Indonesian JELT
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Developing theories of teaching academic Indonesian to non-language majors: Ways of collecting and analyzing data
No full textWriting is the skill most neglected in language education in Indonesia. High school graduates in general are not ready to write academic Indonesian, let alone academic English. This paper discusses practices of teaching Indonesian at pre-college and college levels, theories and practice of writing, and language versus non-language specialists as writing instructors. The objectives of this paper are to demonstrate that: (1) different techniques of data collection generate different types of data, (2) the more data you have, the better you triangulate the findings, and (3) the quality of data is not only determined by its collecting techniques, but also by its relevance with research objectives. In this paper, I want to share the methodology of several studies on teaching writing at college levels I have conducted in the last eight years in English and non-English departments in Indonesia. The studies have revealed the following: (1) language education has failed to provide pre-college students with fundamentals of academic writing, (2) freshman Indonesian should be focused on developing academic or technical writing, (3) the success of teaching academic writing at college levels is dependent on the success of teaching writing at pre-college levels, (4) non-Indonesian language lecturers have the potential to be empowered to teach academic writing in non-language departments, (5) ethnic literature-based writing has the potential to revitalize the ethnic literature, and (6) collaborative writing including peer reviewing and teacher-student conferencing has been effective for coping with big classes of writing
Competency-based language instruction in speaking classes: its theory and implementation in Indonesian contexts
Get PDFThe competency-based curriculum as endorsed by the Department of Education and Culture of the Republic of Indonesia has recently been implemented nationwide from elementary to high schools in the country. It is claimed that by improving syllabi, materials, and activities or by putting a more emphasis on learners’ autonomy, more effective language learning will take place. However, such an approach may also be counter-productive as it emphasizes the outputs more than the inputs. Another problem may arise as learners’ language performance may also entail teaching preparations in that teachers are obliged not only to be knowledgeable of the topics discussed, but also to be skillful and creative in preparing the materials. The implementation of this approach then becomes more complicated, especially when related to the learners’ culture. The features of this language instruction seem to be contradictory to Indonesians’ cultural values and beliefs which are reflected in the forms of total obedience, the unquestioning mind, the concept of the old know all, and the teachers can do no wrong.
Due to the above barriers, this study intends to explore and evaluate the effectiveness of the implementation of this instruction in speaking classes in Indonesian contexts. It will specifically attempt to assess the extent to which closed and open tasks can affectively be accomplished and with what degree of success the students acquire natural language use
lexically-based language teaching metaphor for enhancing learning
Get PDFAlthough metaphor has been ignored, lexically-based language teaching considers metaphor as an important aspect to learn. Learning metaphor helps learners improve their general proficiency in SLA because metaphor is a key to human memory organization, so that it enhances the acquisition of vocabulary, improves comprehension, clarifies ideas, extends thought, and increases attention. As long as meaning is the center of second language learning, metaphorical meaning must also be included because metaphor is pervasive in every day language and thought. Raising students’ awareness towards metaphor helps develop their metaphorical competence, which is a requirement for native-like proficiency. The importance of metaphor in lexically-based language teaching lends support from, cognitive linguistics the theory of mental lexicon, cognitive linguistics, second language acquisition, and the abundant use of metaphor in daily use
Corpus linguistics and the study of English grammar
Get PDFThis paper describes how corpus-based analyses can be employed for the study of English grammar, with a focus on case studies taken from the Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English (LGSWE). Two major themes are developed: 1) the kinds of unexpected findings about language use that result from corpus-based investigations, and 2) the importance of register for any descriptive account of linguistic variation. Three case studies are presented: one focusing on the use of words (i.e., the most common verbs in English); the second focusing on the use and distribution of grammatical forms (i.e., the relative frequency of simple, progressive, and perfect aspect in English); and the third describing how lexis and grammatical structure can interact in complex ways (i.e., showing how verbs with the same valency patterns can have strikingly different preferences for particular valencies). In all three cases, the paper argues for the centrality of a register perspective, showing how the patterns of use vary dramatically from one register to another
Instructing language learning strategies to promote autonomous learning
Get PDFThe paper discusses the effects of language learning strategy instruction on the improvement of the four language skills at tertiary education level. The focus of the discussion reflects two main points. The first relates to the effect of instruction in the use of language learning strategies prior to undertaking autonomous language learning in a self-access center on the improvement of the four language skills, and the second relates to the language learning strategies used in the self-access center where autonomous language learning takes place. The paper argues that language learning strategies instruction promotes autonomous language learning mode and contributes to the improvement of both the productive and the receptive skills. It is also evident that there are some other language learning strategies used during the autonomous learning in the self-access center other than those identified and used in foreign language learning. Practical application of autonomous learning mode in the self-access center in relation to the teaching of English to non-language departments at tertiary education level is also suggested
Teach my children English: Why parents wants English teaching for their children
Get PDFThis paper describes parents’ reasons for sending their children to an English language course, their expectations from the English language instruction, and the disadvantages they perceive in getting their children to learn English at their early ages. A small-scale exploratory survey using questionnaires was conducted among 46 parents whose children learn English at a private course. The results indicate that the majority of the parents are generally aware of the practical values of providing English instruction for their children and hardly perceive any disadvantages in this early English learning. Also, they expect English instruction to enable their children to perform the four language skills, notably speaking. Implications for the young learners’ first language as well as the teaching of young learners are then presented. These may offer teachers, parents, and other researchers some important points to consider
some ideas for teaching grammar more effectively in an EFL context
Get PDFMost teachers in an EFL context place a great importance on grammar and see their primary function as reducing their students’ grammar errors. While ignoring the value of this attitude, this article sets out to show how teachers’ view of grammar is limiting and their approach to teaching grammar (PPP lesson plan and a strong emphasis on grammar production) generates unsatisfactory results. The article then goes on to show how we actually learn grammar through noticing language patterns, noticing-the-gaps, and production, then shows how making hypotheses and testing their validity with authentic texts, building systems to record language patterns and collocations, extensive reading, and scaffolding are the keys to learning grammar. Yet, they are not part of the PPP equation nor are they included in most teachers’ language-teaching routines. It is suggested that these elements along with a more task-based approach could provide useful alternatives. The first part of this article provides some of the theoretical underpinnings, and the remainder looks at some effective techniques for their implementation and some important implications made by these underpinnings and their application in large classes of Indonesian EFL students
Causes of reticence in EFL classrooms: A study of Chinese University students
Get PDFThis paper reports the findings of a studys of students’ reticence in Chinese EFL context. The participants were three teachers and 100 university freshmen from three proficiency levels enrolled in an English Listening & Speaking course. Using journals, observations and interviews as a technique of collecting data, the study revealed that (1) the majority of the participants were active during pair work but only a few volunteered to respond to their teachers or actively engaged in group discussions, (2) advanced-level students tended to be more active than their lower-level counterparts, and multiple variables worked together to result in student reticence in EFL classrooms. The results indicate that more research needs to be done to help students become more active and proficient EFL learners