4.3 Teachers’ attitude and teachers’ self-reported reality of using code-
4.3.4 The frequency of using code-switching to teach Intermediate and Upper-intermediate learners and the reasons behind teachers’ preference of
“As discussed in the two previous levels, the question of whether there is an alignment in teachers’ self-reported frequency of using CS and the amount of CS they think the most efficient in teaching grammar to intermediate and upper- intermediate learners is also investigated. Figure 4.6a gives the statistics of the average amount of CS that teachers reported they use in reality and Figure 4.6b illustrates the average amount of CS teachers believe the most efficient. Closer inspection of the pie charts shows that intermediate and upper-intermediate is the level that teachers use the smallest amount of CS. More than half of the participants advocating the implementation of both languages reported that they use less than 10% CS in their instruction. Meanwhile, none of them reported using more than 40% CS. What is striking about the figures in these pie charts is that there is a huge difference between teachers’ self-reported use in reality and their attitude about the amount of CS which is more efficient to teach this level of proficiency. All teachers think that they should use less CS to teach grammar for intermediate and upper-intermediate learners than they actually use in class.
Among twenty-seven teachers who use both L1 and L2, 77.8% of them believe that less than 10% CS should be used as a medium of instruction, which was 20% higher than the percentage of teachers who actually use that amount of CS in reality. Five in twenty- seven of the participants use 10%-30% CS, whereas only half of this number think that this amount of CS is efficient.”
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“The reason for choosing CS as a medium of instruction for students at intermediate and upper-intermediate also witnessed a difference in comparison with two previous levels. There are two main reasons for using CS at this level, including making students understand the context and concepts of sophisticated grammar points more easily and helping learners be aware of the similarities and differences between their native language and the target language. The percentage of these two reasons double that of the reason about helping students and teachers to create more active discussion than using English only. On the contrary with two other levels, the advantage of helping learners be more confident and better produce the target language seems not to be the explanation for using CS to teach intermediate and upper-intermediate leaners.”
“Regarding reasons given by 62.8% teachers who preferred to use only English to teach intermediate and upper-intermediate learners, there seems to be a significant difference with the results discussed in teaching beginning level, but fairly in agreement with the result of teaching elementary and pre-intermediate.
More than 80% of these participants believe that using only the target language can bring benefits for learners on (1) more opportunity to be exposed to English and (2) the ability to understand the teaching without any mother tongue’s interference. The third popular reason is that they afraid the use of code- switching will increase the students’ reliance and dependency on the teacher, which is agreed by 70% of these participants. It was followed by the belief that Figure 4.6a Teachers’ self-reported
frequency of CS used in reality
(intermediate and upper-intermediate)
Figure 4.6b Teachers’ attitude about the most efficient frequency of CS
(intermediate and upper-intermediate)
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only-English instruction boosts students’ needs to learn a particular grammar structure. Two least popular reason is the advantages of improving spoken English and giving more listening practice in English, but these reasons also accounted for about 40% of teachers’ agreement. (Figure 4.7)”
“Comparing the responses of participants for teaching three groups of level of proficiency, it is undeniable that teachers at the center are more likely to use both L1 and L2 in their instruction because they concern about factors relating to learners’ need. These factors are varied based on characteristics of learners of different levels. The most popular reasons were related to ensuring learners’ comprehension of the context and concepts of English grammar as well as learners’ awareness of the similarities and differences between L1 and L2.
This finding is consistent with that of Copland et al. (2011), Hidayati, I. N.
(2012), Nguyen (2012), Demir (2012) and (Tang, 2002). In teaching grammar for Beginners, CS is preferred mainly because teachers are afraid of the confusion and demotivation learners might encounter if 100% English is used, whereas it is not a concern for higher levels. By contrast, only-English instruction is employed
0.0%
10.0%
20.0%
30.0%
40.0%
50.0%
60.0%
70.0%
80.0%
90.0%
more opportunity to be exposed
to English
understand the teaching
without L1 interference.
more listening practice
improving spoken English
boost students’
needs
CS increases students’
reliance &
dependency
83.3% 86.7%
40.0% 43.3%
56.7%
70.0%
Figure 4.7 Reasons for using only English to teach grammar for elementary and pre-intermediate learners
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due to the concern about student’s reliance and dependency on teachers when they use CS. In addition, it was predicted that teacher choose to use CS because they can save time in explaining what they are teaching when they have to cover the grammar lesson in a tight allotted time, but this turned out to be not the case.
Not many teachers choose saving time as an explanation for their use of CS to teach grammar for all levels of proficiency and it becomes the least reason. This finding does not support the study of Nguyen, Q.T. (2012) and Lee (2010) which have suggested that CS is used when teachers want to save time and to avoid beating around the bush under the pressure of time restriction.”