Learners’ Personal Narratives Research Results

46 P2 and P9 have similar case in term of mother tongue. P9 was born in Timor Leste and raised there until he was around 14 years old. Therefore, he speaks Tetun local language. But, he explains that Tetun itself has various type namely Tetun Terik and Tetun Portu. Tetun Terik mostly adapts many words from Indonesia to be used while Tetun Portu mostly adapts many other words from Portugesee. P9 used to speak those two types of Tetun. As he explains: Bahasa ibu saya bahasa Tetun. Hhm. Bahasa Tetun. Setelah itu saya masuk eeh, SD, itu saya dibawa ke Timor Leste dan Tetun saya itu Tetun, eehh, campuran. Saya dari Tetun yang Terik ke daerah yang Tetun Portu, mau tidak mau saya harus, ehh, beda lagi. Saya harus menyesuaikan dengan Tetun Terik saya dengan Tetun, eeh, Portu. I spoke Tetun as my first language. After I entered Elementary school, I was taken to live in Timor Leste. Therefore I started to speak mix-Tetun Terik and Portu Both of them are different so at that time I had to adapt. While P2 speaks bahasa Adonara East of Flores‘ local language. He also has various type of bahasa Adonara. For its variety of dialects and some lexical or morphemes as he explains: Bahasa daerah bahasa pertama saya. ... Baru saya kan basicnya, bahasa L1 kan ada beberapa bahasa memang, jadi ehm, bahasa ibu ada beberapa bahasa, ada bahasa dialek Flores Adonara-Adonara Barat, kemudian Flores Adonara Timur, dan Adonara tengah. Itu kan, maksudnya masing-masing punya dialek yang berbeda. Ya, saya gunakan. Ketika berbicara dengan orang Adonara Barat, ya, sambung, kemudian Adonara Timur juga harus menyesuaikan dengan mereka. My first language is our local language. Basically our local language is different one another even compared among disctrict. The dialects are different. For example, the one that I used to speak at home is bahasa Adonara-Barat, then also bahasa Adonara-Timur and bahasa Adonara Tengah. Each of them, based on the location, has its own dialect and I used to use all of them depend on whom I speak with 47 Different from what P2 and P9 have, P1‘s first language is bahasa Indonesia. Eventhough he comes from a Javanesse family, his parents decide to use bahasa Indonesia as the language for communication among family members. P1 explains: Bahasa ibu saya, ya bahasa Indonesia. Kami keluarga Jawa tetapi tidak memraktekkan adat Jawa semuanya. Jadi walaupun Jawa, kami di keluarga tetep ngomong bahasa Indonesia. My mother tongue is bahasa Indonesia. We are Javanesse, but we don‘t practice all things as what a Javanesse family usually do. Eventhough we are Javanesee, we still use bahasa Indonesia as a language for communication in our family In dealing with learning English, a learner‘s mother tongue impacts a lot. As what Brown 1980 explains about interlingual transfer as one of three sources of error, it is proved. P2 and P9 claim that it was fairly difficult to start learning and understanding English past tense because of the big difference concept of their mother tongues and English itself. P2 states: Secara teori paham tetapi secara ketika practice nya itu yang sulit. Kadang, mungkin karena konsepnya dalam konsep Indonesia ya sehingga misalnya, “saya juga:,” I also”. Gitu, Begitu. Jadi konsepnya dalam bahasa Inggris sehingga ketika hendak memikirkan untuk membicarakan sesuatu, pasti menterjemahkan dulu, ya terbawa, konsepnya terbawa, sehingga harus terjemahkan dulu dari kata per kata, sehingga kadang membingungkan juga untuk menerapkannya dalam tense. Theoret ically I understand but to apply them, I think it‘s difficult. Sometimes it is because I still hold Indonesian concept, for example, ―saya juga‖, -he translates- ―I also‖. I find that in English we have different concept but everytime I try to use English, I translate it into bahasa first. That is why sometimes the concept follows. I end up with my own confusion then Similar to that, P9 also states: Aahh, SMP kelas 2 itu saya sudah diperkenalkan dengan tenses. Dan waktu itu tenses dasar yang saya tahu itu simple present, present PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 48 continuous dan past. Past pun simple past. Itu SMP. Itu dasar, kira-kira saya SMP kelas 2 lah, kira-kira seperti itu. Hhm, dan saat itu, saya hanya bisa menangkap simple-nya read: present tense. Tapi past-nya itu masih sulit. Past-nya memang sulit, saat itu memang sulit. Saya pikir itulah kesulitan bagaimana merubah, bagaimana merubah satu kata sederhana simple ke past itu, saat itu memang kesulitan saya sejak awal, tentang seperti itu, perubahan kata. Karena konsepnya berbeda, dari bahasa Indonesia I was introduced to English tenses when I was in the second grade of junior high school. But it was just the basic. And, at that time, I think I only could understand well about present tense while past