Do Arab Students and Teachers Use English and Arabic during Instruction - Literature review Example

Literature Review: Do Arab and Teacher use both English and Arabic During their Instructional Time? Literature Review: Do Arab Students and Teacher use both English and Arabic During their Instructional Time? There has been a raging debate as to whether teachers should use or avoid the use of the learner’s first language during their instruction time. The debate has seen some teachers opt not to use the first language of their students based on the argument that using the first language will have the effect of impeding the learner’s progress in learning the second language. On the other hand, supporters of using a learner’s first language during their instructional time point out that it is beyond the ability of teachers to completely banish the learner’s own first language from a first language class. They argue that learning is essentially built upon previous learning and that the most significant resource that learners can be able to bring to a language learning class is primarily their existing linguistic knowledge. This debate has had a large impact on language classes and this paper will seek to answer the question as to whether students and teachers use both English and Arabic during their instructional time. The use of two languages in a sentence is termed as code-switching. In his journal article Ibrahim et al., (2013) notes that “code-switching has always been a rather intriguing phenomenon to sociolinguists and has continued to be a rather interesting area of discussion in relation to multilingual and bilingual speech communities”. The study conducted by Ibrahim et al., (2013) sought to try and observe the attitude among teachers as pertains to the use of code-switching in the teaching of the English language as a foreign language to their Malay students at one of Malaysia’s local universities. In addition to this, the study also sought to establish what was the main function of the use of code-switching by teachers within the classroom. The study is seen to provide useful information in relation to the subject of the paper as it was able to show that the teachers would often use a number of Arabic words such as nazar, Insya Allah and ustadz that could not be translated into English. These results helped to show that despite their claims to the contrary, teachers do indeed make use of code-switching during their instruction time with their students.According to this research, the use of code switching by teachers was found to be mainly used in the transference of subconscious markers such as kan, lah and tu. These subconscious markers are often used in the Malay syntactical pattern to help seek confirmation, to help in the making of an emphasis as well as in the making of enquiries. One of the main limitations of this study is that the study was only conducted in one university. To help in improving the credibility of the research findings, the researchers should have conducted the study across a number of different universities to establish if they would be able to duplicate the results they had achieved at the first university. This resource is quite credible as it was published in a respectable peer-reviewed journal. In a research study conducted by Bista (2010), the researcher sought to try and evaluate the various factors that seemed to be affecting code switching among a group of bilingual students within a university classroom. The study found that “the main factor for code-switching among these students was incompetence in the second language, an attempt to avoid misunderstanding, make an emphasis, as well as a need to maintain a degree of privacy” (Bista, 2010). This article provides useful information to the topic of this paper as the data derived from this study is seen to help in supporting the observation that had been made by Ibrahim et al., (2013) that found that code-switching is often used to help in seeking confirmation and the making of an emphasis. However this study is limited in that it does not detail just how the sample size for the study was selected. This information is important for researchers attempting to duplicate the results of this study. This resource is credible based on the fact that it was published in a peer reviewed journal article. The results of the study conducted by Ibrahim et al., (2013) are seen to be similar to those obtain by Ariffin&Husin (2011) who conducted a study on the use of code-switching and code-mixing in a Malaysian public university. In the study, the researchers hoped to highlight the frequency of the use of code-switching and code-mixing as well as the attitudes of both the students and their instructors towards the use of this communicative behavior. The most pertinent findings of this study showed that the use of code-switching and code-mixing in the classroom was usually related to linguistic competence of not only the students but also their teachers. According to Ariffin&Husin (2011) “code-switching was mainly used for the sole purpose of helping to facilitate effective learning and teaching”. The article by Ariffin&Husin (2011) is seen to provide useful information in relation to the topic of this paper in that the researchers were able to establish that although both the students and their teachers were in agreement that the use of code-switching and code-mixing helped in promoting better understanding, the most English proficient students perceived the use of these communication behaviors to be rather off-putting as they failed to aid them in improving their English language linguistic competence. Another significance of this study to the topic of this review is that Ariffin&Husin (2011) point out that code-switching and code-mixing is a dominant feature in university teaching in Libya despite the fact that the country language policy actively promotes the purification and maintenance of Arabic. The results of the findings in this research project as useful as they help to support those that were observed by Ibrahim et al., (2013) on the same subject matter. The study by Ariffin&Husin (2011) shares the same limitations with that conducted by Ibrahim et al., (2013) in that the sample size should have been expanded to include students in other universities. This resource is credible as it has been published in a credible peer reviewed journal. In a study conducted by Alenezi (2010), the researcher sought to try and investigate on what was the attitude of students in a science class in Kuwait towards the use of English code switching as a medium for use in their instruction. One of the most pertinent findings of this research study is that Alenezi (2010) found that “there is a strong preference by the students in using code-switching as opposed to the use of one language as a medium of instruction”. The results of the study by Alenezi (2010) provides useful information to the topic of this paper as they are seen to have mirrored those of the