Previous research indicates that former schooling is an important factor in shaping teachers' beliefs about teaching; teachers change the way they teach when their beliefs about foreign language teaching change. However, not much research has discovered direct evidence concerning the processes that effect change in teacher beliefs.This study investigated the relationship between teachers' pedagogical paradigms and practices in Chinese language classrooms. Specifically, a qualitative analysis of educated teachers born in China examined how early pedagogical frames were formed, and then transformed in the context of American classrooms.Results of this study indicate that early schooling, language learning, and initial teaching experiences have a powerful affect on Chinese teachers' epistemological beliefs and pedagogical practices. Indeed, embedded and unexamined beliefs can inhibit effective teaching of Chinese language and lead to traditional behavioristcentered learning approaches. However, these data evidence that critical reflection on preconceptions, beliefs, values, principles, and practices can become a precursory for constructivist and transformational Chinese language teaching and learning. The

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