STEM in english language teaching at high schools in central java indonesia: opportunities and challenges

Abstract

STEM as an educational enterprise has grown in importance during the past 10 years, articularly in the USA, UK, and other Anglo-Saxon countries [1]. The problem of this study is that what are the opportunities and challenges of implementing STEM in English language teaching at high schools in central java? The research design was a qualitative study using a sheet of structured interview which was distributed to teachers around at district area like; Pati, Semarang, Demak, Jepara, and Ungaran. There were 13 teachers who collected back the instrument and giving the data through their empirical involvement. The participants were the teachers from 6 state high schools and 7 private high schools. In collecting the data, the writers send the questions through email to the group of teachers’ organization and ask them to participate by answering it. The results are; the opportunities of using STEM that is teachers opportune to apply; 1) social media as a tool in teaching media, 2) vlog in supporting a topic of ‘describing a person/a thing’, 3) direct observation onto the nature, 4) short video in conversation, 5) elaborating some texts genres. On the other hand, there are some challenges like; teachers are facing; 1) less skill in using technology, 2) less facility at schools, 3) no socialization about STEM, 4) less teaching media used, 5) less motivation to grow. Writers also declare to recommend teachers to elevate and upgrade their skill in the usage of technology, collaborating nature as the teaching and be aware with the current teaching approach in order to be able to get in the students’ need in the current era.