tense even is still difficult until now. How to change the form in present to past is difficult for me. Because from the very beginning, my problems is in changing the form of a word and it is different from what we have in bahasa The different concept between English and their mother tongue here specifically goes to the changing form or a verb based on the time marking of a sentence. In Tetun, bahasa Adonara and even bahasa Indonesia, we do not change the verb eventhough the time is different when a certain sentence is uttered or produced. This creates bunch of confusion when they are to deal with English tenses concept. Among their confusion, these students admit that English then was becoming higher and higher required as they entered their Congregation. P2 explains: Tapi ketika masuk kongregasi kan memang tuntutan utama harus bahasa Inggrisnya karena bahasa Internasional. Jadi sempat membuat saya kewalahan juga dengan basic bahasa Inggris yang ala kadarnya kemudian yang sampai ke tingkat itu yang waktu SMA itu, eh, waktu di Kongregasi itu bulan-bulan e, tahun pertama itu kami dapat tiga dosen bahasa Inggris. Itu, grammarnya guru khusus, dosen khusus, kemudian ehm, pronunciationnya juga khusus kemudian dia dalam membuat tulisan juga khusus. Itu. But when I joined Congregation, English became the main requirement. So it was little bit difficult for me to adapt since the basic knowledge of PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 49 English that I got from high school was not adequate. In our Congregation, for initial months we had helped by three lecturers for English. Each of them helped us in grammar, pronunciation and writing of English P9 also explains that, in Seminary, not also English that he got to learn more and deeper but also reflection activity. He tells: Dalam seminari, kami diwajibkan membuat refleksi setiap hari. Itu dari tingkat awal masuk sudah begitu. Dan itu nanti sampai tahap akhir memang harus punya refleksi tertulis setiap hari. Maka boleh saya katakan, kami sudah cukup terbiasa dengan kegiatan berefleksi. Dulu ketika awal, saya masih awal, saya membuat refleksi selama satu bulan penuh, setiap hari, dalam bahasa Inggris. Setiap hari satu halaman. Dan dari situ, paling tidak secara praktis saya bisa membuat tulisan-tulisan bahasa Inggris karena terbiasa. Sampai sekarang, dalam satu minggu, setiap hari Kamis, saya membuat refleksi dalam bahasa Inggris sehingga kebiasaan dengan bahasa Inggris. Di komunitas juga kami memiliki hari bahasa Inggris itu hari senin, selasa dan kamis. Jadi semua repertoa doa- doa dan misa pada hari-hari tersebut, kami pakai bahasa Inggris. Kecuali kalau hari selasa, karena kami misa dengan umat sehingga bahasa Indonesia. Tetapi untk ibadat pagi, doa-doa dan nyanyian semua dalam bahasa Inggris. Dan hari Kamis, itu kami membuat refleksi dalam bahasa Inggris untuk disharingkan dalam komunitas. Jadi refleksi tertulis itu bisa disharingkan kepada saudara-saudara dalam komunitas. In Seminary, we are required to write a reflection every day, from the very beginning. So i can say that we are accustomed to reflection writing. At that time, in my initial period of entering Seminary, I used to write English reflection. But it was only for about one month. But I think it is helpful for me in learning how to write a reflection in English. Until now, every Thursday,I still write a reflection using Englis. In our community – Congregation- we have English days, which are Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. So every activity are in English such as daily mass, brevire and prayers. Except when we have mass with other people from outside – Congregation- we use bahasa. But other than that, we use English. Every Thursday, we also have to share our English reflection to other members. So on Thursday, we share what we have written in our reflection to other brothers in community, using English The fact that, not only required but in Seminary or their Congregation, the exposure of English is constructing through various activities. Based on P9‘s experience, the activity of reflecting using English also done to help them getting 50 involved to English more and more. P1 ‘s experience then is quiet the same. He tells that in Seminary, they got a pretty good practice in tenses, including past tense. He explains: Itu beneran agak nambah waktu di kelas 1. Karena dia jago banget. S3. Gurunya di Mertoyudan. ... H‟mm. Jadi dia itu pake buku yang udah lama banget, dan itu buku itu semacam kumpulan tenses gitu. Itu cetakan lama. Setiap pembahasan ada soal-soal kayak kalimat gitu. In first grade of high school in Seminary, I got more of English. Our teacher was very fluent, Mertoyudan High School Seminary. He used to use an old book, typically a compilation of English tenses. It was published long time ago, I guess. Each part of