The Effect of Using EFL Learners’ Mother Tongue on Their Grammatical Knowledge Improvement: Investigating Two Proficiency Levels
Subject Areas : Journal of Studies in Learning and Teaching English
Sara Shafiee
1
,
Leila Akbarpour
2
1 - Department of Foreign Languages, Shiraz Branch, Islamic Azad University,
Shiraz, Iran
2 - Department of English Language, Shiraz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shiraz, Iran
Keywords: Keywords: Grammar Learning, EFL, First Language, mother tongue,
Abstract :
ABSTRACTThe present quasi-experimental study aimed at exploring whether using EFL learners' mother tongue has any influence on EFL learners' grammatical knowledge improvement at two proficiency levels, i.e., elementary and intermediate. It also aimed at investigating whether there were any differences between elementary and intermediate EFL learners' grammatical knowledge improvement as a result of using their L1 in the classroom. To achieve this goal, 30 elementary and 32 intermediate Iranian EFL learners aged between 16 and 32 were chosen from an English institute in Shiraz. The sampling procedure was of a non-probability convenience type. The participants were divided into two experimental and two control groups. First, Oxford Placement Test was used to homogenize the participants at each proficiency level. Moreover, to investigate the effectiveness of the treatment and also compare the two proficiency levels regarding the effectiveness of the treatment, two teacher-made multiple-choice grammar tests, one for the elementary level and another for the intermediate level participants, were employed. Each of these tests was used both as the pre- and the post-test. In order to answer the research questions, independent and paired samples t-tests were run, and the effect sizes were estimated. The findings highlighted that the experimental groups at both proficiency levels significantly outperformed the control groups on their posttests. In addition, it was concluded that using L1 had a slightly greater effect on grammatical knowledge improvement of elementary than intermediate learners.
