We have returned safely and healthy from our three months at STT HKBP, Indonesia, teaching TOEFL English. We arrived in Medan on Friday, 31st March and after clearing immigration and customs were met by Mr Bakara with a taxi. Mr Bakara, an administrator, was assigned as our co-ordinator. Nothing was too difficult for him and […]

We have returned safely and healthy from our three months at STT HKBP, Indonesia, teaching TOEFL English.

We arrived in Medan on Friday, 31^st March and after clearing immigration and customs were met by Mr Bakara with a taxi. Mr Bakara, an administrator, was assigned as our co-ordinator. Nothing was too difficult for him and he used his initiative when required as evidenced by his request for the Department of Post Graduate Studies to change the dates of the June intensive lectures until a week later, thus giving us the opportunity to coach for an additional week.

We reached Siantar early in the afternoon after stopping for lunch on the way. Mr Bakara showed us to our accommodation and introduced Supaman, Ati and Deaconess Lena to us. Ati proved to be an excellent cook and house help.

The room we were allocated for coaching was excellent and was suitably furnished and ventilated. The round table seating configuration was good for mature age students and allowed free discussion rather than a lecture style format.

Our brief was to assist students who are undertaking post graduate courses to successfully undertake the TOEFL examination. These students require a score of 450 before they can successfully present a thesis at STT HKBP to become eligible for a Masters degree. This requires a high degree of competence in the English language and presents a dilemma for the selection committee of the Post Graduate Programme at STT HKBP. There would be many students capable of undertaking a Master’s Degree in their own language but who would not be capable of scoring 450 in TOEFL.

There were fourteen students enrolled for the Post Graduate programme who were eligible to attend the TOEFL coaching lessons. During the first three weeks additional students approached Mr Bakara and were accepted into the course. These were mainly Seminary lecturers who wished to be involved in a doctorial programme mainly in overseas institutions. Some of the eligible students failed to attend any lessons or some dropped out after a short time. The everyday group settled down to a committed nucleus of six or seven who were very regular attendees and showed great promise. The Wednesday group were a small group of four regular attendees with some students who had to travel great distances joining in where possible.

It was explained initially that there were two groups of students undertaking post graduate work at STT HKBP. The first group were pastors with a responsibility to a congregation and others with release time for study. They were further distinguished by where they lived. Many lived in Pematangsiantar or nearby, while another group lived up to five hours bus travel away.

It had been decided that the group who lived locally would attend for a two hour session every morning whilst those who had to travel would attend for two, two hourly sessions every Wednesday. Thus on Wednesdays there was three sessions during the day. During the lessons, students were given practice in listening skills, structure (grammar) and reading comprehension taken from both of the preparation kits at our disposal. CD’s were used to present the listening practice and proved invaluable. Ruth provided vocabulary and idiomatic expression practice each lesson as well as assisting in pronunciation practice.

We worked together as a team especially when revising the listening skills which uses both a male and female voice. Ruth also did a great deal of work with individual students in regard to essay writing.

Our main concern was to equip students with knowledge they could use to pass the exam. We gave hints on how to interpret questions, how to search for key words and to generally familiarise students with the type of questions found in a typical TOEFL examination. During the final few weeks of our course we concentrated on giving the students practice in doing examinations which simulated a TOEFL exam as closely as we could. Through this we hoped to be able to predict which students could successfully attempt an official TOEFL examination.

We were grateful for the weekend at Sopa Toba Hotel on Samosir Island as a happy and relaxing time.

We enjoyed our experience at STT HKBP and pray God will lead and enable the students in our post graduate programme to use their time wisely to build on the skills they have already achieved.

We value their friendship wand wish them a successful completion of their programme and any further studies they may undertake.

If you would like to consider the opportunity to serve as a volunteer in mission, serving in practical ways, teaching English, teaching in the seminaries and institutions of our partner churches, or in local churches, you are invited to phone LCA International Mission on (08) 8267 7317 or email lcaim@lca.org.au. For more information, go to https://www.lcamission.org.au/join-gods-mission/volunteer/

Read more stories about volunteering at https://www.lcamission.org.au/category/join-gods-mission/volunteers/