How to teach ... migration

Nearly every family in the UK is descended from migrants. Find out more on the Guardian Teacher Network this week.

Children arriving at St Pancras station in 1951 to start their journey to New Zealand under a child migration scheme. Photograph: Keystone/Getty Images

The history of migration to and from the UK is as old as British history. As Barbara Roche, former Labour immigration minister and leader of the Migration Museum Project, puts it, "We are all migrants. If you want to celebrate Britain you have to celebrate migration."

Even children who see themselves as 100% English, Welsh, Scottish or British are likely to have ancestors who were Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Danes, Flemish, Plantagenets from Anjou, or from Germany in the 17th century or Italians, Armenians and Black Africans in the 19th century. Today around 11.5% of the UK population was born overseas.

On the Guardian Teacher Network, our new resources website, you can find a series of primary lesson ideas to stimulate ideas on migration. The resources were produced by the Migration Museum Project, which is seeking to create Britain's first Migration Museum.

In a series of activities that fit with the citizenship, history and English curriculum, children are encouraged to explore why people migrate and given the tools to make a class migration map and local history project. What would children take and leave if they were migrating to another country?

The teaching ideas include poignant case studies, from the story of a young man who left Scotland in the 1860s for Canada to the moving story of Sado, who was just eight when she fled from Somalia to London in the early 1990s.

You can find the primary resources and also a lesson on migration for 14- to 16-year-olds here  

Children who explore the resources will discover that every family in the UK has their own migration story. The Migration Museum Project is asking schools and families to enter the 100 Images of Migration competition, which they are running in connection with the Guardian. The competition asks people to turn these migration stories into pictures. Entries can be paintings, collages, photographs of objects or people or anything else. Winning pictures will be printed in the Guardian's Weekend Magazine.

The Migration Museum Project website is full of moving stories and images as well more as information about the competition and the proposal to create this new museum.

Source: The Guardian

UK plans to be selective in migration, thousands to barred from settlement

Thousands of migrants will be asked to leave the UK under Government plans to clamp down on those abusing temporary visas to stay permanently. Immigration Minister Damian Green says Britain will be 'more selective about who we allow to stay' as immigration has hit record levels last year. Lot of Indians will be affected by this decision. The proposals, announced in a consultation exercise, will affect Indian skilled workers as well as domestic workers such as cooks and 'ayahs', who travel to Britain with their employers. 

Mr Green has told MPs a clearer distinction was needed between temporary and permanent routes into the UK to ensure migrants do not take advantage of loopholes. The number of people granted settlement in the UK reached an all-time high in the 12 months to last September, up 35 per cent from the previous year to 238,950 - the highest level since records began in 1960.

'We intend to break the automatic link between coming to the UK to work and settling here permanently,' Mr Green said. Skilled workers coming to the UK from outside the EU, predominantly as a means of filling short-term skills shortages, 'should expect to leave the UK after a maximum of five years in the UK', he added.

'In future, only a tightly controlled minority will be permitted to stay permanently, where it is in the interests of the UK to do so.' The Government is also considering bringing in an English language requirement for dependants of migrants who wish to settle in the UK.

'This would oblige those wanting domestic workers to recruit instead from the UK labour market, with the rights and protections that affords,' Mr Green said. The current system, which enables domestic workers to stay for up to six years and then apply for settlement, is 'exceptionally generous, and sits ill with an immigration system focused on meeting identified skill shortages and securing the brightest and best migrants', Mr Green added. Temporary workers could also be restricted to 12-month stays 'to reinforce the temporary nature of the route'.

They could also been banned from bringing their dependants, or have their dependants' ability to work restricted. Dr Adam Marshall, director of policy and external affairs at the British Chambers of Commerce, said: 'Britain's migration system must protect our economy as well as our borders. 'Turfing out valuable migrant workers who are turned down for settlement would be incredibly disruptive to companies of all sizes, and to the UK's economic recovery. 'These proposals could also deter some skilled workers from coming to the UK in the first place.'

Sir Andrew Green, chairman of campaign group MigrationWatch UK, said the proposals were 'excellent news'. 'There will now be a real incentive for employers to train British workers rather than continue to take skilled foreign workers 'off the shelf' so as to avoid training costs,' he said.

Shadow home office minister Shabana Mahmood said Labour backed reform of the settlement regime.

But she warned that changes would only be effective 'if they are backed up by strong and consistent enforcement of the rules' and highlighted recent critical reports of the UK Border Agency. 'On top of this, the Government has imposed a 20% cut on the UKBA budget, which will mean the loss of over 5,000 jobs,' she said.

'The Government needs to be straight with the public. 'Its key pledge on immigration - to reduce net migration to the tens of thousands by 2015 - is in disarray, and they have once again failed to explain to the public how this will be achieved. 'The Government talks tough on immigration, but it is clear that it is failing to deliver.'

Rajni Bhatla, Director of Kampus Landing at the leading overseas education consulting organization says, “This decision of the UK government will make UK as a destination less attractive to Indian students.” 

Polish Migrants Fueling the Highest Net Migration the UK Has Seen in Five Years

Reports have just recently started to show that the number of people arriving in the UK, compared to the number of people leaving the UK, has jumped by close to 100,000. This is a stat that is known as net migration.

Right now Brits are currently dealing with the highest level of net migration in close to five years. So far reports have suggested that this big increase in net migration is mostly being fueled by the sharp fall in the number of people who are moving away from the UK. However, the huge increase in Polish migrants coming to live and work in the UK has also caused a number of problems as well.

Due to this big increase, migration experts are expecting ministers to take even more “drastic” measures in order to reach their target. Theresa May, who is the home secretary, is hoping that the decision by Germany and other European Union countries to open their borders to Polish and other workers may help take some of the pressure off the UK.

These official figures do go on to show that the Polish community in Britain is now the largest of any other foreign nationality living in the UK. The reports show that the Polish community is now about 545,000. This is a number that even passes that of Indian and Irish people living in the UK.

Of course, if people look at birth rates in the UK, the Indian community still has the lead. As more and more Indians get British citizenship, they continue to start families and grow their community. Some Brits fear that this could be a problem.