Teacher roles in classroom interaction

CLT as a system and philosophy of teaching proposes a new role of teacher in the language classroom. Traditionally teacher is the main authority who guides the class and everything during the lesson is under his/her control. The teacher-dominated classroom is characterized by teacher's overspeaking that leaves less time to student practice and constantly passing judgment on student performance. Communicative approach denies this teacher-domination as learner is proclaimed to be the subject and the centre of the educational process. Learner-centered instruction leads to greater individualization, encouraging students to perform with the target language; increasing personal sense of relevance and achievement. Thus, teacher shares his/her role and responsibility with learners facilitating studying, and plays a variety of roles. Character of teacher-student interaction, activities proposed, special organisation of the environment and, as a result, teacher roles reveal the peculiarities of the classroom.

Different scientists and methodologists, among them Douglas H. Brown, Kelly R., Byrne D., Harmer J. Bowen T., Marks J and many others, stress that there are two conceptually different roles in educational process – teacher-controller (who is compared to a puppet-master standing at the front of the class and controlling everything) and teacher-facilitator (who maintains students‘ freedom) depending on the organization of the classroom either in teacher-dominated or learner-centred framework.

Teacher-controller is in complete charge of the class. They control not only what students do, but also what language they use. This role may be useful on certain stages of the lesson, e.g. for introduction of new material, since the stage of accurate reproduction and drilling techniques needs to be carefully organized.

Teacher-facilitator has a less directive role when he/she steps away from the managerial or directive (controlling) role and allows students, under his/her guidance, to find their own pathways to success. A facilitator capitalizes on motivating students to discover language through using it pragmatically, creating rich environments and activities for linking new information to prior knowledge, providing opportunities for collaborative work and problem solving, and offering students a multiplicity of authentic learning tasks.

Teacher roles depend upon the purpose and nature of a wide range of activities proposed and the situation they are used in. Donn Byrne proposes a model for classroom interaction which shows how teacher roles differ influenced by the tasks and activities in the classroom. When the activity is controlled, focused on accuracy and done with the whole class, teacher performs the role of conductor or director in order to keep the process flowing smoothly and efficiently and make sure that students know what to practice and to check whether they are doing well.

If the activity is learner-oriented, aimed at accuracy and meant for a pair or group work, the teacher functions as organizer (who clearly instruct students what to do and organizes their work) and monitor of activities. Monitoring is important for watching and checking students‘ performance in order to help in case of necessity.

The main reason for practicing whole-class fluency activities, is to get students to interact, to encourage them to participate. Often teacher needs to make suggestions about how students may proceed in an activity when there is a silence or when they are confused about what to do next. In this case the teacher‘s main role is that of stimulator or prompter.

When the activity is learner directed, focused on fluency, and done in pairs or groups, the teacher‘s role is to set them up (manager), and to be ready to help if asked for (consultant).

In the communicative language classroom teacher can also be an equal participant. Teacher‘s participation does not only improve the atmosphere in the class, but also gives the students a perfect chance to practise English with someone who speaks it better than they. The roles of tutorial, adviser or guide are applied when students are involved in self-study or project work and they are appropriate mostly at intermediate and advanced levels.

Teacher is the head manager of the educational process. It is obvious that classroom management skills are important since they help to ensure the success of the teacher and of the activities used at the lesson. Gestures, facial expressions, teacher‘s manner, position in the classroom, eye contact with students are those teacher's management skills which can serve as perfect tools for conveying the meaning of language, reinforcing instructions, cutting down on the amount of verbal explanations. They help teacher get across what he/she wants to say. Teacher‘s verbal skills – classroom language used, praise and criticism in evaluating learner's work – can hardly be overestimated as he/she serves as a model in using the target language and an expert in assessing students‘ work.

There can be distinguished four main teacher's management skills:

physical (gestures, facial expressions, voice, manner, position, eye contact);

verbal (classroom language, evaluating learner's work);

organizational (arranging physical environment, monitoring);

problem-solving (recognizing options, making decisions and actions).

English language teachers may adopt different roles at various stages of the teaching process since different situations demand different solutions and different activities require different approaches. But the common feature of all teacher roles in the language classroom is that they should evolve gradually and develop in harmony with the needs of the class, leading to successful language learning.

Дата добавления: 2017-01-13