Methods to reduce Mother Tongue Interference (M T I ) in the classroom

Introduction: The importance of English language acquisition as a stepping-

stone for proficiency in school subjects cannot be over emphasized. The
knowledge of English is important both for educational, national and economic
development of a country. English is the official language of administration
and commerce and also a major language of science. It should be further
highlighted at the need for improving the quality of spoken and written English
language among children. Although English language retains its dominant
position in the education delivery system, the thrust of our educational
language policy is the use of the mother tongue or the language of the
immediate community..

English Language Teaching, like all other fields of human endeavour,

generates its share of false prophets. Year after year, we find ourselves that
are buzzing with the news that someone has found “The Best Method”.

Wilkins observes:

“When learning a foreign language an individual already knows his

mother tongue, and it is this which he attempts to transfer. The transfer
may prove to be justified because the structure of the two languages is
similar – in that case we get “Positive transfer” or “facilitation” – or it
may prove unjustified because the structure of the two languages are
different – in that case we get “negative transfer” or “inference”
(Wilkins, 1972 : P 199)

Language Learning is about taking risks and rising to the challenge. Teaching
English as a second language presents some difficulties, one of which is MTI,
especially Pronunciation and Transliteration.

The most noticeable hurdle our students face is MTI. Mother tongue
therefore, is defined as the language which a group of people considered to
inhabitants of an area acquired in the early years and which eventually
becomes their natural instrument of thoughts and communication.

Why Monolingualism?

This is a justified fear. It reminds me of the “slippery slope” argument, that

once you start you will find it impossible to stop just like the first step onto the
slippery slope leads to sliding right down the hill. This argument is also called
the “thin end of the wedge” argument or the “foot in the door” argument.
In all these images, an initial first step is irreversible and leads to more steps
along that path.

I like to compare this to the question of whether or not to drink alcohol, which
used to say “It is the first drink that make you an alcoholic not the last”. It is
much easier to say “no” totally and from the beginning, than to exercise
control and restrict the alcohol.

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This illustration of alcoholic drink parallels the use of L1 in the L2 classroom It
is much easier to refuse the L1 totally than it is to control the use of L1.
Butzkamm though is arguing for controlled principled use and argues that it
can mean L2 is learned quicker.

(http://creativecommons.org/licnces/bsa/3.0)

If your students are monolingual then it is easier to make a contrastive

analysis, diagnose the problems and find solutions,

 The first step is to find errors.

 Be careful not to assume that all errors stem form mother tongue
interferences.
 Try to identify the most common ones and give these priority. The
errors can be classified by type:

Pronunciation
Structural
Lexical
(http://esl-school.com)

There is mother tongue interference in the areas of syntax, grammar, lexis

and pronunciation.

For Pronunciation, look at individual sounds (Phonemes); errors might be

happening because a specific sound in English does not occur in MTI. In this
case, the students need to be helped first to actually hear the sound, then
they need to be shown how the sound is formed and then given lots of
practice in using it. Stress patterns at word and sentence level could be
another phonological challenge and Intonation patterns should be examined
too. Students will find it easier to produce correct pronunciation of sounds if
they know the phonemic alphabet as, unfortunately. English spelling often
hinders pronunciation – the classic example is the many different
pronunciations possible for “ough” – cough, although, through, bough,
rough etc

Structural errors occur most often because the students tries to impose the
mother tongue patterns on the target language, this might be word order, use
of Tenses, difficulty with articles and many more. Once again you need first to
identity the most common problems and then they can highlight the ways in
which English differs.

With Vocabulary, you might find a problem with “false friends” or it might be
that the mother tongue uses certain expressions that the students translate
literally but the expression does not exists in English. An example that comes
to mind is, a student who used the more colorful expression “blood guilty” for
the English “murderer”. Some words in English such as make/do, say/tell
cause confusion because their literal translation into other languages suggest
different uses.
(http://eslschool.com)

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 Should EL teachers use the mother tongue in the classroom?