discussion, there are questions to answer When these students are asked about their own understanding in English past tense, each of them answered in quiet the same way. Most of them are not very comfortable to say that they understand and master it well. While, the thing that differ them one another is their experience of learning it in the past. They share what they had and learned before. P2 for instance, explains his learning experience at school as he began to learn English intensively. Ya, monoton, ikut di buku, kemudian tugasnya pun paling menterjemahkan, Sekedar terjemahkan dan itu kesannya membosankan dari kelas satu sampai kelas dua, kemudian kelas tiga, ganti guru tetapi itu saya rasa bahwa gurunya itu terlalu pintar berbahasa Inggris sementara tidak menyesuaikan dengan kami yang pemula. Jadi itu juga kesannya membosankan. Lalu waktu masuk SMA di Seminari, memang menarik di Seminari itu pada saat bulan-bulan awal itu kami belajar mulai penggunaan tenses, grammar iya, tenses-tenses, Itu, tapi karena gurunya kan Pater, iya kan, jadi hampir setiap hari itu hanya bahas mengenai tenses, sedangkan aplikasinya dalam, misalkan untuk buat tulisan ataupun itu kurang, hanya belajar saja, itu SMA Seminari, kelas satu hingga dua. It was monotonous. Our teacher just copied what written in books and only gave us assignment on translating. Translating is so boring for me, from my first until second grade of senior high school that was only 51 activity our teacher gave. Then in third grade the teacher was changed. But, I think he was too smart so that the method that he used was quiet difficult for us to understand. So it was also so boring. When I entered Seminary, English became more interesting. The lecturer, whose a priest taught me abou tenses, and grammar. But, the activities were also in practicing questions on that. We never had practice to really use it in speaking or writing. I feel that it was not enough for me to be able to apply those tenses appropriately then. Further about his understanding in past tense P2 states: Pemahaman mengenai penggunaan past tense itu yang tahu adalah bahwa sesudah berlalu, walaupun sedetik yang lalu, itu menggunakan past tense. I:Kalau Past continuous? P2: Past continous sampai sekarang masih membingungkan. ... itu juga saya sampai sekarang saya tidak tahu kapan menggunakan have been, kapan menggunakan has been, itu masih suatu kesulitan bagi saya. My understanding in using of past tense as far as I know is if it is something that had happened in the past, even it is only about seconds, we should use past form. I: How about past continuous? P2: Past continuous is confusi ng for me. ... I also don‘t know when to use have been and has been. Those are still difficult for me. The similar story is revealed from P9 when he was asked the same question. P9 explains that his teacher in junior high school tends to give them command to memorize the vocabularies as well as the tenses or rules in English. He tells: Dulu itu kan kalau di SMP, guru omong apa ya kita peracaya saja. Metode yang digunakan oleh guru saya waktu itu adalah menghafal. Dan bagi saya saya merasa itu tidak cocok. Kalau untuk orang yang gamapang menghafal ya baik, tetapi kalau seperti saya yang tidak suka menghafal itu sangat sulit. Guru saya selalu suruh kami hafal, misalkan contoh kalau present itu formula nya harus subjek tanpa predikat dan itu, dan itu harus dihafal. Formulanya harus dihafal dan kekurangan saat itu adalah praktis formula, yang masuk dalam praktek, misalkan saya diajarkan formula past tense, tetapi untuk masuk dan menggunakan past tense itu kurang. Apalagi bicara, itu kurang. Sehingga formula itu hanya semacam untuk belajar saja begitu. Kita diberi untuk menghafal tetapi tidak pernah 52 dilakukan. Untuk mendalami itu secara terus menerus, kalau tidak praktis kan susah. When I was in junior high school, we obliged whatever teachers say. The method in teaching English that was used for us is memorizing. And for me it doesn‘t work much. For those who can easily memorize things, it probably would be okay. But for me, I don‘t like memorizing. Though, our teacher used to ask us to memorize, for example the formula for present tense or other concept. The teachers asked us to memorize without real practising. So it turns to be very difficult for me to apply it in a sentence. For example in past tense. I only memorized it without really understand the function of it. In my opinion, in order to get the understanding of the concept, we really need to practice how to apply it into real form. If it is not, it would be difficult. Both P2 and P9 claim that their teacher in high school tend to give kind of boring activities and only focus on the materials without further consider the students‘ understanding. Add, they reveal that the method for them are helpless since need