Ethnic minorities and linguistic integration at primary schools in Germany

​Description

Abstract

The subproject focuses on the linguistic integration processes of newly immigrated children from minority groups of the Middle East and North Africa at primary schools in Hessen. The aim is to clarify the question of how the language(s) of origin develop in parallel to the learning of German, what role the learning of writing plays here and in what context these processes relate to the cultural orientations of the family in Germany (among other things as members of a minority) and the language offers of the school.

Workprogramm

In the project, the linguistic integration processes of children of primary school age, belonging to different minorities of the Middle East and North Africa, are to be viewed in a longitudinal perspective (if possible from the beginning of schooling in Germany for 18 months with three survey points apart each of 6 months). The focus is on the following aspects:

1. The development of the children’s linguistic skills in their native languages and German in the first year of stay;
2. the use of the different languages of the children in different contexts of use (family, school, peer group, association, religious context), including linguistic attitude;
3. the cultural transmission carried out in the families of origin from the parents’ perspective;
4. Relationships between language skills and cultural/religious/ethnic orientations and attitudes in families;
5. The perspective of German-speaking teachers on linguistic heterogeneity and the inclusion of multilingualism of students in their classes.