Raising Global Citizens

‘Where are you from?’, is one question children will be asked frequently here. And how a child learns to answer it, how they learn to hold multiple places and identities at once, will shape not just their sense of self but their capacity to move through the world. This is one of the most unique aspects of raising your child in Abu Dhabi. And we think, when it's handled well, it's one of the greatest gifts a family can give.

The tension parents often feel
It’s common for parents to have concerns about raising their children far from their home country as they feel children will lose something essential like not speaking their native tongue fluently, not being able to understand certain traditions, a sense of not fully belonging anywhere.

Children who grow up in a country different from their parents are called ‘third culture kids’, the term paints a complex picture, however if you stop and look at the picture from a different perspective, you would see the ‘beauty’ in it. Children develop something quite rare, the ability to read a room quickly, to find common ground across differences, to feel at home in more than one context. They are advantages when growing up in a multi-cultural environment.

What a school can do
Schools in Abu Dhabi have a responsibility and an opportunity when it comes to this. Our classrooms are full of students from around the world, each student brining their own culture and histories with them. When this type of diversity is treated as something common, it is wasted. When it is treated as a means to education, something remarkable happens.

Children begin to see difference as interesting rather than it being threatening. They learn that their own background is something worth talking about to others and not something to set aside, they create a cross-cultural fluency that no textbook can teach, through daily interactions with peers who see the world differently.

At NAS Abu Dhabi, our curriculum connects learning to global themes and local context. Our programmes include the Around the Emirates Reading Challenge, which connects students to culture and history of the country they are growing up in, this is just one of many of our programmes that we offer. What parents can do is help their child build a clear sense of their own story. Not a single, fixed answer to the question of where they’re from, but something that holds all the pieces together, the passport country, the country they're growing up in, the places they've lived and the languages they carry.

If you'd like to find out more about life at NAS Abu Dhabi and how we support students from every background, contact us at admissions@nasabudhabi.ae or book a visit to see the school in action.