Preliminary remarks:
The following suggestions are more time consuming and are primarily suitable for project days. Project days or daily projects rarely take place in HLT, since it meets only 2–3 hours per week. The suggested ideas are however well suited for cooperative ventures between HLT and traditional mainstream education or between different HLT groups, either within the framework of individual project days or as a day within a project week of the school concerned. Another context for the following suggestions are vacation or summer courses, as offered by many HLT sponsors.
2.7a The migration story of my family
Procedure:
- The project is divided into at least two phases (e. g. two half days of a project week). In the first week, questions for the migration story of the family are collected and compiled in a questionnaire. (For sample questions, see below). These questions are first answered by the students individually. Then, they are exchanged within small groups.
- As a homework assignment, the students interview their parents or grandparents and other relatives. The answers are recorded in writing and brought to class.
- In the second phase, the results are documented and analyzed. Small posters can be created for this purpose. They will then be presented, discussed and compared. Important aspects: reasons for migration;
visuals on a map of Europe or world map; effects of the migration on the family (e. g. in terms of economics, cuture and language). The posters can be complemented with pictures, objects, graphics, etc.
- Sample interview questions:
- Questions about one’s own migration background (where were you born? When did you come here? How old were you then? What kinds of contacts did you have with your relatives? How do you maintain these contacts? How do you speak with you parents, siblings? etc.)
- Questions about the migration history of the parents, grandparents, neighbors (Where were they born; where do they live now? Why did they come here? How do the members of your family speak about the country of origin of your parents and grandparents? Which special feasts do you celebrate in your family; who participates, what do they eat? With which groups, associations, institutions do they feel affiliated? What kinds of contacts do they maintain in the country of origin and in the immigration country? In hindsight, how do they assess their decision to emigrate? Which dreams and desires have been fulfilled, which did not?
2.7b Cultural diversity in our district
Procedure:
- The instructor informs the class: by way of interviews and a report from the neighborhood, the cultural diversity and the origins of migration in a broader context that extends beyond the family and ethnic group will be studied and reflected upon.This project continues the suggestion 2.7 in an optimal manner.
- In the class as a whole or in groups, the students compile questions for the interviews with neighbors and other people from the neighborhood. The questions in project 2.7a may serve as a foundation and will be expanded with information about the country of origin, language, timing of the migration.
- The analysis follows the model for project 2.7a.
2.7c Migration concerns us all!
Procedure:
- As an authentic continuation of the interviews from project 2.7b, migrants from different cultural circles (e. g. acquaintances or neighbors from the environment of the students or the instructor ) are invited to tell their migration history to the class in school. Previously, the instructor can discuss with the students important stations and aspects of a migration biography and devise a grid which, for instance, lists the points such as origin, journey, arrival, today’s situation, wishes, etc.
- The students make notes in the grid during the narration. In terms of the country’s situation during the time of the migration, the students could also be assigned a research project about the country or reading a fundamental text about its situation.
- Follow-up with a final discussion of the mentioned points and comparison with their own migration situations and motives.