Category: Lifelong Learning
On September 6, the first-ever SEND Team Leader online training module will begin, and I am thrilled to see the course is full. Seventeen SEND team leaders registered, and I even had to turn a few away because we already have more than I had expected in the class. I plan to offer the online module again early in 2011, after I have had a chance to work through the suggestions for improvement from the first group. I am sorry that I was not able to accommodate everyone who wanted to take the course the first time around.
But if you are interested in taking some other online training modules offered by Grow2Serve, check out their list of upcoming courses. I see that they are offering modules in Ministering in a Muslim context, Coaching for Fruitfulness and Effective Online Facilitation. I took the course on Effective Online Facilitation earlier this… Read the whole post
The SEND summer 2010 Candidate Orientation Program (COP) and Member Orientation Program (MOP) are now history, and after 7 weeks in North America, we are now back in Kiev, Ukraine. While in Michigan at our international office where the training programs were hosted, I enjoyed getting to know two great groups of new SEND missionaries in these 2 pre-field programs. My primary purpose in attending COP and MOP was to better understand what we are teaching to new missionaries, and to look for ways that the two programs might be overlapping or missing some significant areas of necessary training.
Although I had a few recommendations for both programs, my impressions were overwhelmingly positive. The content of the training is significantly different from what I received 25 years ago, and understandably so because the context of the North American churches has also changed, and so has the options available for communication. But I think the quality of the training has also significantly improved since I went through COP in 1985 (no MOP back then). I realized that some of this pre-field training is just too good to be restricted to new appointees. For example, I think many of us missionaries would really benefit by sitting down with someone from the SEND media department and discussing how we can improve our newsletters. In fact, if you struggle to communicate effectively and regularly with your donors and prayer partners, why don’t you make spending some time with the media department as one of your home service objectives? Take along some recent issues of your newsletter and ask them to give you some suggestions for how you can communicate more effectively. I know they will be kind – and helpful.
My daughter, a junior at Kiev Christian Academy, tells me that she is taking a course in “Government” this semester. What kind of a course is that? It has been a long time, but I was pretty sure that I had never taken anything by that name when I was in high school. I discover that it is focused on the government and constitution of the United States of America, and by all reports, despite the valiant efforts of their gifted teacher, is a pretty boring course. Why a Canadian living in Ukraine needs to take a course in US government is beyond me. But it is part of the KCA curriculum, and so Rachel is required to take it. What puzzles me is that Rachel is getting fairly high marks in this course, and seems to be motivated to study hard for tests and do her homework. I am, of course, relieved. I want my daughter to get good grades. But I doubt whether I would be as motivated, if I was in her place.
A book I recently have finished reading Training for Dummies explains why teaching children (pedagogy) differs from teaching or training adults (andragogy). Children or high school students study because someone else (the teacher) tells them they need to learn this material in order to reach the next level of learning. They learn what the expert has determined they need to learn, regardless of whether they, as students, see the content as relevant for their lives today or not. They have no right to question the value of the content, because it is assumed that they have little ability to assess what they might or might not need to know in the future.