Japanese high school students' use of L1 during pair-work

A considerable proportion of English language education throughout the world occurs in monolingual compulsory settings. It is therefore not surprising that both teacher and students' use of the L1 is a common feature of these classrooms. This study, conducted in a language classroom, used a sociocultural framework to discover how Japanese high school students use their first language while engaging in oral communicative tasks. Observations were followed by student interviews in order to ascertain students' attitudes toward the use of Japanese in English classes. Students' use of Japanese was generally found to be positively related to learning, and it emerged that there were specific contextual factors which influenced students' use of their first language, and the implications of this are discussed.