BILINGUALS’ LINGUISTIC REPERTOIRE AND FOREIGN LANGUAGE INSTRUCTION: WHAT DO TEACHERS SAY ABOUT TEACHING EFL THROUGH TRANSLANGUAGING?

Journal of Language Volume 4, Number 1, pp: 166-172, May 2022 e-ISSN: 2685-8878 | p-ISSN: 2655-9080 BILINGUALS’ LINGUISTIC REPERTOIRE AND FOREIGN LANGUAGE INSTRUCTION: WHAT DO TEACHERS SAY ABOUT TEACHING EFL THROUGH TRANSLANGUAGING? Gede Eka Putrawan, Tuntun Sinaga Department of Language and Arts Education Universitas Lampung, Bandar Lampung, Indonesia E-mail: Received: 2022/05/08 Accepted: 2022/05/23 Published: 2022/05/30 Abstract In recent decades, translanguaging has made rapid progress in the field of language instruction. The term "translanguaging" implies that bilinguals have a single linguistic repertoire from which they strategically select linguistic features for effective communication. The current method of language education, which takes a monolingual approach, faces a challenge from the phenomenon known as translanguaging. Therefore, this study aims to describe the perspectives of Indonesian EFL teachers on translanguagingbased EFL instruction for students from a variety of linguistic backgrounds. This is a qualitative study employing interviews to collect data, with eight EFL teachers serving as participants. A content analysis was used to analyze the collected data. This study suggests that EFL teachers have divergent perspectives on translanguaging in EFL classrooms. However, those with negative attitudes toward translanguaging recognize the importance of this pedagogical approach and continue to use L1 in their EFL classrooms, indicating that they still believe in monolingual pedagogy even though they do not fully apply it. Finally, the study's implications and limitations are discussed. Keywords: Linguistic repertoire, Translanguaging, EFL teachers, Perspectives, Language education 1. Introduction In recent years, translanguaging has made significant headway in the field of language instruction in a relatively short amount of time (Cenoz & Gorter, 2017a). First defined by Cen Williams (García & Wei, 2014), the term "translanguaging" refers to an instructional technique where bilingualism is viewed as a resource for learning, rather than a problem that must be handled (Garcia, 2012). Today, what is known as translanguaging poses a challenge to the current method of language education, which takes a monolingual approach (García & Wei, 2014). The use of learners' first language (L1) has, nevertheless, continued to be utilized in language classes all around the world, which is a fact that is well accepted in the relevant academic literature (Hall & Cook, 2012). Empirical evidence show that learners’ L1 is beneficial for helping them improve their foreign language knowledge (Galali & Cinkara, 2017; Hanakova & Metruk, 2017; Putrawan, 2019; Putrawan et al., 2019). In other words, L1 and language teaching are inseparable (Paker & Karaağaç, 2015). On the other hand, recent research has shown that teachers have mixed emotions and perspectives towards https://jurnal.uisu.ac.id/index.php/journaloflanguage Nationally Accredited in SINTA 4 and Indexed in Copernicus 166 Bilinguals’ Linguistic Repertoire and Foreign Language Instruction: What Do Teachers Say about Teaching EFL Through Translanguaging?, Gede Eka Putrawan, Tuntun Sinaga translanguaging, which presents a problem for the practice. Translanguaging techniques indeed exist in the real world (Wei & Lin, 2019), however educators hold two distinct perspectives on the practice of translanguaging (Al-Bataineh & Gallagher, 2018; Wang, 2019). To put it another way, there are some of them who welcome translanguaging with open arms in English as a foreign language (EFL) classroom, while there are others who do not. In spite of this, monolingual pedagogy continues to be the dominant mode of instruction in Indonesia (Ariatna, 2016). Thus, teachers need to have the understanding that translanguaging practices, in which the use of different languages is permitted, might encourage EFL learners to utilize their full linguistic potentials (Nagy, 2018). Translanguaging has the potential to bridge the gap between teachers and students, between content and language, as well as between schools and their communities (Escobar, 2019; Escobar & Dillard-Paltrineri, 2015). Since it is currently unclear how Indonesian EFL teachers regard translanguaging practices, this study aims to describe their views on translanguaging-based EFL instruction for students with a wide range of linguistic backgrounds. 2. Literature Review The term "translanguaging" argues that bilinguals have "one linguistic repertoire" from which they strategically choose linguistic features "to communicate successfully" (Garcia, 2012). More concisely, translanguaging is the practice of bilingual people's language use in pedagogical activities that employ bilingualism as resource (Garcia, 2012). It is via the pedagogy of translanguaging that bilingual students gain greater awareness of their metalinguistic selves and of their bilingual identities, as well as the ability to cultivate their own multilingual selves (Cenoz & Gorter, 2017b; García-Mateus & Palmer, 2017; GüntherVan Der Meij et al., 2020). According to the literature, translanguaging practices in secondary schools where students are predominantly bilingual have a good impact on student performance and help them acquire the content more rapidly, which ultimately results in their linguistic competency (Romanowski, 2019). Teachers are of the opinion that prior language knowledge plays an important part in the learning process. Thus, it is recommended that specific trainings be provided to teachers on how to derive benefit from interactions with their students’ native languages (De Angelis, 2011). Using translanguaging in EFL classes has proven to be a key communication tool (Kampittayakul, 2018). However, when it comes to translanguaging in EFL classrooms, Turkish EFL teachers have mixed opinions about it. Most of them state that the use of L1 assists students with low proficiency, although less than half of them avoid the use of L1 for class activities and explanations of non-content related issues. Although they strongly believe in the value of translanguaging, the policies of their institutions, as well as the expectations of their students' parents and colleagues, make it difficult for them to implement the pedagogical approach (Yuvayapan, 2019). In Norway, language teachers consider multilingualism as a potential asset. They teach L3 in Norwegian and English. They believe that varied linguistic interactions in the classroom assist students learn languages, however this is not the case (Haukås, 2016). It is also reported that translanguaging mimics grammar translation method, which restricts students' ability to learn EFL. However, some argue that teachers and students' L1 can be used in EFL classes under certain conditions and for specific objectives (Escobar & Dillard-Paltrineri, 2015). In Indonesia, it is common in EFL classrooms to use both Indonesian and English to clarify grammatical rul (...truncated)