The eighteen-year-old Syrian Ghaith A. has been living in Munich since 2016. In the meantime, he has become a regular at the Public Library in Giesing. He had never before been in a library.
Migrants start to prepare for a life in Germany long before joining an integration course. The Goethe-Institut in the countries of origin has a key role to play in these preparations. One example is the “Pre-Integration in the South-East Asian Region” project, which runs until the end of 2017.
The new offering “Virtuelle Entdeckungsreise in die deutsche Arbeitswelt” (Virtual Journey of Discovery in the German Working World) is intended for new immigrants on their start in the complex German vocational world and helps contributing to more participation in society. It was now presented at a conference in Munich.
With this app, you can watch the videos and do excercises on all of the eight topics our “Erste Wege in Deutschland” series. The app is available for both iOS and Android.
The Syrian, Mohammed Bakr, has lived in Hamm since 2015. Since then he has been actively using the library's range of intercultural services – first for language learning, now for his professional training. He has even organised a group for refugees to practice speaking German together.
The Islamic scholar Irma Wahyuni visited Germany for two weeks for a visitors’ journey organised by the Goethe-Institut for Muslim intellectuals from Indonesia. Here, she speaks about refugees, radicalism and individualism.
Faced with war and death in my home country I fled to Germany, no longer a writer but a refugee. For me it′s the chance to start over and find my way in this wonderful country.
How can teachers take advantage of multilingual potential in their classes? And how can trainee teachers best be prepared for linguistic diversity in the classroom? Theorists and practitioners in Germany and Europe are looking into these questions.
How can libraries adapt to the growing diversity of society? Goethe.de spoke with Britta Schmedemann, a specialist in target group work at the Bremen Municipal Library, about strategies of diversity management.
