New Zealand has expanded its refugee resettlement programme. Government policy changes, announced in 2018, meant the refugee quota which has been 750 for about 30 years would increase to 1500 people (Immigration New Zealand, Ministry of Business, Innovation & Employment, New Zealand immigration. Immigration Factsheets: Refugees and Asylum Seekers, 2018). This will present settlement and language support challenges and opportunities. Earlier experience seems to point the way to some successful strategies. Our research, underpinned by Tarone et al. (Literacy and second language oracy. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2009) explored the challenges faced by refugee background adults with emergent print literacy. Between 2017 and 2019, the study explored the language learning experiences of 60 learners aged 18-64. It focused on affordances and constraints to learning, strategies employed in the learning process and implications for classroom pedagogy. We highlight the importance of the partnerships developed over time between the host community and refugee background communities, particularly the welcome offered by Maori, the indigenous people of Aotearoa, initiatives of refugee background communities in one New Zealand city; and support for bilingual tutors to work beside learners in the early stages of their language learning. [For the complete volume, "Refugee Education across the Lifespan: Mapping Experiences of Language Learning and Use. Educational Linguistics. Volume 50," see ED660722.]