The percentage of migrant learners has increased significantly in recent years at a school in Lombardy, Italy, mirroring trends across the region. The top foreign communities in Italy in 2009 were Romanians, Albanians, Moroccans, Chinese, and Ukrainians. Integrating foreign students presents challenges like language barriers, cultural differences, racism, and lack of family support. Acquiring competence in Italian is a key priority and objective for integration and school/social success. While everyday communication skills can be learned quickly, achieving proficiency for academic study can take years. A selective plan is needed to first develop basic communication skills before focusing on language skills for learning other subjects. Cultural mediators play an important role in facilitating communication between foreign

2. The percentage of Migrant learners has increased more and more in the last few years at Itis Giorgi. It mirrors the general trend in most of the schools in Lombardia, a very rich industrial area in the Italian territory. Percentage

3. Main foreign communities living in Italy 2004 2009 % Romania 177.812 796.477 347,9 Albania 270.383 441.396 63,2 Marocco 253.362 403.592 59,3 Cina 86.738 170.265 96,2 Ucrania 57.971 153.998 165,6 Filippine 72.372 113.686 57,0 Tunisia 68.630 100.112 45,8 Polonia 40.314 99.389 146,5 India 44.791 91.855 105,0 Moldavia 24.645 89.424 262,8 Macedonia 51.208 89.066 73,9 Ecuador 33.506 80.070 138,9 Perù 43.009 77.629 80,5 Egitto 40.583 74.599 83,8 Sri Lanka 39.231 68.738 75,2 Senegal 46.478 67.510 45,2 P.S. the above mentioned communities were the 75% of the foreign residents in Italy in 2009.

4. Migrants according to the age

5. The impact of the Italian school system on migrant learners becomes a highly topical issue due to the problems coming out from the integration connected with the language aspect and with other aspects as discrepancy between cultures, racism , financial difficulties, no family support etc.

6. One of the priority objectives in the integration of the foreign learners is the acquisition of good competences in the Italian language to guarantee one of the main factors of school success and social acceptance. Priority

8. The language for communicating can be learnt within the space of time swinging from one month to one year , according to the age, the native language, the afterschool usage. On the contrary, a few years can be necessary to learn the language for studying , taking into account we are talking about deep competences. Time

10. The cultural mediator is a prominent figure in the school environment, due to constant increase of foreign learners.

11. The cultural mediator has the objective of facilitating relations between local and foreign citizens, promoting reciprocal knowledge and comprehension between subjects of different cultural backgrounds. The main characterizing elements of cultural mediators are communicative competence, empathy, active listening and good knowledge of both the hosting country and country of origin (culture, laws, traditions, etc.) Cultural Mediator

13. 1. The departure from the native country, the family circle and the western socio-cultural environment; 2. The rejoining to their parents or to one of their parents (emigrated some years before), who being full-time workers are present at home for only a short time, not enough for their children care, just arrived in Italy after years of their parents’ absence. 3. The emotional, social cultural impact and the difficult integration . Foreign students integration difficulties

15. Learning a language is the first obstacle but not the only one. The foreigner is subject to isolation, degradation, relegation. Not all foreign students stand this impact. Some of them isolate themselves, fall into a depression, are unable to express their disease and unease. Yet in the classroom, after a while, they feel safely since they start being in contact with some classmates. The loneliness becomes strong when they go back home. depression