THE COMMUNICATIVE FUNCTION AND THE BENEFIT OF CODE SWITCHING WITHIN BILINGUAL EDUCATION PROGRAM OR MULTILINGUAL CHILDREN IN LEARNING ENGLISH

Abstract

Though code switching research may vary from context to context and situation to situation, the
common factors for code switching will be threefold. That is, code switching deals with
languages in contact. In interactive social situations code switching will be the use of more than
one language. For example the interaction during various social events involving interlocutors
who know more than one language. Gumperz (1982) while discussing the communicative
function of code switching, claims that the speaker plays upon the connection of the we-code to
create conversational effect. Thus code switching is seen as fulfilling the relational and
referential functions of language that amounts to effective communication and interlingua unity.
As an increasing number of children enter the school, districts are faced with meeting their
academic needs. These children enter into the classroom with varying language (mother
tongue). Some schools have adopted bilingual education programs, teaching subject matter in
Indonesian and English. Others believe in immersion, or placing the students in mainstream
classrooms in which they are expected to learn the English language and subject matter taught
in English simultaneously. Still other schools hover somewhere in between, striving to find the
best way to reach these children/students. What factors can affect/force students to use code
switching in their discourse? What are the benefits of code switching for L2 children/student?
What are the communicative functions of codes switching? These questions are the debate of
bilingual education throughout the country. In this study, explore the effects of difference types
of education such as bilingual education. Specifically, this paper discuss of the role of code
switching (the use of both Indonesia/Sasak and English within the same discourse) in bilingual
settings.
Key words: Communicative function, Code switching, bilingual and multilingual.