Abstract:

Teaching is a profession which must renew itself constantly in order to keep pace with current changes. This is the case now more than ever as the pace of change in modern society seems ever increasing. In particular, in the world of today, knowledge is the most important capital and people can readily access a vast range of information from every field of human endeavour. In consequence teachers and schools are no longer the only or even the main source of knowledge and information for students.
This change has significant implications for the education system, and an important area of study concerns the ways in which teachers must adapt to this new environment. On the one hand teachers are dealing, as they always have, with the day- to- day business of teaching, while on the other they must use and also, in a sense, compete with an unprecedented range of sources of information. In addition it is expected that what is done in schools and classrooms will not simply be concerned with learning for its own sake but will be relevant to the knowledge society and the labour market. Finally in pursuit of these goals teachers are expected to take on new roles both within the classroom, for example team teaching and inquiry - based learning but also in the wider school such as distributed leadership, collaborative planning and self-evaluation.
The quality of education going forward will depend on how teachers perceive and respond to these different roles. This research is designed to explore these emerging perceptions, using the analytic framework proposed by Schlechty ( 2001) as a theoretical lens. Schlechty suggests that teaching can be characterised into three inter-related roles- practicioner or ‘clinician’, knowledge transmitter and performer or actor. The present researcher would suggest that leader, in both a classroom and school context, should be added to this framework. This study, therefore, will examine the self-perceptions of teachers concerning their evolving roles under these four characteristics.
Aim: The aim of this study is to explore teacher’s perceptions of their professional roles as clinician, knowledge transmitter, performer and leader. In the light of this general aim, answers to the following questions were sought.
1. What are teacher’s perceptions about their roles as clinician, knowledge transmitters, performers and leaders?
2. Is there a significant difference between the perceptions of teachers about these roles depending on gender, age, branch and work experience?
Method : This is a descriptive survey. The research sample will be composed of 250 teachers at secondary school in the city of Ankara, Turkey. A “Teachers’ Roles” questionnaire developed by the authors will used as a data gathering instrument. The data gathered by questionnaire will be analysed using descriptive statistical analysis methods. In addition the t-test (according to gender) and the Anova analysis (according to branch, work experience and age) will be applied.

Keywords:

Teachers roles, clinician teacher, knowledge transmitter teacher, performer teacher, leader teacher.