more chance to practice and further explanation to understand instead of memorizing and drilling with written questions. While P1 experience some difference in learning English since his very first time. The English course that he took when he was in Elemnetary school helps a lot for its method of finding ‗shortcuts‘ in understanding concepts in English. As he explains: Saat itu tuh, ada bahas „pedang bengkok‟ itu buat present. Pedang bengkok itu S, jadi kalau S kan pedang bengkok. Jadi kami hafalinnya itu. Jadi kalau present gitu kan pakai pedang bengkok. Misal, Ogi takes ... nah ini ni pakai pedang bengkok. Kalau nggak, kalau misalnya di double atau dia apa gitu, nah itu nggak pake pedang bengkok. Saat itu tuh, gue ngerasa nah itu gua udah tahu tuh. Nah, jadi Alfa itu menyediakan cara yang lebih mudah gua ngerti dan inget. There was a part of discussing something called ‗pedang bengkok‘ as a representative of letter ‗s‘. So, we were taught that if it is in present than the ‗pedang bengkok‘ should be used. For example, ―Ogi takes‖, nah, there ‗pedang bengkok‘ exists. If it is not in present than the ‗pedang bengkok‘ 53 should not be used. So, Alfa the English course that P1 joined provides easy ways of understanding concepts in English. It was helpful for me As what he explained, can be seen that P1 experience different method compared to what is experienced by P2 and P9 and the fact claims that the method that applied when P1 started learning English helps him more in understand concepts in English. The researcher then tried to ask these students about their experience if doing the writing reflection assigned by the lecturer in their Bahasa Inggris I class last semester. Each of them answers differently. P2 states that actually he expects a written feedback for what he had written. Since for him, written feedback is easier to remember so that he will know his mistakes and errors. He says: kemarin yang buat refleksi itu bagus, itu memang sangat membantu sekali ya untuk membuat refleksi dalam bahasa Inggris. Tetapi ketika di sana, hanya sekedar mengumpulkan. Tidak ada feedback, kemudian tidak ada memberi kami untuk, menyampaikan kepada kami gambaran sedikit apa yang sudah kami sharingkan itu. Sehingga, istilahnya, mentok di situ. In doing the reflection assignment, I think it was very helpful. That assignment gives me chance to practice writing reflection in English. But, there was no feedback from the lecturer. Even any explanation about the ‗DOs and DON‘Ts‘ which actually we expect as the follow up of that assginment. So it was not improved. P9 shares something different. He says that in doing the assignment, he actually avoided using past tense. He did it because he is still confused about how and when to apply past tense in sentences especially in writing a reflection. It is seen as he explains: Kalau refleksi, seingat saya itu saat menyusun itu, hal yang saya pikirkan begini, saat ini saya menulis, saya akan mengatakan kepada orang, atau PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 54 memberikan materi kepada orang, memberikan renungan ini kepada orang sudah di waktu yang akan datang dan saya akan bekerja di hari ini. Saya membawa teks yang hari ini saya kerjakan untuk hari esok. Artinya, teks ini untuk hari esok itu sudah past. Itu kesulitan pertama yang saya temukan. Dan menggunakan past tense secara tertulis seperti itu, saya menemukan kesulitan. Awalnya, bagaimana mengatakan ini, apalagi ambil lagi ayat dari kitab suci yang sudah ditulis beratus-ratus juta tahun yang lalu untuk dihadirkan di sini dalam waktu present nah itu sesuatu yang sulit dan itu membuat apa, semacam, ya saya bisa katakan bagi saya membingungkan juga karena saya berpikir, masih, masih seperti ini, karena itu tadi, membawa sesuatu yang masa lampau ke saat ini itu sulit. Nah tapi saya berusaha dengan paling tidak apa yang bisa saya buat lah. Jadi waktu itu saya memang tidak banyak menggunakan past tense. Teks saya itu tidak banyak menggunakan past tense, lebih banyak saya membawa ke present karena itu saya bisa lebih pahami dan saya merasa lebih mudah untuk menyampaikan karena itu saat ini. Sehingga memang banyak kesalahan-kesalahan yang sebetulnya itu kalimatnya harus past, saya buatkan present. Saya semacam menghindari untuk buat jadi past karena susah untuk saya mengerti. In doing the assignment, I thought like this. When I write that reflection, I share reflection, experience and materials to people in the future. So, when this written reflection is about to use in the future and the tense that I use is present that would be irrelevant. Then, the reading that I use in my reflection comes from Bible which speaks abouth events that had happened in thousand years ago. That makes me so confused in determining the tenses I use in that assignment. But I tried my best at hat time, in doing that assignment. I worked on it but I avoided using past tense. That is why there in my reflection, you may find lots of present form instead of past form. Using present makes me easier to write and understand my own allure of the reflection. I admit that some errors I made commonly happen when I use present instead of past in telling events that had happened As the final statement, the researcher asked these students to share their opinions about how important to understand English well not only verbal, but also written, for them as the candidate of Catholic Priest. They also share their expectation of method in teaching and learning English based on what they had experienced before. 