English Only
This technique does work well; at the beginning it might need a bit more effort, but before long you should have no problems enforcing this rule.
Method
Prepare a large poster for your classroom. On it, in bold, striking letters, write ENGLISH ONLY and then hang the poster in a prominent place in the room.
Now, whenever anyone says anything that isn't English, stop the class immediately, point to the poster and call out, "ENGLISH ONLY".
Do this without fail whenever you hear anything which isn't English. You need to be consistent here. Importantly, when you do this, make it lighthearted and fun and let the students know that they're not being punished for speaking their own language, just encouraged to speak English.
Then after a while when the students are used to this, encourage the whole class to join in with everyone in the room calling out, "ENGLISH ONLY" when they need to.
Soon enough, all you'll need to do is point to the poster and the class will call out, "ENGLISH ONLY" while you remain silent.
And soon after that you will find that the students start to stop and correct each other by saying, "English Only".
In effect it becomes a lighthearted catchphrase.
Why?
The advantages are obvious - your students are encouraged to speak English as much as possible, not only when they are interacting with you, but also when they speak amongst themselves.
This chimes in with the idea of Full Immersion where students are placed in a completely English environment in the class to help them use English naturally as an English native speaker would.
English Only is useful for several reasons:
- the target language also becomes a tool to teach
- the students use English as much as possible; especially in non-English speaking countries the students may well get a very limited chance to hear and speak English so making it compulsory in your classroom maximises those opportunities
- it reduces mother tongue influence; in time the student's MT will be removed from the process
Quick Tip
If you speak a little of the local language, you can also "accidentally" use a non-English word in the classroom and then call out, "ENGLISH ONLY" to the class. It reinforces the "fun" nature of this process and can help with students who might feel a bit embarrassed at being caught out.
