Only a professional teacher may easily shift from a "teacher" to "a facilitator". Well-planned and organized lessons will have better results if they are developed from a teacher's experience, observations and knowledge of his/her students.

Based on my practice, I presume that without pedagogical, psychological knowledge and theory I can't devise lesson plans because they will not work. I can't facilitate the learning of my students if I don't know how to teach them to learn and develop. In contrast to the teacher, a learning facilitator can be anybody with charisma or a leader and s/he is more process-driven. Stevick's (1996) words would characterize a learning facilitator as "Success depends on materials, techniques and linguistic analysis, and more on what goes on inside and between people in the classroom". A learning facilitator has to gain years of background theoretical knowledge and experience to get to the teaching stage. This, actually, reminds me of Brown's principles, where the role of the facilitator is in fact practicing and being aware of the learning principles as he/she facilitates classroom interactions and activities.

Is it easy for you to shift roles: from a teacher to a facilitator?