“They gave me back my power”: Strengthening older immigrants’ language learning through arts-based activities

Abstract

Through the case of Jacqui, this article describes a community-based project called Seniors Thrive, which was intended to help immigrant seniors learn English, build social connections, and strengthen their leadership in order to support their health and well-being. The programming merged language learning and leadership opportunities through arts-based programming. Multiple classes offered through Seniors Thrive brought together individuals from all walks of life to learn together and from each other. As a result, many learners, including Jacqui, demonstrated heightened confidence in their English speaking abilities and increased their social connections. The arts-based program enabled the voices of older learners to be heard beyond their closed communities. We pose that arts-based activities have the potential to transform language learning in later life, if arts-based programs follow a flexible and community-driven design.

Keywords:

• Adult education
• community-based learning
• seniors
• immigrants
• English as an additional language

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the Carraresi Foundation for funding the Seniors Thrive Program as well as the staff at the UBC Learning Exchange for supporting our work. Much of the evaluation data has been generated through the work of Carolyn Camman and Janina Mobach, and we would like to acknowledge their contribution. Lastly, we thank Dr. Angela Towle and Kathleen Leahy for their feedback on this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 This name is a pseudonym chosen by the participant herself.

2 See Balyasnikova and Gillard (2018) for the discussion regarding combining several data sets within one academic article, issues of positionality and ethics.

3 In accordance with Article 2.5 of the Tri-Council Policy Statement, the evaluation adheres to ethical standards for program evaluation outlined by the Joint Committee on Standards for

Educational Evaluation.

4 The Human Ethics Certificate #H16-0047(UBC Behavioural Research Ethics Board).

5 Although Jacqui refers to the making of a button blanket, that project was from another program at the UBC Learning Exchange and not within the scope of the evaluation or the ethnographic study. Therefore, we do not discuss sewing as an arts-based activity but use the quote and image (used with permission) to illustrate the principle of inclusion that is at play in arts-based activities.

6 Used with permission.

7 The initials replace the names, which were removed from the excerpt to preserve the anonymity of the group members.