1. Marie Perera Dept. of Humanities Education
Use of first language in facilitating the second language writing development
Marie Perera
Dept. of Humanities Education

2. Background A collaborative action research was conducted in
Shortcomings in the primary textbooks
G.C.E. (O/L ) Evaluation Reports
NEEC studies

3. Research on role of the first language in second language learning
Some studies point to the positive effect of the first language on the learning environment ( Ghorbani, 2011).
Further, it is claimed that L1 is most useful at beginning and low levels, where L1 can be used to introduce the major differences between L1 and L2 (Madrinan, 2014)..
Therefore, there is a need to find out the use of L1 in facilitating L2 writing development in the Sri Lankan context.

4. Objectives Analyze the errors in students’ writing.
Examine the influence of mother tongue in making these errors.
Implement a remedial progemme to help learners overcome these errors

5. Research Design Part of an ongoing collaborative action research.
The collaboration is between the principal researcher, three coordinators from the RESC Gampaha and 18 teachers teaching English in 1C and type 2 grade 6 classes.

6. Data Collection - write simple three word sentences correctly.
A pre- test was administered to identify students’ weaknesses in writing
Next, in collaboration with the teachers and RESC staff an intervention programme was planned.
In the first phase teachers were asked to implement the programme on four days.
- The objective was for the students to be able to identify subjects and verbs,
- differentiate between L1 and L2 word order
- write simple three word sentences correctly.
- Explanation of the grammar items was done using L1.
- Students practice the sentence formation through language games.
A post-test was administered

7. Findings
75% of the students could not write grammatically correct sentences
majority of the students appears to think in their mother tongue and attempt to translate to English,
61.5% of the students could not positioned the adverb corretly
Ruwan can fast run
One of the reasons for the mistakes is mother tongue interference
Students enjoyed the activities and were able to form simple grammatically correct sentences
Teachers did not overuse L1

8. Conclusions
Students benefit from the use of the first language in the classroom
Noticing the differences as well as the similarities.
Help to transfer concepts from their mother tongue to the new language

9. Reference
Ghorbani, A. (2011) First Language use in foreign language classroom discourse. Procedia: social and behavioural Sciences , 29,
G.C.E.(O.L.) Examination Evaluation Report. Research & Development Branch National Evaluation & Testing Service Department of Examinations
Madrinan, M, (2014) The use of first language in the second language classroom ; A support for second language acquisition

10. Thank you Acknowledgement
University of Colombo for granting me a small research grant.
Thank you