The rationale for not using the mother tongue was a mixture of pedagogical
and pragmatic. First, use only of the target language allows learners…..

Maximum exposure to English. Thus learners can accustom their ear to the
new sounds, develop listening strategies and be discouraged from translating.
Teachers with multi-lingual groups could not be expected to know all the
native languages of their students, so English was the only practical medium
for teaching. And even teachers with mono-lingual groups do not always a
level of proficiency in the language of the students to be able to teach in that
language.

But if a class is monolingual, the reasons for using the mother tongue for
specific reasons are surely convincing. First there is the time-saving benefit of
issuing complex task instructions in the mother tongue or troubleshooting
when activities are not working too well. There are issues of comprehension.
Take false friends as an example. If the learners are children then use of
mother tongue in such situations can be helpful to keep the pace of the lesson
brisk so that the children do not loose attention.

Recommendation:

 Having discovered that the use of mother tongue in school/colleges

contributes or influence students performance in English, English
language should be used as a medium of communication within and
outside the classroom.
 Both teachers and students should endeavour to improve their
proficiency level of language.
 Good reading habit and library study should also be developed in the
students.
 Students should also be given the oppurtunity to explain points and
express views in class discussion and any error made should be
corrected by the teacher without any intimidation as these will enhance
a proper evaluation of learner’s performance or progress in English
language.
 Textbooks that are useful in English language should be of great
amount in the library to augment student’s efforts.
 Teachers must continually update their knowledge within their
discipline. They must keep information about new methods and
materials.

Above all, if all the recommendations are strictly adhered to, there will be
great improvement to student’s performance in English Language.

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Data Analysis:

Table 1: The Responses of the students or avoidance of English language

despite the fact that subject.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Respondents Yes No Undecided Total
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
100 5 75 20 100
Percentage 5% 75% 20% 100%
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This distribute indicates 75% do not avoid English Language, 5% avoid it
while 20% were undecided.

Table 2: The responses of students on if the consider English Language a

difficult subject
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Respondents Yes No Undecided Total
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
100 95 5 0 100
Percentage 95% 5% 0% 100%
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
95% consider English Language a difficult subject while 5% do not consider
it a difficult subject to understand

Table 3: The responses on if mother tongue hinders respondent’s interest in

English as a subject.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Respondents Yes No Undecided Total
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
100 75 25 ------ 100
Percentage 75% 25% 0% 100%
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Observation at table 3 shows that 75% admit that their mother tongue hinders
their interest in English Language while 25% do not agree that mother tongue
hinders interest in English Language.

Table 4: The responses on if students are keen to master English Lanuage to

perfection.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Respondents Yes No Undecided Total
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
100 90 10 ------ 100
Percentage 90% 10% 0% 100%
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nintly percent of the repondents are keen to master English Lanuage while
10% are not keen.

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Table 5: The responses whose parents interact in English Lanuage at home.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Respondents Yes No Undecided Total
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
100 20 80 ------ 100
Percentage 20% 80% 0% 100%
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
80% respondents parents do not interact with them at home in English
Lanuage while only 20% of respondents parents interact in English Language.

Table 6: The responses of students who feel comfortable in the midst of

friends who speak English Lanuage fluency.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Respondents Yes No Undecided Total
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
100 10 90 ------ 100
Percentage 10% 90% 0% 100%
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
90% of the respondents feel comfortable in the midst of friends who speak
English language fluently while 10% do not feel comfortable because of their
inability to meet the standard of their friends.

Since there is no quick fix here, it would be helpful if we could give each
student a personal analysis so that each one can work on his or her specific
difficulties. I hope this is of some use.
David Adebayo Oluwole

B.Waheeda Parveen
Asst.Prof in English,
SVIT, Hampapuram,
ANANTAPUR.
wahi_arif@yahoo.co.in