Blog: Welcoming Families From Around the World

Blog: Welcoming Families From Around the World

For this assignment, imagine the following scenario:

You are working in an early childhood setting of your choice—a hospital, a child care center, a social service agency. You receive word that the child of a family who has recently emigrated from a country you know nothing about will join your group soon. You want to prepare yourself to welcome the child and her family. Luckily, you are enrolled in a course about diversity and have learned that in order to support families who have immigrated you need to know more than surface facts about their country of origin.

In order to complete this assignment, first choose a country you know nothing about as this family’s country of origin.


POST        The name of “your” family’s country of origin
                  At least five ways in which you will prepare yourself to be culturally responsive towards this                           family.
                 A brief statement describing in what ways you hope that these preparations will benefit both you                    and the family.

The name of the family's country of origin is Brazil. Brazil is one of our closest neighbours in South America and Brazilian families have been migrating to our country in large numbers. If a Brazilian comes to my child care centre I would have to prepare myself to welcome that child and his family. Firstly, I would seek to learn key words and greetings in Portuguese the language of Brazil. This will enable me to connect to the child and family on their arrival. Secondly, I would meet with the family through an organized home visit. During the home visit I would seek to learn about the family culture, expectations and also about the child. I have included this visit in my preparations because I understand that surface culture would not provide the information that is needed for me to understand the true dynamics of the specific family I need to go deeper. Thirdly, once I understand the culture of the family I would ensure that the resources include images that reflects their culture. Fourthly, I would seek to prepare the teachers and the children to welcome this child by talking about the culture of the people of Brazil.  I would also talk to them about how to treat someone who looks and speaks differently than they do. This will ensure that the stress of transitioning to a new environment is lessened. 
I trust that the these preparations will provide a sense of cultural continuity. I also hope that it would help to establish and foster respectful relationships with the child and his family. Most importantly, that the child transitions smoothly into his new environment.