Indonesian Senior Research Articles

Travel motivation of Indonesian seniors in choosing destination overseas

PurposeThis study focuses on the Indonesian seniors’ motivation in terms of travelling to a destination abroad. Using the push–pull motivation constructs and recognising the role of culture in influencing travel behaviour, the purpose of this study is to develop a better understanding of the underlying factors that explain why Indonesian seniors travel to and select an international destination.Design/methodology/approachA questionnaire-based survey was completed to collect data from 246 Indonesian seniors aged 55 years and over who had travelled overseas. Factor analysis was applied to reduce the total of 34 push and pull travel motivation items into new underlying factors. Informal interviews were also undertaken to support the analysis.FindingsPersonal development, relaxation and relationship enhancement appeared to be the three factors that internally pushed the seniors to travel abroad. Meanwhile, facilities and hygiene, destination familiarity, value for money and destination proximity, local attractions and supporting travel facilities were found to be the factors that pulled the seniors to select an international destination they would like to visit. The emergence of relationship enhancement, destination familiarity and value for money and destination proximity factors were evident that the unique aspect of Indonesian cultural values could shape the motivation of Indonesian seniors to go travelling.Originality/valueAlthough studies on senior travel motivation are abundant, empirical research studies that focus on examining Indonesian senior travel behaviour are still rare. This study therefore serves as one of the first attempts to examine the behaviour of Indonesian seniors when undertaking outbound travel trip. Based on the study’s findings, practical recommendations were offered to tourism stakeholders involved in tailoring a specific tourism product and services for the Indonesian senior tourist market.

Lexical Richness of the Expository Writing in Indonesian Senior High School Students

Learning a foreign language is often related to knowing the words which called lexical richness. This current study investigate the lexical richness in senior high school students. The data are taken from the students’ writing on expository essay. Writing an expository essay is a challenge for students where they should be able to write based on a given theme using a varied vocabulary so later the students are capable making a good writing. The students are collected from three grades that consist of 30 students in each grades. By the total amount of the students, it will be measured by some types of lexical richness; lexical density, lexical sophistication, and lexical variation. After being investigated, the results were found that lexical richness in each grades showed a significant increase in each class, starting from grade 10 to grade 12. According to all those three measurements, showed that grade 12 is the highest percentages among others and it concludes that students in grade 12 is the most prepared and have the richest lexical between grade 10 and 11.

The Development of Video Compact Disk Media Using a Scientific Approach for Expository Writing: A Case in Indonesian Senior High Schools

The Development of Video Compact Disk Media Using a Scientific Approach for Expository Writing: A Case in Indonesian Senior High Schools

Correlational Study of Language Learning Attitude and Speaking In Indonesian Context (Case Study)

The important role of attitude in language learning toward English has been increasingly recognized in developing teaching learning English especially in Speaking. However, only a few studies on the correlation between attitude in language learning and speaking. This study aimed at investigating whether there is a correlation between students’ language learning attitude toward English and students’ Speaking in Indonesian Senior High School. The research sample consisted of 80 Indonesian students of class XI-AP 1 until XI-AP 3 in the academic year 2016/2017. The research employs ex-post facto design. The data collected through questionnaire and documentation was analyzed by using Pearson Product Moment Correlation. It shows that there is a strong correlation between dependent and independent variables. The correlation value of the calculation is 0,776 it means the correlation is at strong grade. Based on the correlation value, it can be found the coefficient determination is 60%, it implies that students’ language learning attitude toward English and Speaking Achievement have strong correlation. It can be implied that students’ language learning toward English and Speaking Achievement has significant positive correlation at strong grade. It is show that if students have positive language learning toward English the result of their speaking will be good too. The other 40% is not to be discussing in this research.

PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT OF INDONESIAN SENIOR HIGH STUDENTS: CONTRIBUTION TOWARDS ACADEMIC SUCCESS

The research was carried out to investigate whether there was any significant contribution of family background and parental involvement towards students’ achievement, and which spesific parental involvement aspects best predict students English performance. To this end, English test was administered to Indonesian senior high school students (n= 222), and questionnaire was to their parents.Path analysis with smartPLS was utilized to analyze the data. The results revealed that the contribution of family background towards parental involvement is significant. However, there are no significant contributions of parental involvement and family background towards students’ achievement. No significant contribution is also found between family background and students’ achievement through intermediary variable of parental involvement. Other finding indicated that parents’ aspiration and expectation along with enhancing learning opportunities at home had the strongest effects on students’ achievement.

