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Role of the teacherThe role of the teacher in any classroom situation is to facilitate learning. The teacher needs to do this by adopting many different personas during the lesson. They need to be constantly organised, supportive and have empathy toward the students. Along with these qualities the teacher much also change the way they behave to suit different situations in the classroom. During the study period of the lesson the teacher is an instructor, someone who imparts information. When the student are participating in speaking group activities the teacher is a facilitator who help out if there is problem but otherwise remains neutral. Throughout each lesson the teacher needs to make sure that they do not become the centre of attention. They must make sure they do not talk too much and are constantly bringing the students into the discussion through open ended questions. The teacher should aim to build rapport with their student. If the student think of their teacher as a friend then they are more likely to want to talk with their teacher. The teacher should never be viewed as someone who the student must impress or be afraid of. Teachers need to learn about their student likes and dislike, in some cases they should disagree with the student just to get discussion going. The teacher should also make sure that every student is getting the same amount of attention and is participating equally. The teacher can do this by adapting the layout of the classroom so that talkative students are next to less talkative students. This means that is pair work the shyer student will be encouraged to talk by the more enthusiastic student. The teacher will also need to prevent student from dominating discussion or group work. They can do this by making conscious decisions about who to put with who in group work settings and by constantly bringing other students into the discussion. More dominant student should never be discouraged but they must not be allowed to take over the lesson. Extremely shy students should not be pushed too hard as they will come to dread english lessons for fear of having to speak. If a student is far too afraid to speak the teacher should ask them a few questions when walking around the class as the students are doing work sheets. The teacher needs to adapt their style of teaching to match the personality of each of the students in their class. During each lesson there will be times when the teacher must be the centre of attention. However there are many more times when the teacher must step down from this role to become a neutral party within the classroom. It is very important that the teacher knows which role they should be adopting and why they must do this. Without conscious thought it is very easy for the teacher to become the focus of the lesson. The role of the teacher is always changing throughout the lesson and the teacher may have to adopt different personas to deal with different class. The most important thing for the teacher to remember is that they are there to aid the students learning therefore the role of the teacher must change to best achieve this.