55 As what has been quoted previously, that P2 expects feedback in the process of learning English, especially the written one. He further also refers to what he had experienced when he was in junior and senior high school that teachers should not be changed as the students moved to next grade. He thinks that if there is only one teacher that teach them English from the first until the third grade, the process of learning English would be more effective. Since the teacher would be able to monitor students‘ progress and also control the materials that are given in the process of learning. As the result, there will not be any repetition in giving materials and teacher also can improve the method and technique in teaching based on students‘ progress and need. His opinion can be seen as he explains: Satu problem nya itu juga bahwa setiap guru kan tiap kelas, setiap tingkat berbeda. Kelas satu guru berbeda, kelas satu gurunya berbeda, kelas tiga gurunya berbeda. Jadi guru yang bawa kami dari kelas satu itu maksudnya tidak mengover apa yang sudah kami pelajari di kelas satu sehinga nanti di kelas dua itu kecenderungan tetapi ulangnya dalam hal yang lain. Ulangnya dalam hal yang lain sehingga dalam, membuat kami bingung. Tercampur aduk, tidak fokus. Sehingga guru yang satu dengan dia punya kapasitas yang satu nanti dia punya cara mengajarnya begini, nanti berikutnya kami sudah merasa ya setidaknya sudah merasa in dengan guru ini tapi nanti ketika naik kelas dua ganti lagi guru lagi. Guru ini dengan dia punya type yang begini, cara mengajarnya begini, jadi itu yang buat saya bosan. One problem for me is at school, teacher that teaches us English is different each grade. The one in first grade is different from the one in second and third grade. This makes some of our teachers could not monitor the materials and control our progress. As the result, teacher then repeats the materials that we have had before in the previous grade but in different way or method. This creates chaos in our understanding about the material itself and tends to be boring For the importance of English writing skill, P2 agrees that they –the candidates of priest- need to learn and understand it well. As they have possibilities to receive PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 56 mission abroad. He thinks that English writing skill should be prepared from now. P2 states: untuk kami para frater, kemampuan bahasa Inggris tidak cukup kalau hanya menguasai yang komunikatif saja, tetapi kemampuan menulis juga. Siapa tahu besok-besok kami diberi tugas misi ke luar negeri, komunikasi lewat tulisan juga pasti sangat penting. Makanya kami butuh itu, untuk bisa lebih berkembang. for us as the candidates of priests, it is not enough to master only English for communication. Writing skill is needed too. As if we probably would required to go abroad and run our mission. P2 realises the importance of mastering English writing skill. He has future orientation which is to become a misionarist. The similar thought also revealed by P9 as he tells: Ketika sampai di sini, ketika saya mendapat kelas ini, saya pertama mendapat kelas ini, dan saya berpikir mungkin ada hal-hal yang baru yang saya bisa dapatkan karena saya memahami bahwa saya dituntut untuk mampu berhadapan dengan teks teks bahasa Inggris, red. Karena di Filsafat, kami mulai berhadapan dengan teoi-teori teologi dan konsep- konsep teologi yang mau tidak mau harus dari sana, dari bahasa sana Latin, Yunani, Jerman, Italia, red Memang bahasa Inggris tidak menjadi bahasa dasarnya gereja tetai kebanyakan teks bahasa Latin itu otentisitasnya itu ditentukan oleh bahasa Inggris. Jadi teks-teks dokumen- dokumen itu Gereja, biasanya selalu dalam bahasa Latin dan bahasa Inggris. Dan mau tidak mau harus salah satu bahasa. As I arrived here and joined this class English class, red I think I could get more knowledge. I realise that here I am required to be able to understand texts. In Theology, we are facing theories which provided mostly in English. Eventhough English is not the original language that Church is using but, generally, its documents that originally written in