House calls help Syrians learn English

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This article was published 21/01/2017 (3361 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Amouna Alhassan arrived in Canada last February with her husband, five kids and no English. She also couldn’t read or write in her first language, Arabic.

Now the Syrian refugee says she speaks enough English to safely get around Winnipeg by herself on the bus, go grocery shopping and is confident their life in Canada will be a success.

That’s thanks in part to a unique set-up she and a small group of Syrian moms in the North End have with a volunteer who comes to them twice a week for conversational English classes.

“I try to make the topic very meaningful and personal so it’s relevant to them and the lives of their children,” instructor Val Schellenberg said in an interview before one of the classes, where two three-year-olds are colouring and chattering in Arabic away from the adults who are focused on English.

They’re at Rania Ahmad’s home on Dufferin Avenue. Photos clipped from the Free Press are spread out on the coffee table. Schellenberg gets a discussion going on a topic that’s always timely in Manitoba — the weather.

On this Tuesday — the first day of above-normal temperatures in weeks, the photos remind them of the recent blizzard and the hurdles they now have to climb.

“I don’t like snowbanks,” said Rabah Alfreij, as her three-year-old son Mohammad Nour climbs on her lap to look at the pictures.

“Summer is good,” said hostess Rania’s husband, Fadel Ahmad. The women’s husbands take part in the class and say they’re keen to have enough English under their belts to get to work and set down roots. “I want to buy (a) house,” said Amouna’s husband Kamal Alhassan. He already has his driver’s licence — and his first speeding ticket. “In a school zone,” he said sheepishly.

“I want good English and (to be a) driver,” said his wife, Amouna, who is expecting their sixth child this spring. The women and their spouses talked about what they’re learning in the formal English as an Additional Language (EAL) classes they attend at different locations downtown. Rabah Alfreij said she was preparing for a test on Thursday about introductions and invitations.

Amouna, who hasn’t stopped smiling since she arrived at the conversational English class, said she enjoys this informal setting more because it’s more fun.

“We interpret together and help each other,” she said through an interpreter. “At the beginning it was hard for me,” she said. “Now it’s fine.” Her husband, Kamal, who is one of the most conversant of the parents, says he’s enjoying the opportunity to learn.

“I enjoy language. I like to learn English.”

The Alhassans and the other parents in the close-knit group have all gone through enormous upheaval and stress, yet all of them want to be there learning, Schellenberg said.

“They’re very eager to learn and they’re very thankful to Canada,” she said. “At Thanksgiving, we did a thing about what are you thankful for,” she said. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Canada were common responses, as well as education, Schellenberg said. “They’re very appreciative of what teachers do here,” said the retired EAL expert, who drives twice a week to the North End from her home in St. Vital to help them.

In June, she retired as the Hanover School Division’s curriculum support teacher for EAL. She was looking for volunteer opportunities and heard about the Syrian refugee moms in the North End needing help with their conversational English from the Manitoba Association of Newcomer Supporting Organizations. In August, she jumped in to help.

“At that time, their English skills were very limited,” Schellenberg said. “They just don’t have opportunities to talk with English speakers — particularly the moms,” who are at home with little kids. “Their levels of literacy varied — some had never learned to read or write in their first language, Arabic. “Two of the participants had never written their name in Arabic and were very proud they could write their name in English.”

The families arrived as government assisted refugees during a cold snap last winter. Unlike privately sponsored refugees, they had no family, friends or connections here to look out for them. They first met in temporary housing downtown provided by Welcome Place. The four families moved into a housing complex on Dufferin Avenue in the North End.

Schellenberg is enjoying her time there with them, hearing their conversation skills improve and getting to know them.

“These are lovely, lovely families — each and every one of them,” she said. “They’re fully embracing and thankful for everything. They have high hopes. They have big ambitions for themselves and their children.”

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca