Indonesian Secondary School Research Articles

POOR READING COMPREHENSION ISSUE IN EFL CLASSROOM AMONG INDONESIAN SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS: Scrutinizing the causes, impacts and possible solutions

Reading comprehension is considered a challenging part of learning English for many Indonesian secondary school students. This study aims to explore the causes, impacts, and possible solutions for poor reading comprehension issues. The study scrutinizes the issue by reviewing previous studies, in which a number of articles and books were critically analyzed. The results indicate that poor reading comprehension occurs due to three remarkable factors, which are students’ lack of motivation, low prior knowledge, and poor English vocabulary. Moreover, this issue also leads to three main adverse impacts, such as reducing students’ learning achievement, hindering students’ problem-solving skills, and inhibiting students’ future studies and careers. Therefore, in responding to the problem above, this study proposes two learning approaches, which are the Cooperative Integrated and Reading Composition (CIRC) Technique and Metacognitive Strategy.

Strengthening of Religious Character Education Based on School Culture in the Indonesian Secondary School

This research aims to answer how the implementation of religious character education building based on school culture and conducted a successful program at SMAN 5 Yogyakarta (Yogyakarta 5 Public High School). This study is highly important to conduct since the religious character is an essential value in the learning process in Indonesia. The research subjects consisted of school principals, teachers, and students. Determination of the subjects carried out by purposive sampling. Data collection used interview, observation, and documentation. An interactively inductive data analysis technique performed data analysis with data reduction stages, data displays, and conclusion drawing. The results of the study showed that: 1) the implementation of religious character education building based on school culture was carried out through character building based on religious values, school climate based on religious values, extracurricular activities based on religious values, as well as building relationships between schools and the societies. 2) The impact of the strengthening program of character education produces two themes as follows: the growth of students’ religious awareness and the growth of tolerance among religious communities. The findings of this study indicated the importance of the school’s cultural base in implementing holistic religious character education programs in schools. This finding also strengthens the previous research findings, which had mentioned that the religious character is an essential character for students in a secondary school in Indonesia, and also strengthen that Indonesia’s society, in general, is religious people.

Teachers’ Reflective Practice and Challenges in an Indonesian EFL Secondary School Classroom

This study investigated the EFL teachers’ perception and practices of reflection in teaching. The study was conducted through qualitative method by purposive sampling technique. The data were collected through semi-structured interview, and documentation from seven EFL Junior High School teachers in Makassar. The results of the study showed that the EFL teachers perceived reflective practice mainly as an evaluative process to their teaching experience. They all believed that reflective practice was one of the effective teacher characteristics and useful for increasing the quality of teaching and learning. Their reflections were mostly at descriptive and dialogic level. Inadequate knowledge and workload were identified by the EFL teachers as the challenges to reflection.

A NARRATIVE INQUIRY OF STUDENTS TEACHERS IDENTITY CONSTRUCTION THROUGH TEACHING PRACTICUM: VOICES FROM SECONDARY SCHOOL CLASSROOM IN INDONESIA

This study aims to explore the student teachers’ experience while conduct teaching practicum. The study identified how three student teachers construct their teacher identity and explore the proper way that they do to manage the classroom in the placement school. I examined the narratives from three student teachers by sharing stories of their teaching practicum in a secondary school in Indonesia for about a month. This study uses in-depth online interviews, reflective journals, and photovoice to collect the data. The results suggest that teaching practicum can be a way to construct student teachers’ professional identities and lead them to deal with the situation in the classroom during the teaching practicum. Moreover, preceding teaching experience and good relationships with members of the school are essential to carry them out from teaching practicum.

