Introduction
In Greece, the introduction of English in primary education was established in
1985 (Act of Parliament 1566/1985) and, after a period of experimental
implementation which lasted till 1992, the innovation was spread to include almost all
schools in the Greek territory. This gave the chance for thousands of English teachers
to be appointed in order to teach English to Young Learners, i.e. students whose age
ranges from eight to twelve years. Although most of these teachers had not received
any special training at university on how to teach students of such a young age, their
appointment in primary schools was not accompanied by a programme of initial
training which would equip them both theoretically and practically in order to cope
with the demands of the new situation they were going to face. On the other hand, the
Regional Education Centres (known by the Greek abbreviation Π.Ε.Κ.), which are
responsible for the training of teachers, have not been able so far to implement largescale programmes, in order to give teachers the chance to update their knowledge, at
regular intervals, with findings which arise from research into Second Language
Acquisition (SLA). The above raise a number of questions concerning the
effectiveness and efficiency of these teachers’ practices.
The aim of this work is to investigate the beliefs primary English teachers hold
concerning the way Young learners think and learn, and the way they learn languages,
and to examine whether there is consistency between these beliefs, and their
classroom practices. To achieve this, a research was carried out among primary
English teachers who work in the District of West Macedonia, Greece. The research
employed a combination of both quantitative and qualitative methods of collecting
evidence, referred in the literature as ‘triangulation’ (Research Methods in Education
Handbook, 2001: 65; Bell 1999:102). These methods comprise a mailed
questionnaire, an examination of the extra material teachers provide their students
with, classroom observations, and short interviews with the teachers observed. The
research aimed at providing answers to the following questions:
1. What are primary English teachers’ beliefs concerning the way Young
Learners think and learn and the way they learn languages, and how are these
beliefs influenced by theories which are considered current nowadays?
2. Are the teachers’ practices consistent with their beliefs, and if otherwise, what
are the reasons for such an inconsistency?
3. Taking into consideration that a curriculum innovation is under way, which
involves the publishing of new course books, the question which arises is
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