The roles of the educator

Reflection on Activity: 1

I can say that the views expressed by my colleagues on the role of the teacher in the ICT classroom were quite informative.  Based on the discussion the role of the teacher includes mediator, designer, admission, scholar, pastor, assessor and specialist. Three roles that were of interest to me are the teacher’s role as a designer, a mediator and an assessor.

As the mediator the teacher facilitates learning and creates opportunities for dialogue between the teacher, students and parents. The claims are powerful and unequivocal, when schools work together with families to support learning, children tend to succeed. Therefore the cultivation of strong “family school linkages” is increasingly and widely viewed as an essential component of strategies to improve students’ educational outcomes. The use of blogs and emails can assist to foster this strong school tie. I find this method quite innovative and its a quick way to convey messages to parents about students progress in schools. This method will certainly be used by me as I endeavour to involve parents in the learning experience. 

The teacher operating as a designer certainly tickled my interest. As a designer the teacher devises programmes which cater for the needs of the students. Therefore the teachers in the ICT classroom should be creative in the use of technology based on the curriculum and their students’ needs and design educational materials in their own fields. In this view, the teacher rather than taking on the role of knowledge dispenser or just adopting existing technologies, design their own teaching environment with a variety of technological tools to facilitate knowledge construction. Analysing this role has motivated me to create an environment where technology can be used to teach diverse learning styles, thus ensuring that the needs of students are catered to. 

In the end it’s imperative that students’ learning is assessed on a continuous basis. This will give me a clearer understanding of how learning takes place; this will help me to better collect, analyse and make decisions that are in the best interest of my students.