On the Use of L1 in English Language Classes in Light of Vygotsky’s Genotypic Approach: A Case of Persian Language

Abstract

One main challenge occupying the mind of almost every English language teacher in Iran is the use of Persian in their classroom. They might be warned not to use Persian in their classes, especially with children, while they might be encouraged by several theories to use Persian for many reasons in their training courses. Besides, children's parents might expect teachers not to use Persian in the class. The dilemma might still exist and this can be explored in light of the genesis underpinning teachers’, learners’, and parents’ thoughts and attitudes regarding the use of Persian in the class. Thus, the purpose of the present study was to explore Iranian English language teachers’, learners’, and parents’ attitudes towards the use of Farsi in the classroom. To do so, unstructured interviews were conducted with 30 English language teachers and 40 English language learners and their parents within a period of six month. Moreover, case studies of the challenges on the use of Persian over English language assignments between parents and their children were video recorded. The findings of this study indicate that the controversies over the use of Persian in Iranian classrooms can be explained via Vygotsky’s genotypic approach where the microgeny of learning English language is under the influence of the contrast between the ontogenetic developments of English language teachers and the social, historical, and cultural span developed by the policies of the institutes.

DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n6s2p210