Learning without books: Refugee Camp 📍
- Dayan Ejaz
- Oct 24, 2024
- 3 min read
“Children learn more from what you are than what you teach”. This quote by Du Bois adds weight to the concept of child development through social interactions. Be it a classroom, a home, a community center or a refugee camp, the process of learning keeps on going in one way or another. The broader aspect of this quote relates with Vygotsky’s Socio-cultural theory of cognitive development, which states that children learn through social interactions and cultural environment, undergoing scaffolding by more knowledgeable others while being in the zone of proximal development. What? Didn’t make sense? Let’s deconstruct each component of the theory and examine its relevance in context of refugee situation.
Refuge, be it intentional or forced, poses several threats to the well-being of those involved. The primary focus is upon survival, hence the role of education comes at a later stage. This doesn’t mean that learning is hindered by the intensity of refugee situation or the delay in the provision of education, because Vygotsky’s theory steps in. Children regularly interact with caregivers, teachers, and peers and form a sense of belonging and trust with these people, who provide them support, relieve trauma, and reestablish a sense of normalcy. Their behaviors and actions leave a profound impact on the child’s mindset and help them regain stability that is essential for their physiological development. The displacement brings with it new challenges to adapt, therefore a healthy interaction with these trusted individuals, other groups, or overall just the authorities help children develop skills of language, problem solving and cognitive development. Refugees are devoid of cultural connection, therefore encouraging participation in cultural practices within refugee communities helps children maintain a sense of identity and pride in their roots, which is important for their emotional development.
The theory also goes on to include the idea of MKO (more knowledgeable others) and scaffolding. MKOs can be teachers, social workers, or community members that have agency over the refugee situation in host country and are capable to give directions to thrive in it. However, scaffolding provides children with sufficient support to help them achieve task that they can’t independently. The onset of displacement erupt language barriers, unfamiliarity with cultural and social norms, and mental health trauma. Children can be motivated to speak different languages, practice different cultures, and adopt different ways of mitigating trauma and integrating in the society. This comes at the expense of children looking up to these MKOs, who provide initial support and guidance and gradually make them competent enough to be independent in new environment. All of this doesn’t need the MKOs to convey lessons and imprint knowledge upon children, just the observation of daily routine and interaction help children grasp the basic skills. This further relates to another component of the theory i.e. zone of proximal development. The onus is on MKOs to observe the current abilities of the children such as language skills, problem solving, and coping mechanism for trauma. This involves them collaborating and interacting with the children and then coming up with an understanding of what they can do independently. We see a backward trend where MKOs also learn from their interaction with the children like the way children learn from MKOs, revealing an interesting discovery of social interactions working out for adults as well as children development.
Based on our restrictive domain of the refugee situation, Vygotsky’s theory comes into play before the education is provided. It shows how children learn more from the type of experiences, actions and behaviors that they observe in the refugee situations even before any community-based education programs are enacted and hence the quote in the beginning makes sense. It reaffirms the idea of how learning can happen even in the most difficult situations and solely based on the social interactions. It goes beyond the confines of a classroom and serves as a critical approach for addressing the holistic needs of refugee children as they transition toward stability and learning.