A Multi-dimensional Study On Code-switching Of Teachers In Senior High School English Classes

Code-switching refers to two or more language variants that occur during the same conversation or utterance.In the 1960 s,code-switching attracted widespread attention from the social community,especially from the field of education.A large number of linguists and subject teachers began to cast their sight on code-switching in second or foreign language classrooms.Theoretically,the target language should be widely advocated during the English teaching process.However,in practice,the switching between Chinese and English is very common in the senior high school English classes.The use of the mother tongue has always been a controversial issue,scholars hold different attitudes towards the application of code-switching in senior high school English classes.The existing literature mainly discusses code-switching from the perspective of sociology and psychology,and it has achieved specific achievements.However,the research primarily focused on college English classes,while less attention is paid to high school English classes.Besides,related research lack an active investigation into the process of code-switching.Based on the existing literature and using Krashen's language input hypothesis,Verchuere's speech adaptation theory and Myers-Scotton's markedness theory as the theoretical basis,six English teachers in the senior high school were selected as research participants with 24 English courses were observed and recorded.The collected corpora were analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively based on transcription.Quantitative research mainly adopted classroom observation and tape recording to collect the frequency of code-switching among the two grades and different course types,also,the ratio of different types of teachers' code-switching were also calculated.Qualitative research mainly adopted interview to investigate the various functions of teachers' code-switching from different perspectives,namely,sociolinguistics,psycholinguistics,pragmatics,and conversational analysis,besides,factors affecting teachers' code-switching were also collected.The following research questions are proposed: 1)What are the types andfrequency of teachers' code-switching in senior high school English classes? 2)What are the main functions of senior high school English teachers' code-switching? 3)What are the factors that affect the use of code-switching of senior high school English teachers?The significant findings of this research show: 1)The frequency of code-switching varies from grade to grade and shows differences among different course types.This article mainly collects three different types of code-switching,namely,inter-sentence code-switching,intra-sentence code-switching,and tag-switching.Inter-sentence code-switching is the most frequently used among all types.2)Code-switching from different perspectives shows different functions.From the perspective of sociolinguistics,teachers' code-switching is mainly used to highlight the identity of teachers and show their academic depth;From the perspective of pragmatic,teachers' is primarily used to close or alienate the relationship between teachers and students;And teachers' code-switching is mainly used to activate the classroom atmosphere and improve teaching efficiency from the perspective of psychology.3)There are so many factors affecting teachers' code-switching,and factors are mainly divided into two aspects in this thesis:linguistic factors and non-linguistic factors.Finally,based on the current situation of code-switching on English classes in senior high schools,some principles are proposed that English teachers should follow: 1)Target language should be used prior in English classes.2)The marked mother tongue should be used during English teaching.3)Code-switching should be used timely and limitedly.4)Follow the principle of compliance with the usage of code-switching.Finally,some pedagogical implications and limitations are put forward for further investigation: As an effective and unavoidable teaching strategy,code-switching should be used carefully and consciously in the classroom,but the negative effects of code-switching should also be considered.