Open the door to English with your native language : the role of the mother tongue in English language teaching in China

摘要

This dissertation explores one of the most fundamental but controversial issues in foreign language teaching (FLT) – the role of the learners’ mother tongue (MT)/first language in foreign language (FL) classrooms – with a special focus on the FLT situations in China. The monolingual approach or the English-only approach, which excludes learners’ MT from FL classrooms, is currently dominating the mainstream thinking in FLT. However, evidence presented in this study suggests that the MT is critically necessary for effective FL teaching and learning, especially for beginners. This dissertation consists of five chapters.CHAPTER 1 reviews the history of China’s English Language Teaching (ELT) from imperial to modern times, with a special look at how the use of the target language and the learners’ MT is balanced in textbooks and in classroom interactions. A detailed analysis of the textbooks used in public schools in China over the last five decades yielded valuable information about the shifting methodological trends and the swinging official FL policies in China’s recent history. There are some rich sources of information about FL teaching and learning, which however have been given very little attention to, for example, early missionaries’ FL learning. The biographies quoted in CHAPTER 2 suggest that early missionaries in China learned the Chinese language by no means in a monolingual way, but with a lot of bilingual assistance. Similarly, another source which is often overlooked is “Teachers as Learners”. There are some self-reports in the didactic literature from FL teachers who start to learn another FL themselves. These teachers have been trained to teach monolingually, but in their own FL learning, they strongly prefer bilingual help. When taking an opposite position in the language classroom, teachers are often amazed to realise how contradictory their perceptions as learners are to their perceptions as teachers.CHAPTER 3 mainly presents the controversy in China over the role of the MT in FLT. On the one hand, many Chinese teachers of English still stick to the Grammar-Translation Method, teaching a FL extensively through the MT of the learners. This is probably due to their unfamiliarity with modern communicative teaching methods and also due to their incompetence in the target language. On the other hand, a huge number of native English speakers are employed to teach English in China. They teach English only through English, because they have no/little knowledge of the Chinese language, and also because the modern FLT methodology emphasises that a FL should best be taught monolingually. Besides, there is a huge gap between rural areas and big cities in China with regard to conditions and possibilities. Therefore, this controversy will last many years in China. Moreover, the focal points of the MT controversy world-wide and the developments in neuroscience concerning the human brain and language acquisition are also included in this chapter.CHAPTER 4 includes some of the developments and innovations in bilingual language teaching in the West, showing when and how to use the learners’ MT appropriately. Most bilingual methods and techniques in Chapter 4 (e.g. Bilingual Method, Suggestopedia, etc.) are demonstrated step by step, not only at a theoretical level but also in a practical sense. An analysis of these methods together with comparisons between different methods is also included. Bilingual techniques as used in FL courses for self-study are also demonstrated and discussed. However, despite the developments in FLT, there is still much to be tested and researched, in order to find an optimal method for classroom FLT situations.CHAPTER 5 outlines those innovations in ELT in China which include the systematic use of the MT (e.g. Sandwich-story Method, Crazy English, etc.). They are good examples of the considerable progress China has made in its FL education over the last thirty years. Although they are indigenous ELT methods particularly designed for Chinese learners of English, they may be adaptable to similar teaching situations where English is taught as a FL to large groups of learners at beginning or lower levels.CONCLUSION: Although a world-wide trend of rethinking the role of the MT in FLT has begun, there is still some way to go towards a major pedagogical shift. The dominating monolingual principles should be seriously questioned and a systematic use of the MT in FLT should be promoted. A modern communicative FLT approach is to integrate both monolingual and bilingual techniques which have proved effective in classrooms.