Anglicare’s Cathryn Thew is training an army of English language teachers who are revolutionising outreach even in Sydney’s most Anglo-Saxon suburbs.
Armed with a willingness to serve and a desire to reach ethnic communities with the Gospel, over 120 volunteer English as a Second Language (ESL) teachers came to St Anne's Anglican Church Ryde last Friday for an ESL training day run by Mrs Thew, Anglicare's ESL Co-ordinator.
"At the very least Christians can befriend others from different communities through ESL classes," Mrs Thew says. "In the end however, it's the love and friendship that people share with one another that will help bring people to Jesus and we can do this through the teaching of English."
According to Gaye Doran, an ESL teacher at St Philip's Caringbah in largely Anglo-Australian Sutherland Shire, training days like these are a great source of encouragement.
"We always wish we could do the job better and to serve others well. That's why days like these are so important," she says.
"We have about 14 to 15 students who come regularly to our classes and our classes are very mixed. We have highly educated people from professional backgrounds to people from refugee camps with very low literacy skills."
According to Gaye, serving as a missionary overseas taught her how much someone can value the small kindnesses of people when they're in a foreign country.
"Teaching English is hard work but also very rewarding. Some people [in our classes] have been warmed by the fact we care for them. They have said they didn't know church could be like this. Some have even started coming to an Alpha course we're running."
Recent Australian Bureau of Statistics data indicates that between 1996 and 2001 net overseas migration to Sydney was about 189,150. In 2001-2 alone the figure for NSW was 51,300.
Cathryn Thew, who organised the event, hopes the training day provided a time to share experiences with other church members and encourage each other in their ministry.
"Teaching English as a second language is a specialised skill. Just because you speak a language doesn't mean you'd be able to teach it effectively," says Cathryn.
"We hope teachers will realise the importance of the work they're doing, be realistic about their expectations of what students can do and be encouraged to keep going and develop their skills."
