If I had to choose the topic I see the most discussion about on various forums, it would probably be students’ use of their first languages in school. It’s a difficult question. On the one hand, we need students to learn English, both for their own sake and ours. On the other hand, we know that many linguistic skills transfer; thus, students’ English abilities will only be enhanced and strengthened by their proficiency in their first language. So, how do we find the balance? After more than two decades in the field, I can assure you I do not have the perfect answer. However, I do have thoughts informed by experience, and I’m happy to share them with you.

My thoughts (and conversations with students) generally come down to time, place, and people. When deciding what language we should use, we need to consider the time and place and people involved in the interaction. I usually explain it to my students using examples from their lives. I ask them something such as, “Do you speak and act at your grandmother’s dinner table the same way you do on a picnic with your friends?” or “Do you speak in a meeting at work the same way you do when watching a sporting event at a bar with your friends?” The answer is always “No.” I then ask them why not, and they tell me about how they are with different people and doing different things (or about how their grandmother would punish them or their boss would fire them). We then go on to discuss how this applies at school. We need to consider where we are, what we are doing, and who we are with. These factors will then determine how we should speak, including which language we should use.

Time & Place

The part of the school day is a factor that must be considered. If we are in class or doing academic activities, we should be trying to use English. English is the language of instruction (assuming one is not in a bilingual school/program), the language of assessment, and will likely be the language of our students’ current and/or future workplaces. Therefore, English should be our primary language at this time. That doesn’t mean that the use of students’ first language is forbidden or should be punished. There is nothing wrong with getting a brief clarification from a friend or instructor who speaks your first language. There is also nothing wrong with quickly translating a word here or there. What we do not want to do, though, is create a dependency on translation. The early days will be rough, very rough, but it is too easy to become dependent on human and machine translation. I have had many students still using fully translated materials and unable to communicate effectively in English after multiple years in US schools. That is a problem. An overreliance on translators and translated materials can also create an inequitable learning environment. Learning materials and bilingual instructors are relatively easy to come by for some languages. But what happens when a student who speaks a different language, a language that is more difficult to access materials in, moves into town? Or what about programs with a dozen (or more) languages represented? It is far better to start with the expectation that English is the language of academics than to risk having a problem later.

People

So if English is the language of academics, that means students are free to use their first languages in non-academic settings such as lunch, right? Yes and no. This is where the other people involved in the interaction need to be considered. In social settings, using the majority or most common language is just plain polite. It is rude to purposefully leave people out. If everyone in the group speaks the same first language, use it! If not, then the default should be to the majority language of the country, which, for us here in the USA, is English. A few years back, I saw a beautiful example of this in my middle school classroom. I noticed that a group of my female students kept showing one another things on their Chromebooks, and they didn’t seem to be making much progress on the assignment. I walked by them, trying to see what they were doing, and noticed that every one of them had Google Translate pulled up. I stepped away but kept watching, and what they were doing soon became apparent. Four girls spoke Spanish, one spoke Arabic, and another spoke Mandarin. Since they were all new to English (less than a year of exposure for most), they were using Google Translate to facilitate their conversation. The four Spanish speakers had realized that the other two girls were being left out and voluntarily stopped speaking in Spanish, switching to English. Initially, the conversation was about the assignment. Later, it turned to chatting about typical teenage topics (mostly which of the boys in class they thought were cute). Whenever someone couldn’t remember or didn’t understand an English word (which was often because they were all so new to the language), they’d use Google Translate, translating each word or phrase three times. It was a beautiful example of thinking about who you are with and factoring that into your decision about which language to use.

Conclusion

Does asking students to consider where they are, what they are doing, and who they are with answer all of the questions regarding the use of their first languages in school? No, of course not. But it does help me to decide when to push students to use English and forego translation options and when to “just let it go” for a time. It also helps students begin to think through these things and make these decisions for themselves before they enter the workforce and the stakes become much higher. Happy teaching, everyone.