Differential item functional analysis on pedagogic and content knowledge (PCK) questionnaire for Indonesian teachers using RASCH model

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate Indonesian senior high school teacher’s pedagogical content knowledge also their perception toward curriculum changing in West Java Indonesia. The data used in this study were derived from a questionnaire survey conducted among teachers in Bandung, West Java. A total of 61 usable responses were collected. The Differential Item Functioning (DIFF) was used to analyze the data whether the item had a difference or not toward gender, education background also on school location. However, the result showed that there was no any significant difference on gender and school location toward the item response but educational background. As a conclusion, the teacher’s educational background influence on giving the response to the questionnaire. Therefore, it is suggested in the future to construct the items on the questionnaire which is coped the differences of the participant particularly the educational background.

Extrovert versus Introvert Students: What EFL Learning Strategy do They Use?

<em>Since Indonesian students come from different cultures, languages and personality traits as well, recognizing their personality traits and their language learning strategy choice might be effective to help teacher design an effective teaching strategies to achieve learning objectives. This study was intended to find out (1) what personality traits Indonesian senior high school students fell into, and (2) to investigate what language learning strategies introvert and extrovert students used highly frequently. The 58 participants aged from sixteen to eighteen years old who were from the third grade of senior high school and were all from science class were given eighteen statements of McCroskey’s introversion scale to categorize them into extrovert and introvert and were administered with 32 statements of English Language Learning Strategy Inventory or ELLSI to see their learning strategy. The data were analyzed by means of descriptive statistics in terms of mean frequencies and statistical differences. The finding revealed that majority of senior high school students majoring science study program fell into introvert with 89.6% (52 students). Besides, extrovert students used more language learning strategy highly frequently than introvert students with eight items compared to introvert students with only five items. Interestingly, both extrovert and introvert students share four strategy items in common. Although it is statistically not significant (ρ > 0.05), the finding also shows that extrovert students seemed to use affective strategy more than introverts who used memory strategy highly frequently.</em>

Indonesian EFL Learners’ Perceptions of Classroom Learning Environments in An EFL Context

<p><em>A good learning environment will determine the students’ learning quality. Therefore, creating supporting classroom learning environment is really crucial. This study explored the students’ perceptions at an Indonesian senior high school of actual classroom learning environment in English teaching across gender and grade. What Is Happening In this Classroom (WIHIC) questionnaire was applied to see the participants’ perceptions of the language learning environment. As for data analysis procedure, the scores obtained from the questionnaire were analyzed and described qualitatively. The data was examined to see how how is the students perception of their actual classroom learning environment in EFL classes across grade and gender. The result demonstrated similar perception indicated by five of the seven categories of the WIHIC questionnaire among grades. Across gender, four of the seven categories also indicated similar perception between male and female students where the categories get positively dominant result.</em></p>

The Effect of L2 Exposure Environment on Nnests’ Teaching Skills and Beliefs about EFL Learning Beyond the Class

The study aims at investigating the effect of second language (L2) exposure environment on NNESTs’ teaching skills and beliefs about EFL learning beyond the classroom. This is a survey for non-native English speaking teachers (NNESTs) of Indonesian Senior High Schools ( or in Indonesian terms ‘SMA’) from different L2 environments, namely: 1) urban-region exposure environment schools (n=40), and 2) rural-region exposure environment schools (n=40). There were two instruments used in the present study, i.e. 1) observation scaling checklist, and 2) questionnaire. The observation scaling checklist was used for assessing the respondents’ performance when they were teaching in class. Meanwhile, the questionnaire using a four-point Likert scale was used to elicit data. The researchers used a series of independent t-test to analyze the data. The result reveals that: 1) there is a significant difference between teaching skills of NNESTs from the urban region schools and those of NNESTs from rural region schools, t (78)= 19.499, p=0.000; and 2) there is a significant difference between beliefs about English as a foreign language (EFL learning beyond the classroom of the NNESTs from urban region schools and those of NNESTs from rural region schools, t (78)= - 4.925, p=0.000.

