Pre-figured themes The interpretation of the participants’ lived experience
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knowledge. Watching English movies, listening to English songs and reading English articles were some of the activities they did to develop their knowledge.
Richard 1976: 78 states that when someone enters his adulthood, his vocabulary knowledge is relatively constant unless he actively engages himself through
activities such as reading, listening or others which can improve his vocabulary knowledge. Students might perceive the chance of being autonomous learners
differently but applying ELTGallery as the media of vocabulary learning encourages students to be autonomous.
2 Challenging Vocabulary Learning with ELTGallery
Breaking the conventional way in learning technique offers new challenges for the learning participants. ELTGallery is a breakthrough in
vocabulary learning especially for the PBI students in Sanata Dharma University. It is applied to cover things which traditional classroom cannot cover. Applying
technology in vocabulary learning builds up a large vocabulary, gives students control over what words to learn, presents exercises to promote deeper learning
and so on Goodfellow: 1994 as cited in Miles Kwon, 2008: 1. The learning materials in ELTGallery covers the first thousand word list, the second thousand
word list and the first three thousand word list. Those learning materials were distributed to some features in ELTGallery which allowed the students to learn
and practice them independently. However, both Dipta and Martha felt that the burden of completing the
weekly tasks was very high. Their weekly tasks were completing seventy-five sentences and making twenty sentences. They also had to review their friends’
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sentences and give feedback to them. Although Dipta and Martha realized that the purpose of assigning the weekly exercises was to develop their vocabulary, but
they felt that the number of the exercises were too many. The tasks were quite many, perhaps because the features of the
exercises are so various. Well…actually they are good to improve our vocabulary knowledge but it’s tiring. Too many tasks to do. DA26
The variation of exercises in ELTGallery is good, quite various. But I think, the number of the questions in each type of exercise is just too
much. It seemed pak Dwi only focused on the weekly tasks in which we had to complete 75 sentences and make 20 sentences each week. I
think it would have been better if we had fewer numbers of questions and various types of exercises. MA24
Nation 1990 in his research on frequency counts stated that university students need around 2000 high frequency words with additional of 1000 further
high frequency words to support their study. In accordance with Nation’s
research, the learning materials in ELTGallery already covered the students’ need.
Students need to spend their time to learn the high frequency words to support their basic understanding and knowledge of English. Therefore, the numbers of
the exercises were actually normal and the students had one week to complete their tasks. Moreover, Martha confessed that she developed her reading skill as
the result of her vocabulary learning. The vocabularies from the website help me to comprehend an article. I
love reading, miss. So I think it helps me to improve my understanding in written texts. MA13
Probably what made the weekly tasks became too burdening for the students was because of the technical problem which often occurred in
ELTGallery. A web-based learning environment is considered effective when it is efficient to use and only has few errors Nielsen, 1993. Meanwhile, Dipta and
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Martha complained that they often experienced error in the website which slow down their work.
..The website itself was also problematic sometimes, miss. We need to log in and out several times. It slowed down the work. I guess the
system of the website should be revised. When we only have very limited time and we still have to log in and out several times…that
was so bothering. DA16
…the buttons don’t always direct us to the right destination pages. I experienced it when I wanted to repeat test seventy-five weekly
exercises. I wish I could make it faster, remake it but I had to log out first and log in again, and sometimes the page was error. It’s so
annoying because the time is limited. DA17
The annoying thing is when the features are error. The time is short but we can’t do anything when the website is error. DA28
From the narration above, Dipta felt annoyed when he experienced technical problems since it reduced his time to finish his tasks. Not far different
from Dipta, Martha also experienced error page sometimes. Fast access in web- based environment is a crucial thing. Technical problems and download time
should be minimized to make the learning process simpler and stress free Hall, 2003. Further, Nielsen 1996 as cited in Hall 2003: 7 pointed out that web-
based learning should be able to make students get information simply and quickly. Therefore, the technical problems in ELTGallery need to be fix to support
the student learning process optimally. Further, Martha also shared that her bigger challenges in vocabulary learning using ELTGallery was when she also had
homework from other subjects and some technical problems occurred at the same time. It could make her felt very stressful. Her challenge was also to stare at the
monitor for quite a long time to do the tasks. She said it was tiring. Yet, this case is unavoidable since web-based class required students to deal with monitors most
of the time. Time and task management might help students to reduce this burden. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
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Another challenge was related to the layout of ELTGallery. Dipta and Martha shared the same experience about it. According to them, the layout of
ELTGallery was monotonous. They did not really like the blue color in all the page of ELTGallery. The font used in the website was not favorable. However, the
buttons were quite simple although they still experienced errors. According to Dipta and Erika, the look of the website should be made as attractive as possible
so that the students could enjoy their study time by exploring the website. It was such a challenge for them to deal with the website most of the time while they did
not really enjoy looking at the website layout. Even Martha had an idea to give the students some chances to customize their pages based on their favorite colors,
fonts and so on. She believed that it would be more enjoyable for the students. In fact, there is a surprising amount of research indicates that when learners are
given too much freedom in choosing and selecting their favorable things in the website contents, it will decrease learning effectiveness Large, 1996; Niemiec et
al., 1996 as cited in Hall, 2003. Probably, the website designer did not really concern about the layout because he wanted the students to focus on the contents
only since the goal of the learning process is to improve the students’ vocabulary knowledge.
