The success of bilingual immersion programmes has promoted the debate about whether learners' first language (L1) should be used in foreign language classrooms. Nevertheless, Content and Language Integrated Learning, a pedagogical approach embedded in the development of multilingualism and multiliteracy theories, has overstepped the monolingual…

Code-switching or using a native language (L1) is commonly employed in an EFL classroom to facilitate comprehension to low-proficiency learners. However, in a context where teachers and learners do not share the same mother tongue, it causes some challenges to language teachers. As teachers' beliefs directly influence their practices, and research…

When teaching foreign languages to very young learners, motivation is an issue that needs to be taken into account even more than in the case of any other age group. Teaching materials and students' textbooks used in schools and preschools, however carefully crafted, often fail to cater for the genuine interests of children and to invoke intrinsic…

This article describes a pilot study conducted by teacher candidates (TCs) at an elementary level charter school in Buffalo, New York. The TCs, undergraduate and graduate level college students, enrolled in an English Language Arts/Social Studies methods course block, wrote bilingual English/Spanish information texts and used them in conjunction…

Reviews recent theoretical and empirical literature regarding teachers' uses of the target (TL) and first languages (L1) in second and foreign language classrooms. Explores several issues related to teachers' use of the L1 and the TL in the classroom; exposure to TL input, student motivation, cognitive considerations, code switching, and…