In increasingly culturally and linguistically diverse EAL classrooms, the use of the students' mother tongue(s) can provide students with valuable accoutrements that would optimize pedagogy. This presentation discusses how integrating the students' mother tongues in the classroom can contribute towards fostering meaningful and affirming ways of teaching and learning EAL literacy.
The possibility of maintaining an all-English approach has always been the quest of English as an additional language (EaL) classroom teachers as it has been for years treated as the ideal learning environment with greater learning opportunities (Hall & Cook, 2012). Despite the increasing emphasis on a bilingual approach to EAL teaching that embraces mother tongue (MT) use, recent studies report that national curricula around the globe still suggest maximal use of the target language (TL) (May, 2014). To abide by the ideal setting principle, Inbar-Lourie (2010) argued that EAL pedagogy has tended to ignore or even suppress bilingual or multilingual options endorsing a predominantly monolingual policy, one which equates good teaching with exclusive or nearly exclusive TL use (p.351). As a result, the students' MT was often interpreted by teachers as a source of embarrassment and in some cases borderline incorrect practice (Levine, 2003), engendering in some cases certain attitudes of segregation and exclusion. This presentation discusses how integrating the students' MT(s) in the classroom can contribute towards fostering meaningful ways of teaching and learning EAL literacy. The use of the MT should neither be treated as taboo, nor as an obstacle for the EFL classroom. Embracing usage of the MT in the classroom would certainly assist teachers but also students in the creation of a more productive classroom. References -Hall, G., & Cook, G. (2012). Own-language use in language teaching and learning. Language Teaching, 45(3), 271-308. -Inbar-Lourie, O. (2010). English only? The linguistic choices of teachers of young EFL learners. International Journal of Bilingualism, 14(3), 351–367. -Levine, G. S. (2003). Student and instructor beliefs and attitudes about target language use, first language use, and anxiety: Report of a questionnaire study. The Modern Language Journal, 87(3), 343- 364. -May, S. (2014). The multilingual turn. Oxon, United Kingdom: Routledge.
