Thailand
 Teachers from Minnesota and Thailand gather to learn from one another.
Mission co-workers Scott and Khanita Satterfield serve in Chiang Mai, with the Church of Christ in Thailand (CCT). Their work with the CCT includes writing textbooks, developing curricula in English as a foreign language, organizing professional training seminars for English teachers, and visiting the twenty-four mission schools of the CCT, where they evaluate teaching and curricula and conduct training for English teachers.
Scott writes about one session of a special workshop he arranged for Thai teachers of English in CCT church schools through the Minnesota-Thai Teacher Exchange.
“We gathered all the teachers from both countries for a special question-and-answer session on students with special learning needs. For years, nothing has been done in Thailand to help teachers recognize learning disabilities in their students and provide strategies and services to help them. Dyslexia, sensory disabilities, attention deficit disorder, and other disabilities have been discussed at the policy level, but not brought into the classroom where a younger generation of teachers now understands these students are not just problems to be passed over each year.
“Training teachers, I am learning, is much more than providing them with the tools to teach English. It is preparing them for their students and finding ways to help them make a difference in the lives of the young people they spend all day with. Coming from the United States, where we tend to take education for granted, to work in Thailand — where education is valued by some, sometimes misunderstood, and too frequently seen as an irrelevant luxury by others — I have come to understand the amount of love that goes into teaching. Seeing the expressions on the faces of the teachers as they shared the stories of children marginalized for their disability, children who could be helped, was seeing the love of Jesus Christ expressed.”
Partners/Ministries
Church of Christ in Thailand (CCT): Rev. Sayam Muangsak, general secretary, Rev. Virat Koydul, moderator
Bangkok Institute of Theology: Rev. Rung Ruengsan-ajin, president
Payap University: Rev. Dr. Pradit Takerngrangsarit, president
McCormick Hospital: Mr. Teerapong Chimawong, executive director
McKean Rehabilitation Center: Dr. Anusorn Kunanusorn, director
Presbytery Partnerships
Presbytery of Huntingdon, Presbytery of San Francisco, Presbytery of San Gabriel, and Presbytery of Scioto Valley with the CCT
PC(USA) General Assembly Staff
Dorothea Gordon, BOP
Lewis Gordon, BOP
Denise Govindarajan, GAMC
God of grace and glory, thank you for the witness of the teachers of the CCT. We ask that you would continue to fuel their creativity and passion to make learning possible for all. Amen.
Ps. 97, 145 Ps. 124, 115
Dan. 1:1–21
1 John 1:1–10; John 17:1–11
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