Should we reject or justify the use of mother tongue in our English classes?
How far is it useful for teaching in the 21st century and in the light of current SLA research and theories to adhere to this principle?
Aunque durante mucho tiempo ha existido la tendencia a pensar de que el uso de sólo la L2 (segunda lengua) en el aprendizaje de un segundo idioma/idioma extranjero beneficiaría a los alumnos, las tendencias actuales no parecen ser las mismas. Hoy en día hay muchas razones basadas en investigaciones recientes sobre la ASL (Adquisición de una Segunda Lengua) que cuestionan este supuesto común y obligan a los maestros a reexaminar los principios pedagógicos que subyacen a esta cuestión.
En este artículo daremos una breve explicación de los argumentos que apoyan las ventajas y/o en algunos casos las justificaciones para el uso de la L1 (Lengua materna) en el aula así como las desventajas del mismo. Finalmente se establecerán las conclusiones sobre la base de estos argumentos.
Palabras clave: lengua maternal, segunda lengua, adquisición de una segunda lengua
Though for a long time there has been the tendency to think that using only L2 (second language) when learning a second/foreign language would benefit learners, such does not seems to be the same in today trends. Nowadays there are many reasons based on up to date SLA (Second Language Acquisition) researches that challenge this common assumption and oblige teachers to re-examine the pedagogical principles underlying this issue.
In this paper we shall start giving a brief explanation of the arguments, which support the advantages, and/or in some cases the justification for the use of L1 (mother tongue) in the classroom, as well as the disadvantages. Finally we will draw our conclusion on the bases of these arguments.
Keywords: mother tongue, second language, second language acquisition
The background of this issue starts with the fact that the increase number in the use of English around the world has led to a rise in demand for English classes and English teachers, so the number of people learning English as a second/foreign language are now surpassing the number of native speakers of English. This has also given birth to a new generation of teachers and learners called non-native speaking teachers of English (N-NSTEs) and the L2 users, that at the same time have made researchers studied the implications in the use of English as an international language in the environment of L2 users & N-NSTEs where teachers and students share the same native language and make use of that L1 for better understanding of the target language.
As the L2 user plays a central role in this situation we shall quotate Cook (2002) for a description of an L2 user:
“An L2 user is often an intermediary between two cultures and two peoples…” “This L2 users are not people trying to imitate the behaviours of native speakers; and indeed they may never have met a native speaker…” (p. 86)
This description tells us that this “new generation” of teachers and students is completely different from a native speaker and they have their own characteristics, as we will see in the arguments that follow.
The arguments that support the use of L1 in the classroom are closely related with the nature of the L2 user. We cannot deny the influence of L1 on L2, these two languages coexist naturally in the L2 user, and as a result we have the phenomenon of transfer, which is the learner’s reliance on L1. During the era of the theories based on behaviourism this “transfer” was related to errors, it was taken as positive if there were no errors in the production of the language and negative in the presence of errors. According to Ellis, (1986) this was called “proactive inhibition” “… and it was concerned with the way in which previous learning prevent or inhibits the learning of new habits.” (p.20).
Recently studies have shown that L1 do more that mere interfering and producing errors in the learning of L2, especially at the early stages (beginners) because the students have to learn a number of basic lexical items, give them proper forms and visualize the syntactic relationship among them and the difficulty of this will be determined by how naturally the learner can establish equivalences between the two languages. See (Timor, 2012) for further information)
In the view of Ringbom, (1987) about transfer, he states the following:
“Linguistic differences between L1 and L2 may not automatically mean learning problems, but if the learner is able to perceive structural lexical similarities between L1 and L2 there will be an absolutely essential absence of some important learning problems at the early stages, especially as far as comprehension and vocabulary learning are concerned”. (p.60)
Cognate words for instant have the effect of facilitate the learning and this is a strategy frequently included in many English course books, of course it is necessary to specify that similarity in two related languages may occur and this similarity embraces more than just similarity cognates, on the other hand what makes a word difficult to learn for L2 students depends on other aspects too:
“The length of the word, the transparency of the word structure; (e.g., does it contain familiar element?); word class; the degree of abstractness vs. concreteness of words…) (Takala, 1984, p. 84); also (Lanfer, 1986) as cited in (Ringbom, 1987, p. 41).
Another characteristic of the L2 user is the use of translation and code-switching, Cook, (2002) exhorts the following:“These are normal activities for L2 users, students deserve to be help to carry them out by teaching”. (p. 335). He adds some information about some teaching methodology that have promoted the use of translation and code-switching such as: the New Concurrent Method, Community Language Learning and Dodson’s Bilingual Method; but they have failed because they have not considered these aspects as external goal for the learner which mean that they have not taken into account the right of the L2 user in making use of their L1 as a resource for learning a second language. Code switching on the other hand is an important tool that is part of bilingual behaviour and it plays a main role as a discourse strategy.
