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some of the private schools adopted “national plus curriculum” which means that
they intend to go beyond the minimum government requirements, especially with the use of English as medium of instruction or having and international-based
curriculum instead of the national one.
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. The teachers who teach in elementary level are expected to help students to
develop their potentials not only in religious and spiritual aspects but also in actualizing their learning potential.
b. Characteristics of Elementary School Students
In general, children who are still in the elementary school level ages about 7-11 years old. They used to be called as young learners. Generally, they are
natural learners, they are curious about the world around them. They learn by doing; they learn most efficiently when all of their senses are involved. They are
active but have short attention spans Costa and Kallick, 2000; Shin, 2006. Children in age 7-11 years develop their ability to apply logical thought to
concrete problem. In this stage, they are able to improve their ability to think more logically. They are already very good at interpreting meaning without necessarily
understanding the individual words. They are already having great skills in using limited language creatively. And they also love talking. They learn more through
holistic context, not part by part Costa and Kallick, 2000; Shin, 2006. Therefore, the context in which children carry out activities in the primary classroom needs
to be natural, real and understandable Paul, 2003. Teachers need to encourage them to use language as a vehicle to do things which have a real purpose.
Children bring to language learning their curiosity and eagerness to make sense of the world Cameron, 2001. A child is an active learner. Young child is
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able to think in a more advanced way, and even abstractly, in contexts where she has had a lot of experience Cameron, 2001. This means that if teacher provides
children with a rich learning environment in his English class, he may be pleasantly suprised at how much their students can learn. So, teachers are not only
as the facilitator for them but also to be able to stimulate and challenge their students.
According to Santrock 2008, students of Asia including Indonesia have a collective culture and they tend to work in group. They used to obey the rules of
traditional games, they like to compare themselves with other, and a bit shy to perform in front of the class Mustaqim, 2001. They also realistics and curious to
know something new. They paid attention to their favorite subject and love to work in group or with their peer.
For teachers, to understand their students‟ characteristics help them to provide supportive academic achievement.
4. MutiaraPersadaElementarySchool Yogyakarta
In this section, the profile, the curriculum, and the English Day Program will be defined in detailed.
a. The Profile
Mutiara Persada Elementary School Yogyakarta is the school which applied four language systems. English and Mandarin have been promoted as the
international languages, Indonesian as the national language, and Javanese as the local language. This international-based education system has just applied since
February 2009. Thus, the curriculum is the combination of national-plus and international curriculum. The school‟s vision and mission have a strong
emphasizes on the language development aspects. The languages include English
