A Study Of Mongolian English Teacher’s Classroom Code-switching In Junior Middle School From The Perspective Of Adaptation Theory

Classroom-based code-switching researches in bilingual and multilingual settings started in the latter half of the1970s and have been studied from various perspectives both in abroad and at home. At the beginning, researchers discouraged the using of native language in bilingual or foreign language teaching. However, many researchers acknowledged the code-switching as a strategy in foreign language teaching later on.In China, researchers mainly focus on the Chinese English teacher’s classroom code-switching. However, there are few researches on ethnic minority English teachers’ code-switching. The thesis aims to explore Mongolian English teacher’s code-switching in classroom from the perspective of Yu Guodong’s (2004) adaptation theory who analyzes the adaptation of code-switching from linguistic reality, social convention and psychological intention.The research chooses the northeastern part of Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region to be the setting. More exactly, Jarud Banner of Tongliao City and Jalaid Banner of Hingan League are chosen as the sampling places of the study.The author mainly adopts qualitative method then quantitative method. By participant’s observations, the author collected altogether429.7minutes recording of11teachers and their students’ natural spoken language in classroom and239questionnaires from16teachers and223students. Based on the analysis of collected data, Mongolian English teacher’s code-switching is studied from the following aspects: the frequency of teacher’s classroom code-switching, students’ attitudes towards teachers’code-switching, patterns, types, reasons, and adaptability of Mongolian English teachers’ classroom code-switching.The findings of the research indicate that Mongolian English teachers apply code-switching as an effective teaching strategy and the students also hold positive attitudes towards teachers’ code-switching. The linguistic phenomenon of code-switching occurs frequently in Mongolian English teacher’s classroom teaching and can be categorized in seven patterns and three types. As minority foreign language teacher, Mongolian English teacher’s code-switching is much more complex than Chinese English teacher’s code-switching that they switch among Mongolian, Chinese and English. In their classroom code-switching, intra-sentential code-switching occurs quite often than other two types of code-switching and they apply code-switching for many reasons. Among them, the most important reason is to promote students’ understanding such as the need for translation, perception of students’linguistic competence, for clearer explanation of linguistic points and grammar points, and convenient and saving time. For adaptive principle, teacher’s code-switching is mainly adapted to linguistic reality, teacher’s role, perception of students’language competence, dynamic classroom environment.