Examining Indonesian Secondary School Mathematics Teachers' Instructional Practice in the Integration of Technology

The Indonesian secondary school mathematics curriculum advocates the use of technology in teaching and learning of mathematics. The previous studies paid less attention to what type of digital tools that the teachers used and how they integrated them in the mathematics teaching. This study aimed at investigating Indonesian secondary school mathematics teachers' instructional practices in the integration of digital technology in classrooms and examined differences in teachers' instructional practice according to their background. It employed a quantitative approach whereby were collected through a questionnaire survey. The data were gathered from 341 mathematics teachers in 93 secondary schools. This study suggested that the integration of digital technology has emerged in Indonesian secondary school mathematics classrooms. However, it was also found that most of the teachers did not use the technology in constructive ways. The result also revealed that female teachers have better instructional practices in the use of digital technology than male teachers. In addition, teachers' levels of education play an important role on their instructional practices with digital technologies. This study suggests that it needs a radical improvement of the integration of technology in Indonesian secondary school mathematics classrooms in order to achieve the curriculum objective. Therefore, further research and development on this issue is needed in the country.

Exploring EFL Teachers’ Classroom Management: The Case of Indonesian Remote Secondary Schools

Geared by the scant number of studies on EFL teachers’ classroom management in remote secondary schools in Indonesia, this study seeks to investigate teachers’ involvement in classroom management complexities and to what extent they deal with such predicaments. Data were collected through interviews with the teachers within three months and analyzed narratively. The findings suggest that they encountered multi-facet complexities such as (a) lacking learning facilities in terms of electricity supply, (b) students’ demotivation and inability to use English, and (c) teachers' dilemmas in applying the new curriculum. To deal with such quandaries, the teachers made use of (a) a teacher-centered approach, (b) group learning, (c) students’ row seating positions, and (d) non-integrated language skills learning. The implications of this study are discussed at the end of the paper.

The risk and protective factors for risky sexual behaviors among school-aged adolescents in Indonesia

Abstract Background Indonesia's 65 million young people aged 10-24 comprise 28% of its total population. Studies revealed that adolescents who engage in early sexual activity are prone to sexually transmitted diseases, unwanted pregnancy, and unsafe abortion. This study examined the prevalence and associated factors of risky sexual behaviors among Indonesian secondary school adolescents using the 2015 Indonesia Global School-based Student Health Survey (GSHS). Methods A total of 11,142 students filled the self-administered questionnaire. Risky sexual behaviors measured included 1) ever had sexual intercourse, 2) multiple partners, 3) condom use. The determinant factors were sociodemographic characteristics, mental health-related factors, interpersonal variables, socioeconomic, and parental understanding. A multivariate logistic regression model was used to estimate the adjusted odds ratio and 95% CI. Results The prevalence of ever had sex was 5.3%; 1.2% of students had sexual intercourse with multiple partners; The prevalence of condom use was 34%. Results from the multivariate logistic regression indicated that ever-had sex had the strongest association with suicide ideation (aOR= 4.636; 95% CI = 4.542-4.732) and significantly lower among respondents who have a parental understanding (aOR = 0.318; 95% CI = 0.310-0.326). Having sex with multiple partners had the highest correlation with smoking behavior (aOR= 9.967; 95% CI = 9.816-10.12), significantly lower among respondents who have a parental understanding (aOR=0.644; 95% CI = 0.632-0.656). Having parental understanding had the strongest correlation with condom use (aOR= 6.597; 95% CI = 6.291-6.918), while loneliness had the lowest relation. (aOR= 0.706; 95% CI = 0.669-0.745). Conclusions Adolescent sexual reproductive health programs should employ a holistic approach involving mental health promotion and tobacco control programs. It is also essential to engage parents in any adolescent sexual reproductive health program. Key messages Risky sexual behaviors have a strong correlation with mental health. It is essential to engage parents in any adolescent sexual reproductive health program.

The Effect of Principals’ Leadership towards Effective Learning at an Indonesian Secondary School

<p style="text-align:justify">The study aims to investigate the evaluation model of professional leadership and the characteristics of successful principals at an Indonesian secondary school. It is to further realize the effective learning and to produce instruments that meet the validity and reliability tests. It also aims to discover the correlation and the significance of the independent variables on the dependent variables, and the percentage of influence on the indicators in shaping the model of principals’ leadership. Quantitative data were obtained by distributing questionnaires to 100 students. The number of respondents was determined using a simple random sampling technique. The research findings showed that there was a significant correlation among the principals’ leadership, characters, and effective learning. It indicated that leadership evaluation influenced the school leadership and the principals’ characters on effective learning. The results of the measurement on formative relationships showed that the indicators of behaviour and actions of school principals who manage the teachers to conduct learning activity seriously in the classroom became a determining factor in shaping the effective learning paradigm in secondary schools.</p>

