This case study explores patterns of first and second use by second graders attending an early total one-way Chinese immersion program in the U.S. as they carry out classroom tasks and activities with different interlocutors. Existing research examining immersion students’ language use has emphasized immersion languages that are linguistically and culturally related to English, with scant attention given to immersion languages that are unrelated to English, especially Chinese. The typological distance between the immersion language and English potentially presents students with additional obstacles in learning and use of Chinese in classroom context.

This study addresses the following two research questions:

1. Which languages (English/Chinese) are used by students in peer-peer and peer-teacher interactions in a second-grade Chinese immersion classroom? To what extent do interlocutor factors influence the choice between Chinese and English?
2. Which languages (English/Chinese) are used by students while carrying out academic content tasks in this classroom? To what extent do task factors influence the choice between Chinese and English?

76 hours of naturally occurring verbal interactions of three focal students were audio-recorded. Detailed fieldnotes were also taken. Quantitatively, Rbrul was used to model each child’s choice between Chinese and English to identify which contextual factor(s) consistently contributed to their choices. Qualitative analysis was also performed to explain the quantitative patterns.

Findings suggest that the contextual factor that most affected the children’s use of Chinese and English was their interlocutor. The teacher, researcher, and a particular student as interlocutors strongly promoted the focal children’s use of Chinese; other students as interlocutors variably promoted their use of English. The roles that the children are playing in the classroom may have a major explanation for why they are using certain language with certain peers. Teacher-fronted activities using inductive approaches promoted children's use of Chinese, too. Theoretical and pedagogical implications were explored.