Role playing can be a valuable teaching resource for you to use with your students because are going to need to know how to fulfill the role of the career professional they are training to be.  Also, role playing enables students to develop their communication skills as they demonstrate, describe, or portray a person in the field. 

Set up a situation where the students work through a problem or use their critical thinking skills to resolve a challenge.  The more they role play the more comfortable they will be when they are in the real setting.  Role playing will give them an opportunity to develop a sequence of steps to follow so they won't be left standing without any idea of what to do when they encounter a new situation when they are on the job. 

Role playing also helps shy students to gain more self confidence because they can use the role they a playing as a cover while they are developing their self confidence.  When a shy student plays the role of a patient or customer they are someone else which means they can use their own personality to project into the situation but it is not who they are and that is a comfort to them.  As they develop more self confidence they can expand their own personality to the point they see themselves in the role for which they are training.