An Evaluation Paradox: The Issues of Test Validity in the Realm of Writing Test as the Final School Examination in the Indonesian Senior High School Milieu

Even though there are four English language skills in the Indonesia’s national curriculum at upper secondary schools, each of these skills is given an unequal emphasis since only reading and listening skills are formally tested in the national examination. Although writing competence possesses a particular stake as the determinant of students’ achievement after students undergo a three-year education at the upper secondary school level, it appears that the existing writing tests are low in terms of test validity, as demonstrated by a preliminary study. A further study is carried out to probe the issues of test validity by deploying the framework of test validity, which pertains to theory-based validity, context validity, scoring validity, criterion-related validity, and consequential validity in the scrutiny of the existing writing tests. It is revealed that the current writing tests are fraught with validity problems in all of these facets of test validity. This is corroborated by interview data in the preliminary study and the analysis of the existing writing tests. These particular issues obviously evoke an ambivalence between the exalted educational objectives in the national curricula and the edifice of English assessment. Based on the findings, several implications and directions rise for future praxis of writing assessment.

Efforts to Improve Writing Skills of High School Students

Writing in English is one of the language skills that are taught in the context of learning English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in Indonesian senior high schools. According to previous studies, most of the students consider writing is the most difficult of the four skills. This research was aimed at finding out the main difficulties in writing faced by the grade XI students at SMA Negeri 10 Fajar Harapan, Banda Aceh, and the efforts made by their teacher to overcome those problems. The design of this study was a descriptive qualitative study. To obtain the data, the writers used document collection and interviews. The results from the document collection showed that the highest percentages of problems faced by the students were in the aspect of language use and the least problems were in the aspect of content. The results from the interviews showed that the most common correcting efforts made by the teacher were giving written feedback for all aspects of writing i.e. language use, mechanics, vocabulary, organization, and content. Likewise, teachers need to develop systemized forms of feedback and make it clear to students what the feedback means and what they are to do with them to assist students in improving their writing skills.

Techniques of Optimizing Whatsapp as an Instructional Tool for Teaching EFL Writing in Indonesian Senior High Schools

Studies reported that Whats Apps is effective to enhance the students’ language skills, motivation and rapport especially to adolescent learners. The typical characteristics of adolescent learners challenge teachers to find strategies to engage them. One of the strategies is through mobile learning. This paper shares three techniques of writing activities to help adolescent learners develop their text types writing ability using WhatsApp. The techniques are brainstorming – group drafting – teacher’s feedback, starter – quick writing –peer feedback, and information gathering – elaboration exercises – checklist

Stories from the Frontlines: In-Service Teachers’ Demotivating Factors and Policy Recommendations

The purpose of this current study was to explore the demotivating factors among Indonesian senior high school English teachers in teaching English as a foreign language at two senior high schools in Jambi City, Indonesia through demographic background surveys and semi-structured in-depth interviews. The research design was qualitative in the case approach. The interviews data were analyzed through using the constant comparative method developed by Glaser and Strauss (1967), six salient and interweaved themes related to the demotivating factors that emerged in this research were s tudents ’ limited basic knowledge in English language, students’ l ack of motivation , school environment, limited supporting facilities, working conditions, and teachers’ workload. Policy recommendations and implications of findings and future research are also discussed.

Causes of anger among senior high school students in Indonesia: An indigenous psychology approach

Appraisal theorists have argued that anger is elicited when important goals have been obstructed. Using an indigenous psychology approach, the current study aims to test this premise by investigating the events that account for a person’s anger among Indonesian senior high school students. Data was collected using the anger item from the Happiness open-ended questionnaire, asking about events that make the subjects’ most angry. A total of 425 senior high school students consisting of 171 males and 254 females were involved in the study. The data was analyzed using an indigenous psychological approach by analyzing the content of the open-ended responses, categorization of the responses, and cross-tabulations with the respondent’s sex. The findings suggest that Indonesian senior high school students become angry when they their trust is violated, insulted, encounter an unpleasant experience, and disturbance. Further analysis was conducted to identify variability upon male and female subjects. The chi square test that was run towards the variables “events for causing anger” and “sex” indicated a significant relationship (p < 0.03). Male respondents were most likely to become angry when encountering unpleasant experiences while females were most likely to become angry when their trust is being violated. The findings are contrary to the notions that goal obstruction is central in eliciting anger.