Social Justice Across The English Curriculum In Indonesian Secondary Schools

Social justice across curriculum is believed to entail changes in society, and thus the integration of social justice into curriculum comes to be crucial. Socially just curriculum deals with the principles of inclusive practices at schools, access to important knowledge and skills to all students, and the empowerment of students to act for socially just change. The purpose of this study was to investigate the extent to which the English curriculum in Indonesian secondary schools, year 10, is socially just. This study focused on documentary research, analysing the collected documents – the curriculum framework and school-based curriculum development – from the lens of socially just curriculum indicators. These indicators were constructed based on the state ideology, Pancasila (Five Principles) and prominent scholars’ viewpoints of social justice covered in relevant literature. The results showed that most of all, those documents reflected the indicators for socially just curriculum. Nevertheless, to make a judgment as to whether the English curriculum is socially just is not a simple matter, since further research, which promotes talks with teachers and students, observation of classroom activities, analysis of methods of assessment, student textbooks, workbooks, and other resources, would be necessary to be done.

Infographic of Indonesian Food History in Reading Classes: Focusing on Students’ Perspectives and Reading Enactment

Anchored by scant empirical research on the use of infographics of Indonesian food history in reading classes, this study seeks to explore how students as learning actors perceive this infographic learning enactment and to what extent their reading motivation evolves. To obtain data, seventy-five Indonesian secondary school students were recruited to respond to a Likert-scale questionnaire. Their answers were analyzed in percentages. Besides, ten of the participants were invited for brief interviews. Findings suggest that the students held positive perceptions of the use of infographics in their reading classes. Besides, their reading motivation rises through their knowledge construction on the diversity of food in Indonesia. This study offers pedagogical implications for classroom practices.

INTEGRATING CHARACTER EDUCATION IN THE ENGLISH TEACHING AT ISLAMIC JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOLS IN INDONESIA

The rapid development of digital technology with its likely disruptive impacts on students’ morality and character necessitates teachers to reorient their roles. Teachers need to be skillful in incorporating moral messages and character education in their teaching supported by suitable learning resources. The current research is conducted to fulfill the needs of the English teachers in Islamic junior secondary schools in Indonesia for supplementary materials that can support the integration of Islamic moral messages and values in the teaching of English. These needs were identified from data collected through questionnaires, FGDs, and interviews. The supplementary materials, which were designed based on the needs analysis, underwent expert validation and a pilot study. The final version of the materials consists of ready-to-use-worksheets and teacher's guide and is named the Islamic Life Resource Pack (ILRP).

Exploring the Influence of Computer-Based National Examination on English Teaching Process: Voices from Indonesian EFL Teachers

Currently, the government of Indonesia has implemented a computer-based test for the national examination for secondary schools in Indonesia. It is believed that the administration of computer-based national examination (CBNE) would address some challenges related to dishonesty and validity. The present study is aimed to investigate the teachers’ perception of the implementation of CBNE and its influence on the English teachers’ teaching process. This study employed a qualitative design in which semi-structured interviews and document analysis from the English teachers’ lesson plans were done to obtain comprehensive data. The analysis results revealed that the teachers held a positive view of the implementation of CBNE because it is effective and efficient in terms of the process, security, scoring, and cost-saving. Besides, the components of the teaching process influenced by the administration of CBNE were extra class, teaching materials, teaching methods, and teaching activities. However, the implementation of CBNE still led to several challenges in terms of technical problems and a lack of computer experts. Therefore, by conducting an internship with other supporting parties, those challenges would be minimized.

