Volume: 19  Number: 6  Page: 483–495

Culture Learning from a Constructivist Perspective. An Investigation of Spanish Foreign Language Teachers’ Views

Lies Sercu1, María del Carmen Méndez García2 and Paloma Castro Prieto3 1KU Leuven, Faculteit Letteren, Departement Linguïstiek, België, 2Departamento de Filología Inglesa, Facultad de Humanidades y Ciencias de la Educación, Universidad de Jaén, Spain and 3Departamento de Didáctica de la Lengua y la Literatura, Universidad de Valladolid, Facultad de Educación y Trabajo Social, Spain

Today, teaching and learning tend to be viewed from a constructivist perspective. Learning is regarded as a self-directed process of constructing meaning, which takes place in interaction. The teacher supports the learning process by selecting input and approaches that can scaffold the learning process and guide learners towards independent learning. Teachers are being urged to embrace this paradigm, which focuses on learning by constructing meaning (e.g. Baines & Stanley, 2000). Research into educational innovation suggests that the success of innovations depends on the extent to which teachers can realise a ‘personal paradigm shift’ in their views on what constitutes effective teaching for good learning. A change in teachers’ beliefs is prerequisite for changes in teaching practice. This paper focuses on Spanish foreign language teachers’ perceptions of culture teaching. It investigates to what extent present-day teaching practice reflects constructivist approaches. Specifically, it shows the extent to which teachers depart from what they perceive to be their learners’ current understanding of foreign cultures when selecting cultural contents, and to what extent their culture teaching approaches can contribute to the learners’ acquisition of independent culture-learning skills. The results show that current teaching practice only in part reflects constructivist convictions on the teachers’ side.

Keywords: constructivism, culture learning, culture teaching, foreign language teachers´ perceptions, teacher education

© 2005 L. Sercu et al.

Access this article