Latin, Greece, Germany, Italy are first translated and verified firstly in Latin and English. That is why, whether we like it or not, we need to understand one of them As what is explained by P9, the fact that these students‘ future profession requires also direct contact to written document in other languages. Interestingly, 57 P1 even believes that English can be a transfer language to those other languages. He tells: Yaa, karena buat gua penting banget sebenarnya paham grammar tu. Buat calon Imam, soalnya kita butuh buat baca tulisan ilmiah, iya kan, banyak juga nih skripsi kakak-kakak pake bahasa Inggris. Dokumen-dokumen gereja. Nah, kalau nggak ngerti grammar ntar orang ngertinya beda ya. Dan orang itu kan, lha, biasanya Inggris itu yang kedua ya. Dalam dokumen-dokumen itu biasanya yang pertama, Prancis, Jerman, Latin, Italia. Nah, mereka begitu tahu, satu kata merea terjemahkan begini, lalu ketika ke bahasa Indonesia, nanti maknanya bisa beda lagi. Sehingga setidaknya kita harus tahu versi yang mendekatinya itu apa. Nah tu biasanya tersedia dalam bahasa Inggris yang kedua itu. Maka paling tidak kita harus tahu, biar ngerti. Kalau kita nggak tahu yang kedua itu, kita nggak bakal tahu makna yang paling mendekatinya itu apa. Maka, buat gua, penting tuh metode yang menekankan grammar buat kita calon Imam. For me understanding English grammar is very important. For priest candidates it is important because we need to read scientific articles and journal. Moreover, our seniors‘ thesis are almost written in English. Apostolical documents are also presented in English. If we cannot understand the grammar, we cannot understand the document well. Generally, English is second language that is used. The documents are originally written in France, Deutch, Latin, Italy, etc. It is important to understand every single word and its context. If not, then the translation might be different, when it is taken to bahasa Indonesia. English helps us to understand at least the approximate meaning. If we don‘t master the transfer language, we would misinterpret them. So in my opinion, the method that emphasizes the grammar understanding in important for us as the priest candidates

B. Discussion

Learning language nowadays is not merely focused only on the technical things. Many experts try to elaborate that grammar, tenses and many other rules are not longer be the final goal of teaching and learning language process. However, in preparing a learner to survive with future profession or occupation, language skills including writing matters. In producing a good writing, one needs PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 58 to master the language‘s rules, concept, formula or in other words what people generally called it as grammar or structure. Yet, this study would not be focus on grammar or structure as the goal of a teaching and learning language process. It is used to describe learner language and map their mastery in one of English feature called past tense. This study analyses written products specifically written reflection. Therefore, past tense then is considered as important to master by the writers. As we know that in reflection, one shares ideas, values which related to experience. Obviously, past tense here should be used properly so that the messages and the value that the writer is sharing can be well transferred and understood. Moreover, by seeing how the learners as the subject of this study write their reflection and then analyzing the error of past tense that occurs, researcher than would be able to provide a model of learner language. T he involvement of these learners‘ personal narratives in experience of learning English generally and past tense specifically would complete the model of learner language a sort of clarification. From that, it is expected that either language learners as well as language teachers of English can learn from the data and the analysis in this study. In order to describe the writings as the subject of this study, the researcher use a rubric. Refering to the explicit knowledge of a learner language proposed by Ellis 2005, the researcher forms a rubric that is used to assess the writings. The rubric, as had been explained in the previous section contains of four focuses namely accuracy, content, organization and diction. 