !

this is him Cambia he is all over the place

Whitewavemark2 where did you find that? I would like a copy to stick on my wall and to give to my mum who is constantly complaining about migrants!!

Very moving. As a refugee from Cyprus in 1974 my family & I were lucky enough to have friends & family who opened their homes to us, but I will always remember the fear I felt at being caught up in a warzone and the relief when the British troops organised safe convoys, refugee camps & flights back to England.

Brian is very clever.

I am always a at 'we av to help are own' argument when the increases to adult social care on our council tax is moaned about to high heaven.

Gibraltar?? 10 minutes from me - so small there is hardly enough space for their own citizens--families on housing list been waiting for up to 10 years!! There would be an outcry if Afghan families were housed first!

Bottom to top. How does Germany get away with building a huge fence at the Turkish border to stop Afghans travelling cross country and entering Germany. Think of the outcry if UK turned all the boat people back to France. With the terrible situation in Afghanistan in regard to females why are we still seeing so many males in Kabul trying to be evacuated.

Bottom to top-where I live we’ve already dealt with refugees and are still dealing with them. It’s a very clever and telling piece of writing. It would serve as a good reminder to everyone. My only criticism? It’s easier to write that than to be involved in addressing the needs of refugees wherever they’re from.

Sorry, can’t read either of these - enlarging them just makes them blurred.