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Table of Contents :
Understanding and Supporting Immigrant Youth
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| 1. Adapting to
Canadian Customs 
Adult immigrants to Canada often have 2, sometimes conflicting, needs. They need to adjust
to Canadian society by speaking a new language, finding employment, and accepting
different cultural and societal rules and values. Immigrants also want and need to keep
contact with their homeland by maintaining their first language, styles of dress, and
societal rules and values in their new home.
Children of immigrants often react very differently to exposure to a new culture and
adapt more quickly. They might effortlessly learn a new language and make friends at
school, and along with that want to dress in the same clothing styles as their peers
or have similar freedoms. With this difference in adjusting to a Canadian lifestyle,
tensions between cultures and between parent and child can easily develop.
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| 2. Adjustment to
the Canadian Community
All parents of teenagers often find their child's taste in clothing and music bizarre
or distasteful. To an immigrant parent, this can be even more bewildering, as it is
completely outside their own personal experience and remembered teenage years.
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| 3. Adjustment to
the Canadian School System
The Canadian school system provides children and teens knowledge about not only
academic subjects like Science and Math, but also teaches social skills and provides
a lot of information about fashion and culture.
It is important for teens to have a sense of belonging in their school and among their
peers. Parents should recognize that their child needs to take on qualities of
Canadian culture that may be different from the homeland's culture in order to fit in
and be successful.
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| 4. The Influence
of the Media
In Canada, teens have the money, time, and social permission to create their own
society. This teen society is heavily influenced by the media, of which there is
likely much more of, and of a more liberal type, than media in the family's homeland.
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| 5. Adjustment or
Emotional Problems
Life and growing up is hard for any teen but may be especially difficult for a teen
from an immigrant family. Immigrant parents' may not be able to relate to the teen's
problems because their own experience as a teenager was vastly different. Parents need
to understand the difference between normal 'ups and downs' for a teenager and not normal
'ups and downs' that indicate the teen may need some outside help.
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| 6. Dealing with
Adjustment or Emotional
There are several methods and steps to getting your teenager the help that he or she
will need. One of the first steps is talking with the school. The school will have
experience in helping troubled teens and can lead the way in accessing resources that
can help.
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