Missionaries

Diana Boot - Educational Consultant

Vision

Returning to Africa to work with Educational Care is a beautiful bookend to my teaching career that started at a rural Christian high school in Nigeria. In the intervening years, I taught in a Christian school in Ontario, worked with students with special needs and trained teachers as an Education Consultant. I also enjoyed many years of cross cultural learning as I taught English as a Second Language in Ontario and most recently in China. Even my volunteer assignments have provided a rich foundation on which to build for this position: teacher training in China, and in Kenya, mentoring teachers in the United Nations Dadaab Refugee Camp, and working with orphans and vulnerable children. To me this is an affirmation that “nothing is wasted in the economy of God!’

Parents everywhere want quality education with caring teachers for their children. Christian schools and teachers have a role to play in delivering Christ-centered education. Educational Care is uniquely positioned to equip teachers with a Biblical worldview that impacts every facet of their role. I am working with Christian teachers to come to a deeper understanding of what it means to teach and learn as image bearers of Christ.

As a Christian education Specialist, I am working with Christian teachers to help them grow in their understanding and practice of teaching as a reflection of our calling to serve God in all we are and do. I hope to develop intentional thinking and teaching practice that Christian teachers will, in turn, impart to others.

Mission Work

Do you remember your favourite teacher? He or she probably still influences you today in some ways. In East Africa, educators want to improve their teaching skills but they cannot afford the time or training they need to do so. For many teachers, the current system provides little training and depends on rote learning.

The Educational Care program responds to these needs through an adaptable program that consists of six modules, each addressing a particular learning area:

1. The Biblical Worldview

2. How Students Learn

3. Developing Student Gifts

4. Preventative and Corrective Discipline

5. Leadership in a School

6. The Purpose and Value of Your School

Education Care provides a mentored process for Christian educators to better enable their students to develop a Christian character and perspective on life and vocation. Participants engage in extended discussions about how to integrate faith and learning into the classroom, and they are able to better understand their relationships with each other, parents of students, the church, and the local community.

Jaap and Morina Feenstra

Location: South Asia

Agency: Wycliffe Bible Translators

Focus: Jaap travels back and forth in South Asia overseeing Bible Translation departments, or operational units, in various countries to accomplish their goals of serving churches, organizations and language communities, reached and unreached, in order to provide them with the Word of God. Morina works part-time handling personnel care issues of team members that Jaap is working with. The other 90% of her time is involved with Mother Tongue early childhood training with various partners.

Prayer Requests: Creativity in finding appropriate strategies, energy in the many challenges and safety for travel to the various remote places. May the Lord use them to have the Word of God go out to reach heart for the first time or to feed those who are already His.