Secondary School Mathematics Teachers’ Views on E-learning Implementation Barriers during the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Case of Indonesia

School closures in Indonesia during the COVID-19 pandemic have left 45.5 million school students and 3.1 million teachers dependent on online teaching and learning. Online teaching and learning are an unprecedented experience for most teachers and students; consequently, they have a limited experience with it. This paper examines the views of secondary school mathematics teachers on E-learning implementation barriers during the COVID-19 pandemic at four barrier levels, namely teacher, school, curriculum and student. Furthermore, it assesses the relationship between barrier levels with teachers’ demographic background. Data was collected through an online questionnaire, involving 159 participants from lower and upper secondary schools in Indonesia. The findings of this study suggest that student level barrier had the highest impact on e-learning use. In addition, the student level barrier showed strong positive correlation with the school level barrier and curriculum level barrier. The study showed that teachers’ backgrounds had no impact on the level of barriers. This study stimulates further discussion on the way to overcome e-learning barriers whilst simultaneously maximizing benefits of E-learning during this pandemic and beyond it by highlighting the importance of students’ voices.

Proposing a model of critical literacy program for fostering Indonesian EFL students’ critical thinking skills

This study was intended to depict how Critical Literacy Pedagogy (CLP) principles were incorporated in EFL reading class in Indonesian secondary school and the students’ Critical Thinking (CT) were fostered during learning process. This study was a classroom practice-based model of how the principles were transferred into the detailed teaching syntax in an Islamic senior high school in West Java Indonesia. As a case study elaborating how a phenomenon happened, this study explored teaching steps, teacher-students dialogues, questions and the way the questions posed reflecting students’ CT skills, and students’ engagement in the learning process. The use of Indonesian folklores containing controversy predicted to enable students develop their thinking skills became novelty of the study. In addition, three times interventions were designed in which each intervention consisted of (a) teaching critical thinking concept explicitly and implicitly, (b) seven steps of teaching reading procedure incorporating CLP principles (explaining author’s purpose, activating students’ prior knowledge, reading text loudly, discussing text in group, exploring the text in class activities in which Critical Literacy Questions and CT Questions are incorporated, answering comprehension questions in group, and reflection, and (c) CT skills discussion. This study provides an alternative model of teaching CT in Indonesia context.

Conceptualizing Bilingual Education Programs through CLIL and Genre-Based Approach: An Indonesian Context

The implementation of bilingual education programs in the Indonesian secondary school context has experienced considerable changes in the last decade. In this case, the enactment of the International Standards School (ISS) program that propelled the students to experience bilingual education programs at schools was discontinued by the government in 2015. Consequently, the discontinuation of the ISS program leads to the scarcity of studies in examining the progress and effectiveness of bilingual education programs in Indonesia. At the same time, the phenomenon of private schools that offer bilingual programs has been significantly more popular after the ISS program was abolished. However, there is a lack of established instruction on how to implement bilingual programs in such schools. Therefore, this paper aims to conceptualise the implementation of bilingual education programs through the implementation of Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) and Genre-Based Approach (GBA). Drawing on the relevant literature, this paper examines a new perspective in bilingual education programs by considering the suitability between CLIL and genre theory in the Indonesian secondary school context. Further, this paper also provides a unit of work/syllabus sample that incorporates both CLIL and GBA. Ultimately, future implications in responding to the enactment of bilingual education programs in Indonesia are also discussed.

Teaching Essay Writing to EFL Students Using WTL (Write To Learn (WTL) Digital Tool

A myriad research has demonstrated the use of digital tool as an approach to teaching of English as a foreign language (EFL), but little research on this topic of interest has been undertaken in the Indonesian secondary school and higher education context. Particularly, the use of digital tool as practicing and examining students’ writing remains under-explored in this educational setting. With these in mind, this research presents an empirical study that looks into to what extent the deployment of a digital tool mediates multimodal learning tasks in the EAL classroom. The study specifically examines challenges and benefits of using the digital tool “write to learn” to develop students’ writing and reading competences. The study also looks at the roles of teacher and students in the entire learning process. A total of 80 polytechnic students volunteered to participate the study. Individually, they were assigned to perform a series of tasks, including (1) connecting to “write to learn” website, (2) reading articles and instruction in, and (3) writing essays. Empirical data were garnered from postings, students’ writing and students’ interviews. Drawing on these data, the present chapter reports on four major findings, that is: (1) drafting and negotiating strategies for writing essay creation, (2) framing the use of language in composing, (3) discussing the result essay creation and improvement, and (4) positioning roles of teachers and students in the entire learning process.

