Using L1 in Teaching English to Advanced Students

Using L1 in the English classroom has long been considered as an unforgivable wrongdoing. Many English teachers who use L1 in the classroom feel guilty about it and in many cases do not admit it. Recent researchers started to question the validity of this claim suggesting contexts and situations in which using L1 can be very helpful in ELT and refuting, on the other hand, the claims upon which the idea of using L2 solely were built.  My paper will examine the attitudes of advanced English language learners toward using L1 in the class of English where the students and the teacher speak the same first language and will also examine the attitudes of a group of EFL and ESL teachers toward the same practice. The same questionnaire given to the students will be redesigned and given to a number of teachers so that the study will look at the viewpoints from both perspectives.