Pedagogical challenges in integrating refugee students in the Global North: A literature review

Abstract

For several years now, military conflict, climate change, lack of food, and other forces have compelled many people around the globe to leave their countries and live in exile. As shown by exponentially increasing statistics, children are leaving their homes, sometimes their families, and their schools. Once they arrive in a country of resettlement, they face the challenge of new schooling. To understand how best to support these exile communities and those who work with them—students, their parents, teachers, schools—I searched the international literature for the main challenges of schooling refugee students in resettlement countries in the Global North. This literature review identifies the variety of their profiles, the challenges related to pre- and post-migration experiences, as well as all the intertwined issues taking place within the school: language learning, relationships with the teacher and with other students, teacher training, etc. These challenges are numerous and their intertwining only makes them more complex. Understanding them therefore seems to be the basis of any action in support of refugee education.