Promoting Language Development for the Asylum Seeker and Migrant Worker Community

Many parents in Tel Aviv-Jaffa’s asylum seeker community lack the knowledge to support their children's language development (reading, writing, and communication). To address this, Urban95 and Mesila (a municipal initiative supporting asylum seekers and migrant workers) launched a collaborative project aimed at reducing social disparities and providing equal opportunities for toddlers and their caregivers. The project focuses on strengthening the parent-child bond while fostering cognitive and communication skills through playful, everyday interactions.

Launched in 2020, the project adapted to COVID-19 lockdowns by creating activities and content for use at home and in neighborhood settings. We developed tools to encourage language development, bridging cultural gaps and tailoring them to parents and the community’s communication channels:

• Producing children’s books in four languages: Tigrinya, Arabic, English, and Hebrew. The stories were carefully selected by experts to promote language acquisition, teach numbers, and support positive parenting practices. The books were printed in durable hard copies and distributed by social workers to families supported by Mesila, as well as to public-municipal daycare centers for the community’s children, operated by the "Lasova" non-profit organization.
• Developing and distributing play kits for the books: We created complementary play kits for the books designed to encourage parents and caregivers to continue language acquisition activities in a playful and enjoyable way. For example, a kit might include a Snakes and Ladders game featuring illustrations from the book, game pieces, dice, an instruction sheet, a coloring book with characters from the story, a pack of crayons, and the book itself.
• “Story Time” Videos in Multiple Languages: To support language literacy, we produced videos for each book, featuring clear and engaging readings in the relevant language. These videos provided parents with examples of interactive storytelling to promote language development and were also suitable for toddlers to watch directly. Social workers distributed the videos to Mesila-supported families via WhatsApp and shared them on Mesila’s Facebook page.
• Creating instructional videos for parent-child activities at home: In response to the lockdowns and the challenge of reaching families in person, we produced instructional videos for parents in all four languages. The videos focused on two skill areas – color matching and counting. They included step-by-step guidance on creating games with and for children using everyday household materials. These videos were also distributed by social workers to families via WhatsApp.

In addition to developing targeted content and tools, we organized a variety of summer activities specifically for young children and their parents from the city’s undocumented population. These included theatrical story time sessions, a “Sounds of the World” music workshop (as part of the Salta workshop series), and a bubble-blowing activity. All the activities supported language, communication, and motor skill development for young children.

Partnering municipal units:
The Community, Culture, and Sports Administration; Mesila.