Southern Ontario Cooperative of ESL Ministries
By Tom More The winter solstice, December 21, marks the darkest day of the year. For an ancient people, the sun giving way earlier each day, relenting more and more to the darkness, must have carried with it the question of whether the light would ever return at all. World plunged into darkness. Christmas, then, […]
By Carey Jo Johnston The need for ESL ministries is growing in Canada as the number of newcomers increases each year. More Christians and Churches are realizing that they have an amazing opportunity to share the love of Jesus with newcomers through ESL ministry. Sometimes trying to start and keep an ESL ministry going seems […]
By Mary-Jane Davison Fight4Freedom (F4F) is a Christian ministry that outreaches to and journeys with individuals impacted by the sex industry and trafficking. F4F outreach teams visit locations known to have sex industry activities and seek to build relationships with the individuals at those locations. When they express interest to receive support and/or would like […]
Joyce always goes to class on time. She is the only one who is there on the snowy evenings in winter. She is shy and never speaks much during the class. Sometimes she writes down new words and looks them up in the dictionary at home. She likes grammar exercises, but she does not like […]
By Linda Reed What a summer! Heavy Rain, Soaring Heat, Hours of Olympics, and . . . a changed Heart. My heart was deeply moved through visiting a large house for incoming refugees, Adam House, in Toronto. How can it be people arrive at Pearson with nowhere to go? Housing and work are now real […]
In the Fall of 2022, some of you participated in a survey for volunteers working in church-based ESL programs. A summary of the result was published in The ESL Link Volume 14.1 in February 2023. The author of the survey, Gordon Moulden, has written an article based on this survey with additional information. The article […]
By Allan Pole We want to help new Canadians communicate in English so that they can thrive in a community. We do this by establishing common ground, where our lives intersect, and we recognize we are alike in more ways than might first appear. The Latin word “communis” and the Old French word form “comun” […]
By Tom McCormick I have been noticing a change in the use of English, even by native speakers. Have you? Sometimes the changing forms come up in ESL sessions. What to do? What do you do? One school of thought teaches the ‘correct’ forms, then also informs the students of the ‘changing’ forms—sometimes kind of […]
By Elmer Warkentin I could hardly believe my eyes as I watched the leather whip bite into the flesh on the bare chest of the young boy seated on the stool, leaving an ugly welt. On my Sunday morning walk outside of the African school campus where we lived and taught, I had stumbled on […]
Christian Content General Easter Content Beginners’ level Conversation questions Readings North American cultural stories to do with Easter (good as warm-ups or lead-ins to Easter story) Miscellaneous Other Good Friday handouts Easter card