12 important for teachers to make the students feel like they are doing tasks the way
they should be used Yang, 2010. Authentic communication therefore refers to performing language the way it is used in a real world setting.
Authenticity should be comprehended from both the materials and other aspects of learning such as students and setting. ―Authenticity is a function not
only of the language but also of the participants, the use to which language is put, the setting, the nature of the interaction, and the interpretation the participants
bring to both the setting and the activity‖ Taylor, 1994:6. Therefore, it should also be connected with the learning tasks or activities as stated by Gatbonton and
Gu, 1994:24 ―Because of the different meanings of authenticity, the issue becomes subjective to individual interpretation‖Taylor, 1994:3
In order to create an authentic learning, teachers should create activities that allow students to use the language.
Teachers should design tasks that allow learners to practice identifying the key grammar and vocabulary in real-world texts and to develop the skills of speaking
and listening in an integrated way, just as in authentic communicative situations Yang, 2010: 341.
In addition, teachers should also adapt the learning to the students‘ context. Materials which are based on the relevant environment are expected to
boost the learners‘ motivation which results to more effective learning Nguyen, 2005.
b. Authenticity in Language Learning
Most students in Indonesia have started learning English since they are in their elementary level of education. Nevertheless, their English remains low. They
13 keep considering themselves as poor English learners and being incapable to
involve in communicative activities like dialogues, presentation, role playing, drama and others. This has been resulted from the lack of practices in authentic
communication. ―Many foreign language learners experience limited exposure to auth
entic discourse in the target language‖ Oxford Lin, 2011:163. School teachers unfortunately give little or no activities that provide students with
authentic communication practices. This might be caused by their lack of time to provide such activities. There are three approaches that become the standards for
authenticity in language learning Mishan, 2005: 1:
The precedent for authenticity in language learning can be seen to fall into three groups: ‗communicative approaches‘ in which communication is both the
objective of language learning and the means through which the language is thought, ‗materials-focused‘ approaches, in which learning is centered principally
round the text, and ‗humanistic approaches‘ which address the ‗whole‘ learner and emphasize the value of human development.
It can be understood that authenticity should not only refer to a text as in the ‗materials-focused approach‘ but also to communication in the target language
in order to guarantee the learners‘ progress. Unfortunately, most teachers do not put enough appreciation to the communicative and humanistic approaches. It
eventually contributes to the learners‘ low competence in learning. ―Although a lot of effort has been put into the development of ELT programs, they have been
largely unsuccessful in meeting eve n their limited goals‖ Kaplan and Baldauf,
2003:97. Indonesia as one of the expanding countries considers English simply as a
foreign language which is only taught in school Kirkpatrick, 2010. The lack attention on communicative approach in which students should experience using
14 English as a mean to learn the language is one main reason of the learners‘
incapability of using the language. To be authentic, the learning materials should always provide practices for using the language Tomlinson and Masuhara,
2010:400. Teachers therefore should create authentic learning activities which enable the learners to really use the language for the learning to be more
humanistic in which improvement becomes the base of learning.
c. Authentic Tasks
