ABSTRACT
Views about the role of the teacher are culturally embedded. Substantial variations in how school teachers think about their roles and responsibilities have been found across France, Spain and the UK, for example. Spanish teachers, working within a democratic management system, in which headteachers are elected from amongst teachers within the school, have been found to be more likely to think of teaching as a collaborative activity and to have a stronger sense of responsibility to the local community (Laffitte, 1993). French school teachers, on the other hand, tend to think of their role as relating much more to expertise in their subject specialisms and do not regard their responsibilities as encompassing the pastoral care that their English counterparts value more highly (Broadfoot, Osborn, Gilly and Brûcher, 1994; Planel, 1995).
