Rituals and Beliefs Ingrained in World Language Pedagogy: Defining Deep Structure and Conventional Wisdom

Abstract

Why are so many teachers still not using communicative methods or making communicative language teaching (CLT) a part of their daily instructional approach? Many world language teachers seem to posses certain beliefs about language teaching, and perform particular rituals, which emphasize rote grammar learning and translation. Teachers’ beliefs, based on their values and experiences, significantly influence their methods. Deep structure, molded by conventional wisdom shared by teachers, constitutes a barrier that inherently makes it difficult to change world language pedagogy. Teachers need support from inside and outside their classrooms to try new methods in order to break away from rituals and beliefs world language teachers have valued for centuries.