An Investigation into Teachers’ Cognition: Saudi English Teachers’ Instructional Practices in the use of Code Switching.

Abstract

Research on teacher cognition and language instruction has recently attracted attention among researchers in the field of language teaching. Educational research has also revealed that the study of teacher cognition about all aspects of their work can help in understanding what they hold in their minds and how it contributed to their classroom practices. This study examined the origin of twelve English teachers’ cognition and understand how their mental perspectives are displayed through their instructional performances in classrooms regarding the practice of code switching in language teaching, particularly in the context of Saudi Arabia, where Arabic is its main language. The necessity of carrying out such a study is to contribute to finding out some significant aspects of teachers prior learning experiences that appear to be powerful in forming their cognitions and understand how these mental constructs underpin their instructional performances regarding the practice of code switching. Moreover, the study seeks to determine the role of contextual factors that might impact teachers’ instructional practices so as to improve and facilitate the teaching process. Qualitative data was collected using autobiographies and semi-structured interviews. The findings of the study showed that teachers perceived code switching strategies to be necessary as they shared similar prior educational experiences. Their focal concern of cognition regarding the practice of code switching, though it seemed to be against the policy on language teaching and some of participants’ perspectives, was to facilitate the teaching process due to the domination of the Grammar Translation Method in language teaching. The findings also revealed that teachers’ ongoing actual practices are significant as they are influenced by contextual factors imposed by institutional policies which appeared to be obstacles to the fulfilment of their tasks.