3 ELTGallery Learning Atmosphere
Learning atmosphere is also important to help students achieving the learning goal. If students feel comfortable during the learning process, they will
be confident and enthusiastic to give their best performance. Brown 1987, Krashen Terrel 1983 and Lozanov 1978 as cited in Egbert, Chao, and
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Hanson- Smith 1999: 6 present their ideas that “before becoming mindfully
engaged and willing to communicate their ideas, learners must experience an optimal level of anxiety in the language learning environment, any feelings or
worry or apprehension must be facilitative rather than debilitative”. Therefore, even if learners experience anxiety during the learning process, it should be
challenging instead of discouraging. Once learners feel stressful, then it will lead them to discouragement which affects their motivation to continue the learning
process well. Unfortunately, both Dipta and Martha felt that the stress level in web-
based vocabulary class was high. The main reason was that they had to complete many tasks in a limited time. Martha even felt that although she had managed her
time but she could not keep up with the tasks. …I always felt in a rush to complete the tasks, miss. Whereas I
thought, I had made my time schedule to arrange my activities and time to do campus tasks. But, I don’t know…the time seemed never
enough. It was very very exhausting. MA38
Dipta felt stressful with this new teaching method because of its high expectation. His first expectation learning vocabulary with ELTGallery was fun.
He expected that ELTGallery would help him learn vocabulary in a fun way. Yet, he found out later that he could not enjoy the learning process. Instead of having
games to facilitate the vocabulary learning, Dipta had to complete the weekly tasks in form of exercises. Dipta also felt bored with the class situation.
…I don’t know…I felt bored. Perhaps because of the layout or maybe the situation in class. It was not really fun. DA4
Further, he said that the conventional class was easier to handle since there were not many homework and there were more supervisions in class. Martha got
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confused every time she wanted to ask and consult her problems to friends because she felt uneasy to disturb
her friends’ activity. …Traditional class provides more interaction between the teacher and
students. Furthermore, in traditional class there are not a lot of things to do at home. Everything is done in class…DA16
I don’t know…I just feel happier in traditional class…the one with books and printed handouts. It is easier, I think. It is more suitable
with my learning style. I just need to study in the class, no more exercises at home. Everything is under control because it is done in
class and the lecturer check the work directly. DA24
…Conventional class is better because the lecturer helps the students more actively. I myself prefer the traditional class. I guess it is more
effective because there are more supervisions and interactions in class. In web-based class with ELTGallery, when we got confused we
felt awkward to ask, the weekly tasks are just so many. In my opinion, vocabulary should be learnt bit by bit, repetitions should be more,
because I tend to have short time memory so I still need more practices. MA20
At last, Martha and Dipta confessed that they felt more comfortable learning vocabulary in conventional class than in web-based class. Since
conventional class offered more interactions and supervisions, they would not get confused whom to consult when they had problems during their learning time.
According to them, applying a website in a class created space between the students and the lecturer which resulted on awkwardness. They hesitated to ask
and consult since they rarely had conversation in class. Besides some technical problems which happened to the website, the plenty number of weekly tasks also
caused the high stress level in the class. Whereas, once learners feel stressful, it will lead them to discouragement, which affects their motivation to continue the
learning process well. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
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