Understanding social inclusion: stories of disruption through school policies/practices in refugee families' life making in Canada

Composing lives that have a sense of coherence is part of the identity making of refugee families and shapes their attempts for social inclusion. Their struggles for narrative coherence are shaped by the bumping places and tensions that they experience as their lives bump against dominant narratives that structure the policies and practices of many institutions including schools. Using narrative inquiry, we inquired into the experiences of three Syrian refugee families as they bumped against institutional policies and practices. Drawing on two years spent alongside children and their parents we composed field and research texts that showed the importance to understand social inclusion in school settings through the experiences of individual children and families. It is important to focus on experience to redefine the significance of narrative coherence in relation to social inclusion and to create spaces for telling stories that can help transform school policies and practices.