Students empowerment in chemistry learning through the integration of dilemma teaching pedagogy in plastic waste

The research aimed to engage students in reflecting their values through the integration of dilemma teaching pedagogy in chemistry classroom. Dilemmas stories have been engaged students in values awareness through critical and dilemma thinking in the issues of plastic waste. The research was conducted in four secondary schools in Indonesia with 457 students, with depth case study in two classrooms of year 12. The mixed-method study as a methodology provided different perspectives to understand the participants. The survey as quantitative data collection used The Constructivist Values Learning Environment Survey (CVLES), followed by qualitative data through semi-structured interviews, and classroom observations. The CVLES obtained perceptions of student engagement with the story, the teacher’s supportive role, critical thinking skill development, and students’ learning to listen actively and think about the chemistry learning. The results show that the students and the researcher engaged in critical reflection on their values, collaboration with others, on their roles in participating in environmental education, social issues, and in deep chemistry learning. In addition, the dilemmas stories play important roles in developing character education which is relevant to new Indonesia curricula.

INDONESIAN, MALAYSIAN AND THAI SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS’ WILLINGNESS TO COMMUNICATE IN ENGLISH

Purpose – This quantitative study explored willingness to communicate (WTC) across two settings, ESL in Malaysia, and EFL in Indonesia and Thailand. Participants’ WTC levels were measured and communicative situations in which participants were almost always willing and almost never willing to communicate in English were identified. Method – Convenience sampling was used to select the three countries, four secondary schools and 42 intact classes from Years 7 to 10. Two schools were in Malaysia, while one school each was in Indonesia and Thailand. A total of 1038 participants, consisting of 291 Malaysians, 325 Indonesians and 422 Thais took part in the study. The instrument used was an adapted questionnaire measuring WTC inside and outside the English classroom. Findings – The major findings were: 1) Situations in which students were almost never willing to communicate in English were mainly found outside the classroom; 2) Students were almost always willing to communicate in English in brief, predictable situations requiring the use of set phrases; 3) ESL students had a higher level of WTC than EFL students; and 4) WTC inside the classroom was significantly higher than WTC outside the classroom. Significance – The findings have implications for ESL/EFL classroom instruction. English teachers remain the main interlocutors in increasing WTC in the classroom. They also need to bridge the gap between the classroom and the outside world by preparing students for real social situations. This is consistent with the situation-specific aspect of WTC in the heuristic model proposed by MacIntyre, Clément, Dörnyei, & Noels (1998).

Suicide Attempt and Associated Factors Among Adolescents in Five Southeast Asian Countries in 2015.

Background: Suicide is a major cause of death among adolescents. Aims: The study aimed to report on the prevalence and correlates of suicide attempt among in-school adolescents in five Southeast Asian countries. Method: Cross-sectional data from the 2015 Global School-Based Student Health Survey (GSHS) included 33,004 middle-school children (mean age = 14.3 years, SD = 1.6) that were representative of all students in secondary school in Indonesia, Laos, Philippines, Thailand, and Timor-Leste. Results: The overall prevalence of past 12-month suicide attempt was 9.0%, ranging from 3.9% in Indonesia to 16.2% in the Philippines. Among those with a suicide attempt in the past 12 months, almost half (49.0%) had suicidal ideation and 47.7% had a suicide plan in the past 12 months. In adjusted Poisson regression analysis, female gender, residing in Laos, Philippines, Thailand, and Timor-Leste, no close friends, loneliness, anxiety, bullying victimization, physical attack, lack of parental support, lack of peer support, current alcohol use, lifetime cannabis use, lifetime amphetamine use, soft drink consumption, truancy, and injury were associated with suicide attempt. Limitations: The correlational nature of the study limits the implications of the findings. Conclusion: Almost one in 10 students had attempted suicide in the past 12 months and several factors associated with suicide attempt were identified among adolescents in five Southeast Asian countries.

Exploring EFL Teachers’ Classroom Management: The Case of Indonesian Remote Secondary Schools

Exploring EFL Teachers’ Classroom Management: The Case of Indonesian Remote Secondary Schools