The proportion of newly arrived students with no or limited experience of formal schooling has significantly increased in Swedish primary schools over the past decade, according to the Swedish National Agency for Education. Despite this, schools largely lack strategies, knowledge, and organizational conditions to provide these students with appropriate education.
– To better meet the needs of these students, it is important to understand how the school views them and what specific needs they are considered to have, says the thesis author, Malin Brännström.
Her results show that teachers perceive newly arrived students with short school backgrounds, as students with extensive and specific needs, needs that the school struggles to meet. At the same time, those with short school backgrounds tend to be marginalized by teachers and disappear within the broader category of newly arrived students who need to learn Swedish, where they are often assessed as "slow" or "weak" in learning Swedish.
Teaching for newly arrived students - the same for everyone
In 2016, the Swedish National Agency for Education issued general advice on how teaching for newly arrived students should be organized in schools. The advice makes no distinction between students with a long school background and students with a short or no school attendance. According to Malin Brännström, this leads to the school marginalizing students' short or non-existent school backgrounds and explaining their school difficulties by attributing them to coming from a different culture or having lower cognitive abilities.
– Sometimes students who do not need special education receive it anyway, or the problem is shifted outside the school, to the parents and the entire culture considered to create the problem, which leaves limited space for the school to help the student, says Malin Brännström.
The amount of previous education is neglected
In an interview, a special education teacher explained that the reading difficulties of a former student with a short school background were due to having a cognitive impairment. This despite similar difficulties in a much younger student who had attended school for the same length of time as the newly arrived student being considered normal.
– The special education teacher expected the student to acquire a certain level of writing and reading skills when reaching a certain age, as if the amount of education didn't matter.
Malin Brännström hopes that her results can be used to shape education policies and school practices to develop strategies and resources that better meet the needs of newly arrived students with limited school backgrounds.
Text: Ragnhild Larsson
