A Study On Code-switching In The College English Classroom In China

In recent years, whether teachers should teach in target language exclusively or in L1 and target language code-switching in foreign language classroom has always been a debate issue for many teachers and educators. People who insist on target language exclusively teaching assume that second language learners should get target language input as much as possible, and teachers should create target language circumstance for learners. They think that code-switching deprives students of the opportunities to get close to target language, which is bad for second language acquisition, while people who approve of L1 and target language code-switching assume that principled and limited code-switching promotes SLA.Many domestic and foreign researchers have done a lot of empirical investigations and conclude that principled and limited classroom code-switching is an effective way to promote second language learning. This study assumes that if the target language input cannot be fully comprehended by learners, classroom L1 and TL code-switching is necessary. Principled and limited classroom L1 and TL code-switching can help not only to comprehend the input, but also to activate classroom atmosphere, increase students'interest in second language learning and promote the interaction between the teacher and students, which can make the SLA process more effective. Nowadays in China, many teachers and educators take mother tongue as a taboo in EFL class. Whether to use mother tongue in EFL class is a confusing problem, especially for the new teachers. Most classroom code-switching researchers focus on the analysis of teacher talk, few researchers study code-switching in the process of classroom interaction between the teacher and students in China. The effects of limited and principled classroom code-switching on students'English proficiency have not been quantitatively studied by now. In light of the current situation of classroom code-switching research in China, the author studies classroom code-switching in the process of classroom interaction between the teacher and students in order to answer three questions: (1) the current situation and characteristics of code-switching in college EFL classroom in China, (2) the interaction situation both in English Chinese switching class and in English exclusively class, (3) the effects of limited and principled classroom code-switching on students'English proficiency. Besides, this thesis investigates how to make good use of classroom code-switching to promote English teaching and learning. With regard to the third research question, the author makes a hypothesis: Limited and principled classroom code-switching can promote students'English proficiency.This thesis mainly studies classroom code-switching qualitatively and quantitatively. The instruments are the classroom observation and an experiment. The English lessons of two freshmen classes and two sophomore classes are audio-recorded in one college. The collected audio materials are analyzed to find out the current situation and characteristics of college EFL classroom code-switching. In addition, an experiment is conducted. One English teacher teaches two different freshmen classes. The teaching contents are same in the two classes. One class receives English exclusively instruction and the other receives English Chinese code-switching instruction. The interaction frequency is recorded and compared at last. Then the role of classroom code-switching in classroom interaction between the teacher and students is analyzed. At last, the end-term English scores of the two groups are analyzed by the Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS version 11.5). The two scores of the two groups were compared to find out if there is a significant difference between them.