User talk:Usha getiyavar

Functions And Roles Of Teachers

Broadly speaking, the function of teachers is to help students learn by imparting knowledge to them and by setting up a situation in which students can and will learn effectively. But teachers fill a complex set of roles, which vary from one society to another and from one educational level to another. Some of these roles are performed in the school, some in the community. Roles in the school or university Mediator of learning Disciplinarian or controller of student behaviour Parent substitute Confidant to students Judge of achievement Organizer of curriculum Bureaucrat Scholar and research specialist Member of teachers’ organization Roles in the community Public servant Surrogate of middle-class morality Expert in some area of knowledge or skills Community leader Agent of social change In those areas in which teaching has not yet become a profession, the teacher may fill fewer of these roles. The primary-school teacher in a simple agricultural society, for example, will fill only the first five of the school roles and the first and possibly the second of the community roles. Some of the roles conflict; that is, the performance of one, that of disciplinarian, for example, tends to conflict with another, such as that of confidant to students, or the role of independent and creative scholar will tend to conflict with that of the bureaucrat. In the community the role of surrogate of middle-class morality tends to conflict with the role of agent of social change. In the presence of these role conflicts, the teacher must learn to balance, to know when and how vigorously to act in a particular role, and when to shift to another in a flexible way.

Role in curricular design The family, the government, the church or religious authority, and the economic or business-industrial authority all have an interest in the development of children and youth, and all play a part, therefore, in setting up and controlling formal and many informal means of education. In the more-developed societies, they employ teachers to do the work of education, and they work out with the teacher an understanding of what the teacher is expected to do. The more “professional” the teacher is, the more autonomy he demands and is given to teach within the concept of understood and mutually accepted goals and methods. The elementary-school teacher must teach the basic mental skills—reading, writing, and arithmetic. Beyond this, the elementary-school teacher must teach facts and attitudes favourable to the nation or the church or any other institution supporting the school. Thus, he must teach in a way that is favourable to communism in China, to a mixed capitalist-socialist economy in Britain or the United States, to the French or Brazilian systems in France or Brazil, and so forth. In a society in which schools are directed by churches or religious groups, as in Spain, he must teach the relevant religious beliefs and attitudes.