DYNAMICITY OF INTERLANGUAGE ERRORS: A CASE STUDY OF INDONESIAN STUDENTS LEARNING ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE

ABSTRACT : Interlanguage errors are an inevitable sign of human fallibility; therefore, they always exist in foreign language learning. They are very significant since they become the source for studying the system of the learners’ second language (interlanguage). As a language system, interlanguage has at least three prominent characteristics, namely, systematicity, permeability, and fossilization. Applied linguistic researchers are no longer in disagreement with the view that interlanguage is systematic and permeable. However, the premise that interlanguage is fossilized is still debatable. This study deals with interlanguage errors; in particular, this tries to investigate whether the learners’ grammatical errors are fossilized (in a sense that they are dynamic) or static. For this purpose, an empirical study was conducted, using an error treatment method. This study used Indonesian senior high school students learning English as the research subjects. The data were collected from the students’ free compositions written prior and after an error treatment. The error treatment was carried out for one semester. The data were analyzed using quantitative and qualitative method. The result indicates that the learners’ grammatical errors were dynamic. At a certain period of the learning course, some grammatical errors emerged. As a result of the error treatment, some errors were fluctuating; some became stabilized; while others were destabilized. The fluctuating errors tended to be destabilized while the stabilized errors were also likely to be destabilized. Error treatment was proved to have significant contribution to the destabilization process; that is to say, it helped develop the learners’ IL system. A conclusion drawn from this study is that the learners’ grammatical errors are dynamic. They are destabilzable. Thus, there is a possibility for the learners to acquire complete target language grammar. Key Words : error treatment, stabilization, fossilization, dynamicity, interlanguage

The Teaching Constraints of English as a Foreign Language in Indonesia: The Context of School Based Curriculum

ABSTRACT : This article presents the teaching constraints of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in the Indonesian Senior High School context outlined by the development of recent English curriculum (school based curriculum). It discusses teaching constraints of EFL speaking in recent school based curriculum, constraints on understanding learners’ differences, constraints in learning material resources, constraints on classroom activities, constraints on teaching methods, and constraints on speaking assessment. Based on the discussion, this article also provides some solutions on what teachers of EFL speaking can do in order to achieve a higher quality of EFL speaking teaching and to improve the speaking skill of EFL students in Indonesia. Finally, the issue of the contribution of inserting learners’ differences in curriculum design to promote independent or successful learners becomes important in the implementation of school-based curriculum as current curriculum with focusing on learner centered instruction in large and mixed ability class and in other old paradigms in EFL teaching and learning in Indonesia. Key words: Teaching constraints, English as a Foreign Language, learner differences, and school-based curriculum in Indonesia. About the Authors: Karim Mattarima is a Ph.D. Candidate at the Faculty of Education UTM (Technology University of Malaysia) in Johor Bahru, Johor, Malaysia; and Assoc. Prof. Dr. Abdul Rahim Hamdan is a Senior Lecturer at the Faculty of Education UTM. They can be reached at: karimmattarima@yahoo.co.id How to cite this article? Mattarima, Karim & Abdul Rahim Hamdan. (2011). “The Teaching Constraints of English as a Foreign Language in Indonesia: The Context of School Based Curriculum” in SOSIOHUMANIKA: Jurnal Pendidikan Sains Sosial dan Kemanusiaan , Vol.4, No.2 [November], pp.287-300. Bandung, Indonesia: Minda Masagi Press owned by ASPENSI, ISSN 1979-0112. Chronicle of article: Accepted (September 4, 2011); Revised (October 7, 2011); and Published (November 20, 2011).