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Teachers--who needs them?

Article Excerpt
Abstract

This purpose of this paper is to invite language teachers to look at their teaching practices, and to investigate whether they are promoting or hindering the process of learning. When we consider the importance of affect in the classroom, and the ways in which affective barriers to learning are set up, it becomes apparent that the classroom educator needs to be proficient in establishing a positive and productive learning environment, as well as being a "learning expert", empowering students in terms of self-direction, self-assessment, learner training, and self-access skills. Teachers thus have a very active role to play in learning, but this role is one of facilitator, counselor of autonomous learning, and visiting consultant in the language workshop.

1. Introduction

This paper poses the question of whether the presence of a teacher in the language classroom has a positive influence on the learning process that goes on there: "What do students learn from the teacher that they cannot learn by themselves?" It is argued that, having dropped the dubious "modeler of correct language" and "transmitter of desirable information" concepts, the language teacher has a responsibility to construct and maintain a holistic, humanistic learning environment (a life-skills workshop), in which he/she is a consultant, encouraging and empowering students to grow into responsible, creative, and critical-thinking adult members of society.

2. Then and now

When investigating the effect of second language instruction, some twenty years ago, Long (1983) concluded that the presence of a teacher in the classroom made a slight difference in terms of grammatical accuracy on the part of the students--not a huge endorsement for teachers or teaching methodologies at that time! Since then, theory and research have progressed in a number of fields (e.g. affect, alternative assessment, autonomy, learner training, the process syllabus), such that the learner-centered classroom (cf. Tudor, 1996) is now a sine qua non in TEFL literature. Roles of teachers and students have thus changed radically since 1983, and the contemporary learning environment has little place for the view of the teacher as dispenser-of-information, or the student as an empty vessel into which that information can be poured. In this sense, "teacher" ("One that teaches; especially: one whose occupation is to instruct", Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary) is an outmoded concept, and the passive student a thing of the past. Instead, humanistic and holistic principles, which have been at the foundation of education since its inception, have combined with recent research to redefine the teacher's role as counselor and learning resource.

3. Educational principles

Putting aside perceived impracticalities and administrative restrictions, most teachers, when asked about their role in society (and in the classroom), would agree with the following quotes:

The object of education is to prepare the young to educate...

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