Pixel International Conferences

Already since the mid-20th century, the industrial societies of the European North have witnessed the phenomenon of movement and relocation of people, which is due either to refugee flows, or to the forced or voluntary migration of people seeking better professional prospects. Over the last three decades, this phenomenon has spread to countries in the European South. Greece is a case in point as it is a gateway to the countries of the European Union, receiving considerable numbers of refugees and/or migrants and exporting migrants to the European North. As a result, the implementation of policies for the educational reception and integration of children with a refugee and/or migrant background is a major challenge for the Greek state [1]. The present paper focuses on the language education of children with a refugee and/or migrant background in Greece approaching bilingualism as an important asset in today’s multilingual society [2]. The emergence of bilingualism or multilingualism raises the question about language maintenance or language shift of refugee and/or migrant populations as to which of the two developments is the appropriate strategy in terms of the educational and social integration of these populations. Without overlooking the influence of a family's practices on the issue of language education [3,4], school policy has a significant impact on the way students are linguistically educated in a way that leads to the acquisition of the language competence that a citizen of a modern democratic society needs to be able to participate with relative self-reliance and adequacy in communication. After a brief overview of the policies implemented in Greece in the last decades regarding the education of children with a refugee and/or migrant background, some thoughts are presented approaching the language education of these children in Greek schools as an educational challenge of great importance.

References

[1] Stergiou, L. & Simopoulos, G. (2019). After the Container. An Intercultural Look at Refugee Education. Athens: Gutenberg [in Greek].
[2] Tsokalidou, R. (2005). Raising Bilingual Awareness in Greek Primary Schools. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 8(1).
[3] Andritsou, M. & Chatzidimou, K. (2020). Family Language Policy: Interdisciplinary Components of an Emerging Research Field in regard to Childhood Bilingualism. 10th International Conference “The Future of Education”, Virtual Edition (pp. 551-556). Bologna: Filodiritto. 
[4] Konstantinidou, E., Griva, E., Stamou, A.G. (2014). Immigrant parents' views on their children's linguistic, cognitive, and social development. Proceedings of the International Conference "Education across borders" (pp. 311-321). Florina: University of Western Macedonia.