A Study On Teacher's Codeswitching In The English Class Of Minority Nationalities

Codeswitching is one of the consequences of language contact. In the field of linguistics, the studies could be classified into five approaches: the grammatical approach, the sociolinguistic approach, the psychological approach, the conversational analysis approach and the pragmatic approach. The literature summary part has outlined the research results and the present situation of codeswitching home and broad.Since the year of 1968 witnessed the Bilingual Education Act approved by Congress in the U.S.A., codeswitching has been studied in the language classrooms. In the foreign language classroom the ratio the using of mother tongue becomes the argument's focal point. Intralingual strategy holds that foreign language is the best choice to govern and guide the language class while crosslingual strategy emphasizes the critical role of mother tongue in foreign language class. There are a few of researchers focusing on the research of teachers'codeswitching in the English class of college.Most of the existing research has only studied the codeswitching between two languages. The previous domestic research often takes the English class of Han Nationality student as the object to study. Up to now, no one has conducted an analysis on teachers'codeswitching in the context of minority's English class in China. The present study focuses on teachers'codeswitching in the English class of minority students (most of them are Uygur nationality) with an empirical way to probe the true situation, the students'attitude and their expectation of teachers'codeswitching as well as teachers'perception.To ensure the data needed in the research, there are three means: Questionnaire, classroom recording and teachers'interview. Questionnaire is applied to check whether there exists teachers'codeswitching, whether there are English Chinese codeswitching and English Uygur codeswitching (In Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, all minority students can skillfully use spoken Uygur language and Uygur language is the second assisting teaching language except Chinese in the English class), and which codeswitching is preferred, what the students'true attitudes, demands and judgments towards codeswitching are. Classroom recording can reflect the true situation of teachers'codeswitching in the English class of minority nationality. Teachers'interview includes teachers'teaching and training experiences, philosophy of teaching and teachers'own attitude towards their codeswitching in the English class of minority nationality. The subjects included freshmen, sophomores, and juniors, to be exact, from Urumqi Vocational University (uvu.), in the first term of the 2007-2008 academic year. After 180 copies of questionnaires were given and collected, the incomplete ones were discarded; only 150 copies were finally selected. Altogether 10 teachers of EFL in uvu. were asked to be recorded while they gave lectures and 4 of them were interviewed.There are six assumptions: 1. There is the existence of teachers'codeswitching in the English class of minority nationalities. The codeswitching covers both Chinese and Uygur language. 2. The students'demands for their teachers'using Chinese or minority language correlate negatively with their education levels. That is, freshmen ask for the most amount, and sophomores less, whereas juniors and seniors ask for the least amount of Chinese or minority language used by their teachers. 3. Female students are more tolerant of teachers'codeswitching while male students favor it more because the former have higher proficiency in English than the latter. 4. Students hold different views towards teachers'codeswitching to Chinese in different aspects of teaching English. They prefer teachers' codeswitching in reading, writing and translating courses to codeswitching in listening and speaking courses. Therefore, they have different standards for the ideal percentages of Chinese used by teachers in different aspects of English teaching and learning. 5. Students prefer teachers who can make codeswitching in their minority language to explain the difficult parts during their English classrooms in their lower grades. 6. Teachers codeswitch according to their understanding of students'English proficiency level and even Chinese level.The researching result has proved the above assumptions.1. There is the existence of teachers'codeswitching in the English class of minority nationalities. Most teachers and students welcome properly Chinese or Uygur code. Teaching assisted by Chinese is more common because most teachers are Han Chinese. 2. The students'demands for their teachers'using Uygur language correlate negatively with their education levels while they object to other minority languages. That is, freshmen ask for the most amount, and sophomores less, whereas juniors and seniors ask for the least amount of Chinese or minority language used by their teachers. But Chinese is preferred even by the third-year students owing to curriculum arrangement not because of learning grades (It is explained fully in 4.5 Minority students'option towards 2 categories of teacher's codeswitching in different English courses). 3. Male students need more teachers'codeswitching because the female minority students have higher proficiency in English than minority boys. 4. Students not only have different standards for the ideal percentages of Chinese used by teachers in different courses, they also have different standards for the ideal percentages of Uygur used by teachers. Minority students hope their teachers employ Chinese in the courses of English Extensive Reading and Translation. More Chinese is demanded than minority languages in other courses such as English Intensive Reading, English Listening, English Writing and English Grammar. English-only is strongly needed in teaching oral English and Audio-visual English. This part is a little different from the fourth assumption (Students hold different views towards teachers'codeswitching to Chinese in different aspects of teaching English. They prefer teachers' codeswitching in reading, writing and translating courses to codeswitching in listening and speaking courses. Therefore, they have different standards for the ideal percentages of Chinese used by teachers in different aspects of English teaching and learning). 5. Students questionnaire and teachers'interview have all confirmed that students prefer teachers who can make codeswitching in their minority language to explain the difficult parts during their English classrooms in their lower grades. 6. Teachers'interview can manifest that teachers should codeswitch according to their understanding of students'English proficiency level and even Chinese level. Classroom recording reflected the amount of Chinese or Uygur used by teachers in the English class of minority students and frequency of Chinese or Uygur code occurring in the class recordings.In the conclusion part several suggestions have been proposed based on relevant literature review and the investigation result. English course should be set up for minority students in junior high school as a general rule for Han Chinese students. The minority's bilingual education should be carried out earlier and thorough. The English teachers should receive correspondind fit for the minority region, that is, English teachers should basically have knowledge of spoken Uygur language (the major language used by local minority nationalities).