Creating a sense of meaning in connection to school attendance of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children

This small-scale action research project explores unaccompanied asylum-seeking children's experiences with the educational system in the period of the procedure of granting asylum. The project is part of a larger research project with the overall aim to investigate asylum seekers experiences in Denmark during their stay in asylum centres and how the stay and waiting time can be empowered by improving everyday life and the sense of meaningfulness. Together with a group of initially 7 unaccompanied asylum-seeking children we have looked closer at the barriers to learning and how to respond to the different circumstances that contribute to lack of motivation and poor school attendance.  
 
Theoretical framework: The main theoretical foundation and framework is in everyday life sociology (Jacobsen & Kristiansen, 2014) (Dreier, 2011) and inspiration from learning theory (Wenger, 2004) and participation in decisions making and community (Hart, 1992; Schwart, 2014). 
 
Methodological design: The project is carried out as an action research project leaning on the tradition of the Danish-German school of critical psychology (Jartoft, 1996; Mørck, 2006). Through practice research and the firstperson perspectives (Holzkamp, 1983) of the unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, we examine the conduct of everyday life emphasizeing the societal, political, social and spatial processes that contributes to the lack of meaningfulness the unaccompanied asylum-seeking children experience towards their scool attendance in Denmark.