From Form-Focussed to Communicative: How University Students Change Their Beliefs about Learning a Foreign Language

Taking a contextual approach to research on language learner beliefs, this longitudinal study of 49 Swiss university students learning Danish as a foreign language investigates how and why the participants change their beliefs over time. At the beginning of the three-semester language course, the participants believe that form-focussed approaches to language learning are most efficient, whereas at the end of the course, they believe that communicative approaches to language learning are more important. The study is based on 142 written learning journals that were collected during a year and a half and analysed quantitatively and qualitatively. The main finding of the study is that the participants change their learner beliefs in accordance with changes in their perceived linguistic progression and in accordance with the methods and materials chosen by the teacher.