The Mismatch between Non-native English as a Foreign Language (EFL) Teachers’ Grammar Beliefs and Classroom Practices

Abstract

Teachers' beliefs affect their classroom practices, whether these beliefs are implicit or explicit (Williams & Burden, 1997).However, there may be discrepancies between what teachers believe and practice.The purpose of this study was to investigate the mismatches between language instructors' beliefs and practices regarding grammar teaching.The participants were non-native instructors of English as a foreign language (EFL).A 12-item qualitative questionnaire was used for the data collection.Classroom observations were also conducted to observe how grammar was taught in the classroom.The data were analyzed in abductive and iterative manner (Dö rnyei, 2007).There were three main findings to the study: 1) Many of the teachers believed that communicative language teaching method (CLT) would be the best method to teach grammar.2) The teachers who favored CLT did not make use of it in their classrooms and many used grammar translation method (GTM).3) Finally, the washback effect (Taylor, 2005) widely influenced teachers' way of grammar teaching.This study makes a contribution to the TEFL field by revealing the mismatches between teachers' beliefs on what would be the most beneficial for student learning when teaching grammar and the classroom practice realities.

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