It is acceptable to a certain point the use of only English in the classroom and the arguments for these claims are also quite reasonable: Learners want to learn the language in a limited time due to their personal necessities in using English so the best solution can be using the “immersion research” where students are not allowed to use their mother tongue in the classroom otherwise they would be penalized for doing so. At a first glance this idea may not be dangerous, it is giving the learner what they have asked for, but if we give a closer look the implications that it embraces are of high priority because of the effects that using this approach have brought up for both students and teachers. To begin with students are affected in their self-esteem because they cannot understand the teacher, as a result they do not participate in class and at the end they decide to drop out, teachers also suffer the bad experience of frustration because if students do not participate how can they create or develop communication and interaction in their classes to promote the use of the language? Tollefson, (1995) illustrates this harmful situation:
“…For example, an article in a recent issue of the TESOL Newsletter (June, 1990) extols the virtues of fining students for committing “crimes” against the teacher’s first language, including the crime of using their first language. The teacher told students “This is an English-only classroom. If you speak Spanish or Cantonese or Mandarin or Vietnamese or Thai or Russian or Farsi, you pay me 25 cents. I can be rich” (Weinberg, 1990, p. 5)” (p. 25)
What is beneath this proposal is the statements of consider the L1 as a sub-language. Also in (Roberts, 1993).
In the same book Tollefson describes the opposite situation where L1 is used in the classroom, the results are in this case quite positive, students feel more self-confident and there are more evidences of progress. This represents evidence that L1 is an important tool as a facilitator for more meaningful interaction in the L2. (Tollefson, 1995, p. 27)
But L1 can have other uses as well for instant, we would like to refer to a particular case which is being described in Tollefson’s book; this is the experience of an ESL programme for Central Americans in Boston, the teachers report that they have made use of L1 (Spanish) for the following purposes:
This experiment has resulted in a “gradual, developmental process in which use of the L1 drops off naturally as it becomes less necessary”. (p. 28). What this has proved is that the use of L1 in the classroom provides more pedagogical and psychological benefits to the classroom community (students & teachers) than the concept of prohibition.
The latest trends in teaching methodology such as the Task Based Learning consider now the acceptance of L1 use in the classroom, Ellis, (2003) in his book “Task Based Language Learning and Teaching” explains that in the SCT (sociocultural theory of mind) there is an interpersonal interaction which is held by the learner as a self meditation (private speech) and this is utilize by the learner as an strategy to gain control of the language forms specially in tasks which demand a great challenge. Ellis also states that the time allocated by the learners in this self-regulation depends on their level of proficiency, cultural background and learners’ goals. We shall specify that this private speech has not contributed to the learning of a second language what is relevant to be mentioned here is that as a consequence of this mental activity, L2 learners may use L1 in their private speech. The SCT researchers recognize that those students with basic knowledge of the language are more likely to use private speech and as they move to a higher level the use of it is reduced, this theory provides another reasoning in the use of L1 as a platform from where students can make progress in their learning of a foreign language and its uses is accepted: “Learners often use their L1 to achieve control of the task, for example, to set and revise goals and to engage in private speech. In this respect, the use of the L1 should be viewed positively.” (Ellis, 2003, p. 200).
Rights in education is related to the United Nations “Universal Declaration of Human Rights” In the chapter about “Second Language Learners’ Rights” by Francisco Gomes de Matos he states: “a learner right should be understood, analysed, and implemented in its own right: as a new kind of humanising language-learning experience, inspired by insights from human rights, justice, peace and democracy.” In (Cook, 2002, p. 309).
One of the proposals about L2 rights says:
“Teachers should respect specific nationalities and their respective languages, for example Brazilian learners’ rights as speakers of Portuguese and as members of the Brazilian culture, and the rights of bilinguals and multilinguals.” Gomes de Matos in Cook, (2002, p. 312).
A final point to be mentioned here is the idea of “humanising” and the role of the teachers as “humaniser” which paraphrasing Gomes de Matos’ words means that teachers do not only teach they are also promoting values and rights and if the learners have the right of using the L1 to enrich their knowledge of L2, the teachers should use this as an efficient strategy and maximize the advantages that this brings in the process of learning. (Cook, 2002, p. 317)
The prohibition of using L1 in the classroom implies more than just a decision taking unilaterally by the teacher, it means that the teacher does not show respect to the learners and private them from their own identity when the objective should be to enable students to be themselves, and to project their own personality.