59 Generally, these students achieves best points for content. Based on the data, these student achieves in average 58.45 for accuracy, which is the highest average point among all four terms that assessed. Content here as the element that is assessed in these writing covers what are the ideas and illustrations of messages that these students use in writing their reflection. It is clarified that they actually have been accustomed to reflecting, orally and verbally. Three interviewees claim that they are required to have a written reflection every day which produced using bahasa, even since the first day they started studying and living in Seminary. By having reflection writing as a habit, there is no doubt that these students could perform fairly good in picking their ideas to share. However, referring to the rubric proposed by Brown Bailey 1984, 58.45 cannot be considered as good enough. There are still quiet lot of grammatical problems appeared and influenced reader‘s understandings toward the writings. Students of Bahasa Inggris I class B need to consider this point as what to be improved. The second best point is achieved mostly all of them in term of organization with the average point is 54.57. Generally, these students faced problem in organizing their ideas. They are more likely missed to put some particular ideas in the appropriate part, such as illustration is in the body of their writing instead of in the opening or introduction part. Or in other cases, some put conclusion in the early part without confirming it again in the next paragraphs. This creates confusion when the ideas mentioned in the beginning never showed again until the end. Also, sometimes, the writer even forgets their main ideas. The main ideas are not even stated clearly. In the contrary, some of them repeat the PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 60 same ideas quiet a lot. Much more that it should. The repetition then blurs the main idea that the writer is actually going to deliver. Through the rubric used in this study, the average point then confirmed that students need to develop more on the ideas and pay attention more on the existence of the idea itself. In diction, these students achieves quiet low with the average point is 52,9. In the writings, still found relatively lot of vocabularies misused. The students need to improve their awareness of part of speech of each word in English. Yet, the lowest average point is in accuracy. The point for accuracy is 52,72. Through the rubric, it can be seen that these students still produce run-on sentences. Even the messages are getting through the readers but that problems affect the understanding and later the communication between writer and the readers. As the result error analysis, mostly the errors found in past tense are typically archi-form misformation. According to Dulay 1982, archi-form errors are made by the learner in using form. Based on the findings, most of the errors made by the students are in using form. Even there are some of the students found to make errors only in using form. The personal narratives of the three persons that have been interviewed show and clarify it. In order to make it clearer, the discussion on this would be elaborated based on source of errors explained by Brown 1980. 1. Interlingual transfer Brown 1980 defines interlingual transfer is one of the source of learners‘ error in learning a language. Corder 1973 uses the term mother tongue. Both of these experts explain that a learner can make an error because the impact of the 61 mother tongue of the learner itself. Two out of three subjects that had been interviewed used to speak their local language as their mother tongues. Both of them even speaks their mother tongues in more than one types in terms of dialect. The first one started to learn bahasa Indonesia before he formally attended elementary school and then started to know and learn English when he just attended junior high school. Therefore, his mother tongue is his local language, then bahasa Indonesia becomes his second language and English becomes his third language. The second one also claims the same. His first language is his local language as well as his second language bahasa Indonesia and his third language which is English. Only one of those three that has bahasa Indonesia as his first language and then English as his second language. The first two P2 and P9 perform not as better as the third P1 does. In their personal narratives, also claimed by those who have local language as the first language that it is difficult to understand and apply concept of past tense once they are learning English. That is because they don‘t have such the same concept of tenses in their local language. While, the third one, whom perform much better in using past tense compared to other two claims that it is quiet easier to apply the concept of past tense in English because it is similar to his first language bahasa Indonesia. 2. Intralingual According to Brown 1980, students can produce an error because of the nature of the target language. In cases of the three subjects that had been interviewed found that intralingual is one of the sources of errors they produce. P2 and P9, beside that they have local language as first language, they also did not PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI