TEACHER ROLE: THE 7 MOST IMPORTANT FUNCTIONS - CULTURE VOCABULARY - 2025

The role of the teacher is to help and guide the students in the learning process. This is one of the basic roles teachers play in the classroom, and there are others.

Today, being a teacher goes beyond planning informational lessons. In fact, teachers become just another parent to students due to the amount of time students spend at the educational institute. This is another of the teachers' roles.

The role of the teacher changes continuously and there are various factors that intervene in it. For example, the age of the students: when the students are younger, the role of the teacher should be much more familiar than when the students are adolescents or adults.

Other roles that teachers play are: mentor, regulator, prompter, organizer, role model, source of information, advisor, tutor and participant.

Main roles of the teacher in the classroom

Within the classroom, a teacher can play different roles. Each of these represent functions of the teacher, which take into account the needs, the age of their students and the demands of the chair that is taught.

1- Mentor

Mentoring is one of the main roles teachers take on. This role involves promoting the desire to learn on the part of students and making them give their best.

2- Father or mother

Teachers spend a lot of time with their students. For this reason, they often become a father or a mother for their students.

This role includes guiding young people beyond the academic plane, listening to their problems and advising them.

3- Regulator

The teacher is the person in charge in the classroom. Therefore, you must regulate what students do, what they say, and how they say it.

This role is assumed by teachers on different occasions, among which the following stand out:

- At the beginning of the classes, when the contents that will be treated in the lesson are exposed.

- Before starting any activity, when its guidelines are exposed.

- When it is necessary to discipline students.

4- Promoter

In this case, the teacher acts as a teleprompter or a pointer, giving key information to students only when deemed necessary.

In general, the teacher uses this role during oral presentations, when a student forgets the right word, loses the train of thought, or cannot continue with the presentation.

In these cases, the teacher suggests to the student a word or idea that allows him to continue with the activity.

5- Organizer

The role of organizer is one of the most important that the teacher must fulfill since it involves planning the lessons to be taught.

The organization will vary according to the chair that is being taught. For example, if it is a scientific subject (such as chemistry or biology) the teacher will organize the lessons in two phases: a theoretical phase (which will take place in the classroom) and a practical phase (which will be carried out in a lab).

The organizer is also in charge of giving precise instructions, so that students can carry out the activities efficiently.

In this sense, part of your tasks as an organizer are mixed with the tasks of the regulator.

6- Model to follow

Teachers don't often think of themselves as role models. Yet they are.

Students spend a lot of time surrounded by teachers, so indirectly they become figures of importance for the student's life.

For this reason, it is the duty of teachers to present faultless behavior, so that students have a good example.

7- Source of information

Another role of the teacher is to be a source of information for students. Although it is true that students have academic texts and other sources, the teacher also provides new data while corroborating the information in the books.

Likewise, it helps to enrich the vocabulary of the students, providing them with key words that serve as support during the communicative activities that are presented in the classroom.

However, the teacher as a source of information should not intervene in the student's research-learning process.

In other words, it is not about providing them with all the information or restricting the spaces for investigation, but rather to act as a guide in this process.

8- Advisor

The role of advisor occurs when the teacher verifies the progress of his students. For this, the teacher creates environments in which he can evaluate the students: taking exams, exhibitions, oral evaluations, workshops, among others.

As an advisor, the teacher must verify that the parameters required by the chair and by the school curriculum are being followed.

Similarly, it is the teacher's job to provide students with the grade for their performance and the corrections and recommendations that will serve them for future activities.

9- Tutor

The tutor role is based on providing guidance and support to students. Typically, the teacher plays this role when students are required to carry out a project at home.

What the teacher does in this case is to monitor the progress of the students' work, clarify any doubts that may arise, make recommendations, among others.

This role is ideal for studying individual cases. On the other hand, it can be inconvenient if students get used to depending on the teacher's help.

10- Participant

The role of participant occurs when the teacher gets involved with his students in the activities he has planned for the class. This role allows the teacher to interact in the classroom, so that the students do not feel like a distant figure.

The advantage of this role is that it transforms the teacher into an example. Thus, students will be able to know how to act in the activity that is carried out.

The downside is that if you are not careful you run the risk of the teacher dominating or coercing the students, which would be counterproductive.

References

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6. The role of the teacher. Retrieved on September 11, 2017, from faculty.londondeanery.ac.uk
7. Roles of the teacher inside the classroom. Retrieved on September 11, 2017, from slideshare.net
8. Redefining the Role of the Teacher. Retrieved on September 11, 2017, from edutopia.org.