The role of English teachers in student’s learning process

As it is presented on Harmer’s text called The practice of English language teaching

(1988), English has become undoubtedly global. It has spread increasingly around the
world through announcements, economic issues, music, films, and even one the most
important ceremonies such as the Oscars1. For that reason, the fact of speaking English
allows us not only to get better job opportunities but also to come into contact with other
cultures which certainly have English as a second language. Taking into account this, the
role of English teachers in students learning process is fundamental 2. To begin with,
“teacher’s art is the ability to adopt a number of different roles in the class” (Harmer, 2010,
p. 25). Indeed, it depends on the subject students are learning or what they need. A teacher
can assume different roles at the same time such as facilitator, assessor, tutor and evaluator.
Nevertheless, the role that should prevail is the teacher as communicator. In other words,
the teacher is able to establish interaction patterns which allows the learner and the teacher
get involved in the construction of new meanings. It means they are constantly linking
worldviews, their mother tongue and the second language learning. It is necessary to
clarify, Brown (2000) says in order to have a meaningful learning set and construct new
meanings, the teachers must encourage their learners to relate the new learning task to what
they already know.

Nowadays, English is seen as the global language of business and its communicative goal
has changed, it seems the main purpose is to earn money. However, teachers and learners
should take advantage of English as the global language not only to construct and configure
reality itself but also to exchange cultural values.

1
an international recognition of excellence in cinematic achievements
2
serving as, or being an essential part of, a foundation or basis;
basic.
Language is bond up with identity
Krashen, among others, suggested that teachers should concentrate on acquisition rather than
learning and that the role of the language teacher should be to provide the right kind of language
exposure, namely comprehensible input (that is, language that the students understand more or
less, even if it is a bit above their own level of production). Provided that students experience such
language in an anxiety-free atmosphere, the argument goes, they will acquire it just as children do,
and, more importantly, when they want to say something, they will be able to retrieve the
language they need from their acquired-language store. Language which has been learnt, on the
other hand, is not available for use in the same way, according to this argument, because the
learner has to think much more consciously about what they want to say. The principal function of
learnt language is to monitor what is coming from our acquired store to check that it is OK. As a
result, learnt language tends to ‘get in the way’ of acquired-language production and may inhibit
spontaneous communication.

Language is bond up with identity

Jennifer Jenkins has suggested, we need to exposed our students to the reality of World Enlgish.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/312610317_ROLE_OF_A_TEACHER_IN_ENGLISH_LANG
UAGE_TEACHING_ELT