Arabic lessons: 'It's respectful, the Irish people learning my language'

"I find it respectful that the Irish students are learning my language."

These are the words of Mohammad. He is 14 years old and moved from Syria to Northern Ireland in 2019.

In school, his Northern Irish friends come up to him and speak to him in Arabic, greeting him with "Marhaba (hello)", "Sabah alkhaer (good morning)," and "How are you (kifak)?"

English-speaking students in Sacred Heart College Omagh, County Tyrone, are learning his native language as part of a five-week online course.

Pauline McAnea, a language teacher, said the main motivation for wanting her students to take part in the course was due to an increase in Syrian students who have attended the school in recent years.

"It is important for us to show that we respect them and their language and culture," she said.

"They have made such an effort to learn our language so it is important that we reach out and make a bit of an effort to learn theirs."

The project is being run by a company based in London that is providing short courses to British schools, teaching more than 1,000 children about Arabic culture and the basics of speaking the language.

Sacred Heart College in Omagh is the only school in Northern Ireland taking part in the project.

Each week the students attend a free online live lesson with two Arabic teachers and also take part in e-learning with interactive games.

"Sometimes in class I would get the Syrian students to go up to the board and write their names in Arabic and the children are fascinated," Ms McAnea said.

"It really opens their mind to see that there is more to the world than just Omagh."

This is not the first time the school has taken part in a project to help students from different countries feel included in the school community.

Earlier this year, Syrian students learned about Irish culture by participating in Gaelic games, including football, hurling and camogie.

Ms McAnea said there were 57 overseas pupils in the school from countries such as Poland, Hungary, Lithuania, Slovakia and Romania.

"We have nine different languages spoken in the school so it's important that our children realise the wealth and richness that those children bring to our school," she said.

Bahaa, 16, moved to Northern Ireland in 2019 from Damascus in Syria.

He attends the Arabic classes to help English-speaking students with the language.

"It feels like society is open to learning new things from different cultures, different perspectives, which is really heart warming," he said.

Helping the other students with the language made him feel special and important, he said.

Rama, 14, moved to Northern Ireland from Lebanon in June 2019.

She loves when other students in her class greet her in her native language.

"It makes me feel really, really good because only my family speaks to me in Arabic.

"They would say 'hi', 'how are you?' and 'thank you'."

Ciara, 13, said she enjoyed learning the language.

"It opens your mind and your perspective to the world," she said.

She is friends with Rama, with whom she speaks in Arabic.

"It's nice being able to chat to her," said Ciara.

"They have come here and learnt English for us so why should we not do the same?"

Dawid, 14, is originally from Poland and said he found learning Arabic easy because he had to learn English when he moved to Northern Ireland.

"When I came here, nobody understood me, my parents didn't know how to speak it so I had to learn by sounds and that's when I started to understand everyone."

He said he would like to be a translator when he is older.

"I would like to translate from Polish to English or from Arabic to another language."