study that was conducted by Ariffin&Husin (2011) as well as that which was conducted by Ibrahim et al., (2013). the data in this articles helps to provide additional evidence that students and teachers tend to use both Arabic and English during their instruction time. The main limitation of this study was that it was only limited to the second year students that were present in Kuwait University’s Allied Health Science College. This factor is seen to severely limit the degree to which it is possible for the findings of this study to be generalized and applied to the target population. This resource is credible as it was published in a profession peer reviewed journal. In a study conducted by Taweel&Btoosh (2012), the researchers attempted to try and investigate the issue of code-switching with a particular emphasis on intra-sentential switches. The most pertinent finding of this research study was the researchers discovered that the “Jordanian Arabic-English students that participated in the study were opposed to the use of the communication tool of code-switching into another language after a grammatical morpheme” (Taweel&Btoosh, 2012). The article by Taweel&Btoosh (2012)provides useful information in relation to the topic of this paper as the data presented in the paper can be used to show that code-switching is not always accepted by students. The results of this study also help to show that the results that were obtained by Ariffin&Husin (2011), Ibrahim et al., (2013) and Alenezi (2010) are not universally applicable among all students. The studyby Taweel&Btoosh (2012) is limited in that it was only concentrated a small number of Jordanian-Arabic English speakers at one university and as such cannot be easily generalized across all students. Although this resource is credible, its credibility is impeded by the fact that it was only published on a professional, online peer reviewed journal. In a recent study conducted by Almansour (2010), the researcher sought to try and investigate the issue of code-switching among non-Arabic speaking Muslims that had been drawn from what was a rather diverse linguistic background. One of the most pertinent discoveries that was made by the researcher is that although the participants in the study did not speak the Arabic language, they were prone to code-switch form English to Arabic in an attempt by them to try and produce common Arabic phrases such as bismillah(In God’s name) and ma sha Allah (whatever God wills). This article helps to provide useful information in relation to this topic as the data from this study can be used to argue that non-Arabic speaking students at times also use code-switching. The resource is also useful to the study as the researcher provides what is an rather interesting argument, according to Almansour (2010)“it is rather important for teachers to support non-Arabic speaking students in their attempts to try and code-switch between English and Arabic”. Although the study by Almansour (2010) was able to use subjects from diverse linguistic backgrounds, it however has a critical limitation as the researcher fails to mention the duration over which the study was conducted. This information is of great importance to researchers that might be attempting to try and duplicate the results of this study. This resource is credible based on the fact that it was published in a journal and its author is an accomplished educator. In an article appearing in a 2011 issue of the Language Forum journal, Al-Saidat (2011) conducted an analysis of number and gender assignment of English loanwords that have been incorporated into Jordanian Arabic. The researcher found that “the English loan words that were used in Jordanian Arabicshould not be considered as being code-switches but instead, they should be regarded as borrowed words as they essentially follow the Arabic language system as opposed to their following the English language system” (Al-Saidat, 2011). The resource by Al-Saidat (2011) is useful to the topic of this review as the data presented in this study can be used to argue that some of the perceived instances of English Arabic code-switching between teachers and students are not essentially code-switching but the use of borrowed words. This is because in an attempt to try and not violate the morphological and phonological systems of the native Jordanian Arabic system, the borrowed English words undergo changes that categorize them into masculine and feminine forms based on the Arabic language. This study by Al-Saidat (2011) is limited by the fact that it rather synchronic and this factor has caused the study to solely focus on grammatical aspects such as the lexical borrowing of number and gender in the loan words that have been borrowed from English and adopted into Jordanian Arabic and are now widely used in the present day Arabic that is spoken in Jordan. As opposed to focusing on the number and gender grammatical aspects of these words, the study should have instead tried to focus on analyzing the history of these words. This resource is credible as it was published in a peer reviewed journal. References Alenezi, A. A. (2010). Students’ language attitude towards using code-switching as a medium of instruction in the college of health sciences: An Exploratory Study’. ARECLS, 7, 1-22. Retrieved from http://research.ncl.ac.uk/ARECLS/volume7/alenezi_vol7.pdf Almansour, B. S. (2010).On ‘Non-Arabic Speaking’Muslims.Griffith Working Papers in Pragmatics and Intercultural Communication.3, 1 (2010), 39-49. Retrieved from http://www.griffith.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0004/244462/4.-Almansour-On-non -Arabic-speaking-Muslims.pdf AL-Saidat, E. M. (2011) English Loanwords in Jordanian Arabic: Gender and Number Assignment.Language Forum. 37 (1), 59-72. Retrieved from http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Emad_Al - Saidat/publication/237233159_English_Loanwords_in_Jordanian_Arabic_Gender_and _Number_Assignment/links/00b49522e4aeca320a000000.pdf Ariffin, K., &Husin, M. S. (2011). Code-switching and code-mixing of English and Bahasa Malaysia in content-based classrooms: Frequency and attitudes.The Linguistics Journal, 5(1), 220-247. Retrieved from http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.418.219&rep=rep1&type=pdf Bista, K. (2010). Factors of Code Switching among Bilingual English Students in the University Classroom: A Survey. Online Submission, 9(29), 1-19. Retrieved from http://www.esp -world.info/Articles_29/Factors.pdf Ibrahim, E. H. E., Shah, M. I. A., &Armia, N. T. (2013). Code-switching in English as a foreign language classroom: Teachers’ attitudes. English Language Teaching, 6(7), p139. Retrieved from http://www.ccsenet.org/journal/index.php/elt/article/viewFile/28012/16900 Taweel, Q. A. &Btoosh A. M. (2012).Syntactic Aspects of Jordanian Arabic-English Intra -Sentential Code-Switching.Linguistica online. 1-21. Retrieved from http://www.phil.muni.cz/linguistica/art/taweelbtoosh/tab-001.pdf Read More