By Marion Chang and Stephen Cheng
At the SOCEM Gathering in October 2010, Stephen Cheng talked about life stresses among immigrants. Here let’s consider two questions at bit more: First, what roles should teachers take when our students need mental health support? Second, what resources are available to us when our students need expertise that we cannot offer?
The ESL Teacher’s Roles in Student Mental Health
New immigrants often have trouble accessing the mental health care available. They may define their problems in a way unrelated to our cultural concepts of mental health. They may not appreciate their double burden of major life changes coupled with major life losses, and they may be unwilling to admit the stresses they are under. Even when the problem is out in the open, newcomers may not know the system or how to connect to the right people within the system. Here are 4 ways you might help.
- Promoter of health literacy. As well as learning health literacy ourselves, we need to teach our students how to get information, communicate with health professionals, and make good decisions based on that information. Newcomers should understand that it is their right to seek help. Students need to acknowledge that immigration is very stressful. Class discussion topics such as ‘culture shock’, ‘losses and gains in our new life’, ‘how living in Canada changes family life’ or ‘signs of stress’, will help awareness. We need to show that it is not a shame or weakness to talk about stress, for example, by admitting our own stress battles.
- Cultural broker. We become ‘cultural brokers’ when we teach how the health system works. This would include information such as when to see a family doctor and when to go to a hospital emergency room, what a psychiatrist does, what a psychologist does and how to get access to them. Most immigrants think that they lack the language to function well in the health care system. In the classroom we can model conversations with doctors to show what is expected and provide necessary vocabulary, then have students do role-plays. Making a list of appropriate questions ahead of time before a doctor’s visit can increase the effectiveness of that visit.
- Cultural interpreter. Mental health is defined differently in different cultures. In Canada, we tend to separate symptoms into cognitive, emotional and physical. However, complaints of headaches and stomach troubles are common indicators that Asian immigrants are having stress issues. We should also be aware of how shame plays out in different cultures. Illnesses of the mind carry individual stigma in Canada; they may carry shame for an entire family or group in other cultural contexts.
- Mental health advocate. Advocating could mean making phone calls on students’ behalf to find the right kind of help. It could also mean listening carefully to what our students are telling us, and then making sure this message is getting across to medical professionals. It may even be necessary to accompany a newcomer on appointments, especially when it is for the first time.
ESL teachers can make a difference by taking on these roles. However, they are unlikely to be filled by one individual. Discuss mental health literacy teaching approaches with other ESL teachers. Consider forming a caring community for prayer, visits, and information gathering.
Click on the link below to access more resources: