The Modern New Roles Playedthe Teacher of English.doc

英语教学中当代英语教师的新角色The Modern New Roles Played by the Teacher of EnglishContentsAbstract.1Key Words.1IIntroduction .1II. Changes of Teachers Role .32.1 Teachers Code Switching as Adaptation to the Teachers Role .42.2 Teachers “Macro-Role” .5 2.2.1 The Teacher Should Serve as a Conductor For Communication Learning .72.2.2 The Teacher Should Develop Classroom Activities to Foster Students Communication Competence .82.2.3 The Teacher Should Attempt to Help Students Open Up to Communicate in Class.82.2.4 The Teacher Should Fulfill the Obligation of an Evaluator in Communicative Class.8IIIRoles of Teachers of English and Requirements of ELT .9IVConclusion .11References.12The Modern New Roles Played by the Teacher of English摘要： 新课程标准注重, 传统样式老师被集中应该被转移到学生集中, 如此老师必须是用不同的角色, 像设计师, 组织者, 提示者, 参加者, 资源提供者, 控制器, 科税者等等。 怎么能老师行动这些角色最好,在本文中提供了六点建议。本文阐述了在教学中英语教师的角色定位问题。如何把课堂交给学生，引导和激励全体学生的主动参与。教师的角色不是单一的，当代教师可扮演诸如“组织者”，“启发者”，“引导者”，“帮助者”，“评论者”等新的角色。教师在课堂设计和安排上应注意发挥学生的主体性，激发学生探究欲望，想方设法培养其独立获取知识的能力。关键词：当代；教师；教学；角色Abstract: New curriculum standard emphasizes that traditional pattern of teacher-centered teaching should be shifted to be student-centered one, so teachers have to adopt different roles, like designers, organizers, prompters, participants, resource-providers, controllers, assessors and so on. How can the teacher act these roles best? Six suggestions are provided in this paper. This paper, therefore, attempts to prove that it is more effective teaching for teachers to adopt different roles in various teaching situations. The modern new roles played by the teacher of English may include the “organizer”, the “initiator”, the “guide”, the “assistant”, the “critic” etc. The teacher should pay attention to exploring students initiation, inspiring their desire of seeking knowledge, and meanwhile trying his/her best cultivating their capabilities of independent study.Key Words: modern；teacher；teaching；rolesIIntroduction Teaching is considered one of the most demanding and challenging social under kings in our society, with the ultimate goal of training students to acquire the ability to communicate effectively in English. It's generally agreed that good teaching necessitates good communication between teacher and students as well as among students themselves. The best teaching results in a classroom come from effective co-operation between the teacher and the students. Therefore, the teacher's roles in class can be vital to the effect of the students language learning. This paper focuses on the analysis of the different roles a teacher plays either in a conventional classroom or an online classroom, and draws the conclusion that these two types of teaching are not enemies but friends. The paper presents a comparative study of the teaching procedures in these two different classrooms, and finds:1) Traditional teaching provides the necessary experience and teaching resources for the development of the online teaching; 2) Online teaching can on the other hand supply the up-to-date information and technology for classroom teaching and provide much more freedom for the students.Larsen-Freeman (1986) explains that role plays, whether structured or less structured, are important in the communicative approach because they give learners an opportunity to practice communicating in different social contexts and in different social roles. Role play on the teachers part is a highly flexible teaching activity which has a wide scope for variation and imagination. According to Larose (1987), role play uses different communicative techniques and develops fluency in the language, promotes interaction in the classroom and increases motivation. Here peer learning is encouraged and sharing of responsibility between teacher and the learner in the learning process takes place. Role play can improve learners' speaking skills in any situation, and helps learners to interact. As for the shy learners, role play helps by providing a mask, where learners with difficulty in conversation are liberated. In addition, it is fun and most learners will agree that enjoyment leads to better learning.New curriculum standard requires that teachers should put students first. English like any other language, is a subject that requires very practical language skills in the learners part. First students should take part in the activities, and then they can change the language knowledge into language skills, finally they may reach the required language proficiency. When teachers use the “New Senior English for China Students Book”, teachers need pay more attention to students developments in their language skills. The new book contains a lot of information; it does not mean teachers talk all the time. Instead, the aim is to let students practice more. In the process of teaching, teachers should pay attention to developing students learning potentials. As a result, the role of the English teacher act differently, based on the function that the teacher performs in different activities; Harmer defines the teachers roles as designer, organizer, prompter, participant, resource-provider, controller, assessor (Harmer, 1983:201). Besides, these roles, in my opinion, there are other roles for an English teacher, too.Teacher development is a process of socialization in which a teacher learns how to learn and constantly obtains requirements and regulations related to the role of teachers. The socialization of teachers involves the following stages：a. the exploration stage of the confirmation and adaptation of teachers roles；b. the rapid development and stabilization stage of the maturity of teachers roles；c. the stagnation and withdrawal stage of confusing and losing of teachers roles；d. the consistent development stage of modification and continuous socialization of teachers roles. Teachers in different stages have different behavior characteristics of teachers' roles. Those who are always going beyond the limitation of self- knowledge and teaching experience will keep the state of being dynamic, open and continuous development and becoming scholar-style teachers.Students should realize that the teacher can play many different roles at different times. I would like to demonstrate these different roles so that students should realize when the teacher takes a minor helping role .I would like to let students get used to being responsible for their own learning rather than depending on the teacher all the time. With some class-relevant background information and some necessary help the teacher provides, the students can work out the problems by themselves.Teacher's consciousness of their role is essential in their professional development. Different methods have different assumptions about what roles the teacher plays in the classroom. The term“ role” has been defined in two different ways： 1. a role can be defined generally as “a part people play in the performance of social life”;2. “a role is a set of norms and expectations applied to the incumbency of a particular position”. 3.The focal type of teacher role is occupational and identifyingIt is a position with certain responsibilities and expectationsIn the classroom，a teacher in this type of clothes is in contrast with the student and the pupil，both of which are also identifying but not in contrast with the word” learner”; 4.The last type of role is manifest to the learnerIt is transactional and incidentalThe transactional part of role is more sophisticated as the teaching and learning process goes along，the teacher may serve as a model in using the type of language，an organizer in conducting activities，a counselor in diagnosing the learners' problems and giving good advise，and participant-observer of the teaching and learning process，etcIIChanges of Teachers RoleAt the beginning of the 21st century an unprecedented high demand is set on the quality of teaching of foreign languages，especially the teaching of English in Chinese schools and universitiesMeanwhile the Ministry of Education is promoting teacher professionalismHow can teachers of English (as a foreign language in China) develop their competency to become true professionals? The traditional knowledge skill mode of professional development is not adequate in the new era and that the development of awareness（of the multifaceted nature of language and the multidisciplinary feature of language teaching）should be added as a component of the goal of teacher educationThe first part conceptualizes the operation of TEFL as a component of education in ChinaThe second part analyses the categories of the variablesThe third part explores the concept of teachers roles and makes the point that teacher's authoritative role should be enhanced rather than diminished in learner-centered and task-based teaching and learningThe fourth part proposes a 3-R approach to promoting in-service professional development of EFL teachers in China，namely，reflecting to be aware of variables and their relations，reading to communicate with specialists of the foundation disciplines，and researching to innovate in the classroom2.1 Teachers Code Switching as Adaptation to the Teachers RoleTeachers Chinese/English code switching as adaptation to the teachers role refers to the instances of Chinese/English code switching as a result of the teachers consideration of his/her role in society -the teachers “macro-role”，or the roles in classroom-the teachers “micro-roles”.We tentatively discuss teachers two kinds of roles: one is the teachers social role; the other is the teachers role in classroom. Teachers play very important roles in society, who are respectable and set examples for other people. We call this kind of role the teachers “macro-role”. Next, teachers also play different parts in their dynamic process of interactions in the classroom context. Harmer (1991) has given one kind of categorization: teachers in classroom can play the roles of a controller (in complete charge of the class); an assessor (for example, to see how well they are performing or how well they performed); an organizer (for example, to organize an activity, to tell or to give instructions); a prompter (for example, to encourage students to participate or to make suggestions); a participant (to participate as an equal in an activity). We can name this kind of role teachers “micro-role”. Chinese/English code switching in foreign language classrooms is one of the effective strategies used by teachers to preserve their respective roles.2.2 Teachers “Macro-Role”In our society, teaching is regarded as the most sacred and noble profession; teachers are those who have higher quality and never say any dirty words not even to say in the classroom. In this class, she has to mention such English expressions, and by the way talks about his personal experience on this phrase. In order to adapt to the “teachers macro role”, she avoids Chinese dirty words, but switches to English such as nonsense with the aim to weaken the negative effect of those dirty words.When asking this question, the teacher wants to be a participant in this discussion, but the students keep in silence. So, how to break silence and make students become voluntary participants in the activity is a problem to be solved. Consequently, in that context, he has to make his role as an intended participant automatically changes to be a prompter by encouraging students to think and open the mouth. What is the role of prompter? As Harmer (1991) said: “Often the teacher needs to encourage students to participate or 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. This is one of the teachers important roles, the role of prompter.” Why does he choose code switching as a strategy? Firstly, Chinese is our native language and switching to Chinese may shorten the distance between the teacher and students and lessen their anxiety to speak English. Secondly, maybe students do not make clear the meaning of “consciousness”. So his switching codes to Chinese are just to adapt to the change of his teachers role. With the guidance of traditional ELT approaches, teacher has been reduced to be the slaves of textbooks; teachers talent and creativity have been greatly repressed by the examination-oriented education systems. However, the teaching is an art rather than the mechanic transfer of knowledge; it requires much enthusiasm and originality from the teacher.With the transfer from the teacher-dominant classroom to the learner-centered classroom, teachers role has changed and encountered great challenges. The main role of the teacher has changed from the transfer of the knowledge to the creative organization of classroom activities, which includes such things as following: selecting and using flexibly textbooks and teaching materials according to the earlier knowledge, personality and actual demands of students, cultivating and making full use of students motive, respecting and analyzing their emotions and personalities to facilitate the communication and cooperation between teacher and students, stimulating students with multiple teaching aids to accomplish the learning process with the joint efforts of the teacher and students. Thus the changes in teachers role give much weight to the enlightenment and guidance of students in English classroom.Scrivener classifies the functions of the teacher into three categories: explainer, involver and enabler. The explainer conveys information to the students by explaining or lecturing. The involver tries to involve students actively by designing and organizing appropriate and interesting classroom activities. The enabler creates the conditions that enable the students to learn by themselves, hence the teacher becomes a “guide” or a “counselor” or a “resource of information when needed”. Scrivener holds the view that teaching is essentially about working with other human beings. Therefore teacher should be fully aware of the thoughts and feelings of individual and group students according to which he/she plans and designs specific activities to establish effective working relationships and a good classroom atmosphere. Teaching actually is the process in which teacher and students cooperate to discover and make use of knowledge, thus what to teach should be decided according to the demands of students or even by learners themselves.In the actual teaching process, the