Using bilingual techniques in teaching EFL to Turkish learners: effects on self-efficacy and learner perception (a case study)

The assumption that the learner?s first language has to be avoided in teaching and learning a foreign language has been challenged seriously over the last two decades. A great deal of studies suggests that L1 provides learners with a tool to perform cognitive, social and affective functions in the learning process and can be exploited in language teaching in form of cross-linguistic comparison. A catalogue of bilingual techniques to implement L1 systematically into L2 teaching and learning is now available. This mixed methods research reports on a case study that examined the effects of an inclusion of bilingual techniques into teaching a group of 26 Turkish young adult EFL learners at a Turkish state university. The study took 14 weeks and the group was taught by the researcher. A self-efficacy scale of English was used to investigate effects of an implementation of bilingual techniques on learner self-efficacy perceptions. Furthermore, the learners? perception of L1 inclusion in teaching and learning was studied. For this reason, the participants wrote minute papers after bilingual techniques had been employed in class at regular intervals and filled in a course evaluation form after the course had been completed. Six participants (identified by extreme sampling strategy according to the results of the English self-efficacy scale) were invited to take part in a semi-structured interview to gain deeper understanding of the learner perceptions and to triangulate the results of the comparative analysis of the self-efficacy scale. Additionally, a teacher journal was used as an instrument for data collection. The quantitative data were analysed with descriptive statistics and Wilcoxon signed rank test. The qualitative data were analysed with content analysis. The analysis revealed that five of the items related to perceptions about speaking and writing in the self-efficacy scale changed significantly, while for the other perceptions covered in the self-efficacy scale significant differences were not ascertained. The findings from the semi-structured interview suggest that changes in self-efficacy were associated with the implementation of bilingual techniques and also with other factors. The participants perceived the bilingual techniques employed as functional for their learning, but also negative evaluations were made. According to the overall appraisal and feedback received from the participants, L1 inclusion was generally perceived positively. However, it was also observed that learner engagement was rather poor in the activities in which bilingual techniques were not used. Keywords: Bilingual Techniques, Self-Efficacy Perception, EFL, Young Adult Learners