Essay On Missionary Teachers

Many missionary English teachers enter the TESOL field not fully aware of what they are getting into. There are three fundamental aspects that missionaries who teach English should understand about their role. First, individuals who teach English represent something bigger than just themselves. Often English teachers are viewed as ambassadors of the West; this is a preconceived notion that includes everything from Hollywood to Christianity (Snow, 2001, p. 27). Many people in non-Western countries believe the West is fully Christian, and therefore anyone who is from the West is to some degree Christian. Christians who wish to represent their faith in a foreign context must address this misconception. Additionally, teaching English generally

This is true of all teachers that they should have a vision and purpose in order to firmly grasp why they believe their profession contributes to the improvement of students and the world (Edge, 2003, p. 708). Because Christian teachers believe their religion impacts someone for eternity, it is evermore important for them to be able to justify why they are teaching as a platform to share their religious beliefs. All teachers bring their own perspectives and worldview to their classroom; different aspects of their lives influence the classroom, and religion is one of the biggest influences upon a teacher’s pedagogy. Therefore the intersection of English teaching and living out one’s faith cause a missionary English teacher to be ever so aware of their identity and purpose. One study of missionary English teachers identified that an individual having a sense of purpose and identity is one of the most telling signs of whether or not that individual will thrive or fail in a cross-cultural setting (Wong, Kristjansson & Dornyei, 2013, p. 27). Furthermore, before one focuses on the specifics of English lesson plans or Christian evangelism tactics, he or she should have an awareness of who they are and why they want to cross cultures and borders to

Although this is not true of all missionary English teachers, these problems are common. First, sometimes missionaries are not become properly qualified to teach English because they are more focused on sharing the Gospel than on teaching English well (Pennycock & Coutand-Marin, 2003, p. 341). However, Christians should seek to do the best they can in whatever field they enter. A second common problem is that missionaries lie and do not disclose their true motivations for teaching in a cross-cultural setting. This becomes an issue when teachers advertise for English classes, but they only use their class time to share the Gospel. In doing this, Christians damage their witness as ambassadors or the Gospel, and Christians should not compromise the Gospel in order to share it (Varghese and Johnston, 2007, p. 10). When teachers are transparent, they can be held accountable to others who ensure the teachers actually follow through and teach what they promised to teach (Edge, 2003, p. 705). A final common problem with missionary teachers occurs when they abuse their position of power by indoctrinating their students. Although few care to admit it, some level of indoctrination is inevitable in any classroom as the teacher has to choose what curriculum to teach and what to omit. However, when a teacher is opposed to a discussion about differing views, he or she excludes out