STONE MOUNTAIN, Ga. --- Digging happily in a sandbox as Old McDonald Had a Farm plays in the background, 4-year-old Alfun Niyonkuru is a world away from the refugee camp in Tanzania that he and his family left in June to start a new life in suburban Atlanta.
The boy, born in a camp where his parents lived after fleeing a civil war in their native Burundi, is one of 20 students in a new pre-kindergarten program aimed specifically at children of refugees. The program was started Aug. 11 by Refugee Family Services, a nonprofit organization in Stone Mountain, and held its ribbon-cutting ceremony Monday.
It is the first of its kind in Georgia and one of only a handful around the country. It aims to teach a traditional pre-K curriculum while addressing the specific needs of refugee children and their families, Refugee Family Services Executive Director Allen Shaklan said.
"We're going to be affecting 20 lives here, kids who otherwise would not have had this opportunity, who will now be starting school better prepared," he said.
He said research has shown that children who learn early on end up doing better in school. That exposure is even more critical for refugee children, he said, because many of them live in households where English isn't spoken and often have parents who can't read in their native language. The program also helps parents with transportation and has multilingual caseworkers who can translate if needed.
"I believe that education is very important, so I wanted my son to be part of an early education program," Jean-Pierre Ciza, Alfun's father, said through a translator in his native language, Kirundi. "I believe that my son will be able to learn the language quicker and get the knowledge he needs to start school by being in this program."
The children in the class have families that come from Burundi, Congo, Liberia, Ethiopia, Burma, Iraq, Honduras, Somalia and Vietnam. Nine of them were born in refugee camps. Collectively, they speak 11 different languages, and seven speak little or no English.
To deal with the language barrier, the teachers and volunteers rely heavily on physical cues -- hugs, facial expressions and pointing -- and also on pictures and songs, head teacher Sharifa Chambers said.
The program receives funding and is licensed by Bright from the Start: Georgia Department of Childcare and Early Learning, with additional money coming from other nonprofit organizations.
Organizers hope to eventually include more children and also provide care later in the day because the current program ends at 2 p.m.
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