Interaction of Russian educational institutions with children from migrant families (analysis of expert opinion)

The article aims to show that children from migrant families are, first of all, members of their families; therefore the success of their adaptation to the Russian education system is determined, among other things, by the characteristics of these families and their inherent intra-family relationships. The empirical basis of the study is in-depth semi-structured interviews with representatives of the pre-school and school education sphere (17 interviews). The findings indicate that educational institutions, when interacting with children from migrant families and their parents, inevitably engage with the familial system. Experts identified a range of social and cultural characteristics unique to these families, with a key feature being the hierarchical and patriarchal structure of child-parent, spousal, and intergenerational relationships, which is heavily influenced by factors of age and gender. The study revealed that many educators have already developed a repertoire of strategies aimed at fostering effective interactions with migrant families, using the aforementioned characteristics to facilitate a more conducive educational environment. This underscores the necessity for educational institutions to acknowledge and adapt to the complexities of familial structures when addressing the needs of migrant students.