Teachers' attitudes towards and practices of L1 use in EFL classroom

Abstract

This study explored teachers’ attitudes towards their use of L1 in language classrooms and their practices in terms of use of L1 both as a communicative and methodological tool. The study was conducted with the participation of 120 teachers teaching at Anadolu University School of Foreign Languages, who were asked to fill a questionnaire survey developed by the researcher. The questionnaire’s focus was on the teachers’ attitudes and practices as a communicative tool and methodological tool. While answering the practices parts, teachers were asked to take the lesson and the level that they were teaching into account. The results of the quantitative analysis revealed that the teachers mostly had negative attitudes towards the use of L1, especially towards its use as a communicative tool; however, the teachers did not believe that L1 had negative effect on L2 acquisition. They were in favor of L1 since they believed that the learners did not have any other opportunity to access the target language. Thus, they believed that they should interact with the learners in TL as much as possible. This study implied that further research is needed to find out the variables which affect the teachers code-choices in more detail and see the picture from the students’ point of view.