Ellis, (1986) gives an insight to the analysis of the negative aspects of using L1 in the classroom, the first one is related to the idea that L1 interferes with the learning of L2 and when this happens features of the L1 are transferred into the L2 and the most obvious evidence of this assumption is the “foreign” accents of the L2 users. The explanation that Ellis provides about transfer has a historical background to second language acquisition through the behaviourism paradigm during the 1960s whose representatives: Skinner and Watson had concepts of language learning based on the habit-formation theory (stimuli-response-reinforcement) and within this theory the definition of L1 and L2 acquisition was taken as being the same and errors were the result of L1 transfer so they should be avoided. (p. 19-40)
Ellis, (1986) added: “In behaviourist accounts of SLA, errors were considered undesirable. They were evidence of non-learning, of the failure to overcome proactive inhibition.” (p. 22). In order to predict potential errors so they can be anticipated and avoided, Lado, (1957) promoted the Contrastive Analysis which broadly speaking is a comparison of the foreign language with the native language, from here it emerged two versions; one stated that “all L2 errors can be predicted by identifying the differences between the target language and the learners’ first language”. The second version was based on the identification of errors using a corpus and error analysis hypotheses. Years later researchers have demonstrated that not all errors come from L1.
“It is now evident that the L1 is not the sole and probably not even the prime cause of grammatical errors”. “A major failing of Contrastive analysis has been the lack of a well-developed psychological theory. This has been one of the major sources of criticism of contrastive analysis.” “Third and perhaps most important, it was recognized that error was a multi-factor phenomenon and that interference, as one of the factors, interacted in complex ways with other factors.” (Ellis, 1986, p. 24)
There are specific classroom variables that are likely to benefit on using only the target language. As it was stated in argument 1, the benefits of L1 use are mostly limited to low level learners, on the contrary, some difficulties would be presented with students of higher levels mainly because they often feel the use of their first language slows their L2 learning.
At the starting point of learning a second language, learners tend to rely on their existing language knowledge to understand the target language but the consequences when it does not have a critical use are a large number of negative errors, in this case the use of L1 should be as a resource and with a selective reason for doing so. Using L1 in the classroom can also be dangerous if teachers do not caution its overuse which can led to an over dependency on the L1.
In a multilingual classroom there would be almost not benefit in using the L1. It would be difficult to pretend the teacher knows all the L1s spoken in the classroom and use them, on the other hand it would be more difficult that the students know all other languages, the use of only L2 in this case is acceptable as a matter of practicality.
L1 plays a fundamental role in L2 learning, as a resource of knowledge and a contributing factor in the development of learning a second language.
Students cannot be stopped of using certain strategy to simplify their tasks of comprehension, that is a natural tendency, so when students face with the learning of new items instinctively they will try to establish relations between L2 and L1, as a consequence those items which are similar to L1 will be more easily understood in this way if L1 provides the learner with a potential knowledge of L2, it facilitates not only comprehension but also learning.
On the other hand the L1 functions as a clip on which the learner can hold new information by making use of their schemata, thereby facilitating learning especially with beginner students who do not have too much experience with the target language than the assumption that L1 and L2 patterns are to a certain extent similar. As the learner progresses he will be able to realize the differences between L1 and L2 and will have less influence of L1.
The relevance of this issue in teaching methodology points towards the seeking for more serious studies about the implications of L2 learning to obtain a better understanding of the learning process. Our experience as teachers has shown that we should keep an open mind and always think about the possibility that principles can have two points of view according to the particular teaching context, what may be useful in one class may not be the same for another group of students. In the light of this new era of post-methods, the one that best suits the learners and teachers necessities would be the best option to be chosen. In any utility of L1, there should be taken into account the advantages or disadvantages for the students’ learning processes, if it actually will help students in their learning, if not the teacher needs to examine the reasons and make decisions according to knowledge of alternative pedagogical principles.
1.Cook V. (Ed.). (2002). Portraits of the L2 Users. Clevedon, England: Multilingual Matters Ltd.
2.Ellis R. (1986). Understanding Second Language Acquisition. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.
3.Ellis R. (2003). Task-based Language Learning and Teaching. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.
4.Lado R. (1957). Linguistics Across Cultures: Applied Linguistics for Language Teachers. Ann Arbor, MI, US: University of Michigan Press.
5.Ringbom H. (1987). The Role of the first Language in Foreign Language Learning. Clevedon, Avon, Philadelphia: Multilingual Matters Ltd.
6.Roberts AE. (1993). Reexamining English only in the ESL Classroom. TESOL quarterly, 27 (1), 9-32.
7.Timor T. (2012). Use of the Mother Tongue in Teaching a Foreign Language. Language Education in Asia, 2012, Vol. 3, Issue 1, pp. 7-17. Retrieved from: http://dx.doi.org/10.5746/LEiA/12/V3/I1/A02/Timor in March 28th, 2015.
8.Tollefson JW. (1995). Power and Inequality in Language Education. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.
[a] Maestra por asignatura del Área Académica de Odontología,Farmacia y Gerontología, Instituto de Ciencias de la Salud, UAEH. rosariodelos_milagros@yahoo.com.mx
[b] Maestra por asignatura del Área Académica de Odontología y Psicología, Instituto de Ciencias de la Salud, UAEH. petroviusky@hotmail.com