The use of mother tongue in foreign language teaching is still causing various dilemmas. Experts’ views about the use and disuse of mother tongue are divided. The problem is mostly that there are no concrete guidelines about of the amount of mother tongue in teaching, the circumstances in which to use it and the methods to use in teaching children. Because of the discordant views, several different methods of language teaching have been developed. Teachers are left to make a decision of a suitable method for them and children they are teaching on their own. They often decide on the appropriate method on the basis of different factors like prior knowledge of children, types of activities, their own beliefs …
In the theoretical part of the thesis, I described early foreign language teaching, I presented different methods and approaches, wrote about the use of mother tongue in foreign language teaching, and listed advantages and disadvantages about the use of mother tongue. In the final part I listed some guidelines that I gathered for the use of mother tongue in foreign language teaching and described some research results on this topic.
In the practical part of the thesis, I researched how much mother tongue is used in foreign language teaching in kindergarten, when teachers use mother tongue as well as the teachers’ points of views and opinions about the use of mother tongue in foreign language teaching. The practical part of the thesis is based on interviews and observations. The teachers who were part of the interviews and observations are teaching English in kindergartens. The research shows that the use of mother tongue represents about 0–20 % of lesson. Teachers use mother tongue in various cases, but most commonly to discipline and give instructions. The results show that participants support the use of mother tongue in foreign language teaching, but they believe that it should be used only when it is necessary. They are aware of the positive and negative aspects of mother tongue use.
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