Though language teachers filter much of the methods and content through their own systems, the discourse about foreign language education in China has mainly concentrated on the accessible behavioral aspects rather than on the teachers' mental lives and personal styles. Based on the distinctions of relevant concepts and a local teacher survey, this paper first analyzes the hidden side of the language teaching style through a systematic reflection on the belief-behavior inconsistency of the language teachers, and then advocates a need to focus on the covert style of Chinese individual teachers as well as an effort to look beyond methodological theories and to take teachers' competence and conditions into consideration.
