Abstract
The purpose of this study is to examine students’ perceptions of L1 translations when learning L2 vocabulary as a pre-listening activity and to investigate their listening comprehension test performance. Higher and lower level Japanese university students were required to learn vocabulary as a pre-listening activity. Both levels were divided into two groups. One group was asked to learn vocabulary items using L1 translations, whereas the other used L2 definitions. Previous research has suggested that using L1 translations is preferable for lower level students. However, the results of the present study contradict the findings of previous studies. The present study shows that both higher and lower level students tended to prefer L2 definitions when learning L2 vocabulary, and that this tendency was stronger among lower level students. Moreover, regarding listening comprehension test performance, the results show that higher level students who used L1 translations consistently outperformed those who used L2 definitions, although lower level students did not show such consistency.
Highlights
1.1 Introduction of the StudyThis study examines students’ perceptions of L1 use in the EFL classroom
The results indicate that students who adopted a bilingual rather than monolingual approach exhibited seemingly superior performance; the differences between them were statistically insignificant
The follow-up survey results show that the mean scores for students who preferred a monolingual approach were 4.292 and 3.864 among higher and lower level students, respectively
Summary
This study examines students’ perceptions of L1 use in the EFL classroom. Japan is a largely monolingual society in which most students are native speakers of Japanese. There have been ongoing debates concerning whether or not teachers should use their students’ L1 in EFL classrooms. This study investigated students’ perceptions of L1 use as they completed a listening comprehension test. I began by examining the listening test results to determine whether L1 use was a more effective learning mode for participants when compared to L2 use alone. I administered a questionnaire to determine participants’ preferences for L1 or L2 use in vocabulary learning
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