BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

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CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

This chapter introduces and presents research questions. The purpose of this chapter is to ensure the validity of the research project in order that the reader finds the study meaningful and relevant. After Background of the Study is presented, the feasibility of the study is explained in Problem Identification, Problem Limitation, Problem Formulation in which the research questions are presented, and Objectives of the Study in which the research questions are reformulated in statements of objectives. The relevance of the study is also found under Benefits of the Study, and, in addition, Definition of Terms is given at the end of this chapter.

A. BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

Language teaching in general and English language teaching in particular are expected to have a goal that enables the learner to communicate in the target language – that is, to acquire the four language skills speak, listen, write, and read the target language. While ‘the ability to communicate’ is not a very clear term since it does not contain a specific action verb, it is sufficient here to define it informally as “the ability of the language user to promote social interaction, control behavior, explain, question, praise, encourage, etc. ” Emmit Pollock, 1997, p. 22. The ability to communicate in English the target language will enable the learner to become autonomous independent and develop himselfherself because heshe can communicate with 2 people from other countries for various purposes, including for everyday socio-cultural encounters, for the continuation of hisher study, or for finding a job, all of which require a good command of English. In other words, the ability of the learner to develop hisher potential should become the aim, although perhaps implied, of language teaching. This general goal cannot be separated from the development of an orientation towards current scientific, political, socio-cultural, and educational ideas. Education, including language teaching, is also expected to adapt and accomodate itself to new ideas. Post-modernism – one of the most influencing new philosophical trends – offers ideas that are related to education, which are compatible with the goals of education suggested by educational bodies and leading figures in education. The goal of education that is post-modern post-modern education is related to the fulfillment of the aspiration that the learner should develop wholly as a self-actualizing person – a person who develops himselfherself individually and socially Bismoko, 2011, p. 8. While self-actualization is considered as a process – that is, a process of growing and developing as a person in order to achieve individual potential Cherry, 2012 – many current educational ideas, not necessarily influenced by post-modernism, nor by Maslow ’s theory on hierarchy of needs, claim that a person’s self-actualization, being the highest level of human needs, should be the goal of education. The means to achieve this goal is not dependent on one method or viewpoint, yet a learner-centeredness environment may offer a promising viewpoint in education. Learner-centeredness is considered as the consequence of constructivism, a viewpoint which can be considered essential to post-modern philosophy J. Bismoko, personal 3 communication, May 2011. In short, post-modernism and education may go hand in hand to formulate and elaborate the major educational goals and the ways to achieve them. The teaching of English around the world has also been influenced by this new orientation. One of the issues often cited by English teaching specialists Brown, in Richards and Renandya, 2002, p. 9; Richards and Rodgers, 2001, p. 245 is the reduced role of the language teaching methods. This is considered as the influence of post- modernism on language teaching Fahim and Pishghadam in IJALS, 12, 2009, p. 37. Language instruction contains such unpredictable elements and processes that it cannot be handled by one single most effective method. We are now entering the post-methods era in which the emphasis on a local curriculum and on language learning principles is given priority. An English teacher is expected to be a material designer who develops hisher own goals, material, and activities locally and contextually and pay attention to the language and language learning principles that underlie curriculum and material development. A material designer is expected not to subscribe to a certain teaching method such as the Audio-lingual Method, Suggestopaedia, or Community Language Learning. More importantly, learner-centeredness and constructivism post-modern consequences in education are expected to be in a material designer ’s mind so that heshe produces flexible, localized, constructivist, student-based material. Here post- modernism is considered as a major influencing factor in education and English language education. A large number of students of ELESP English Language Education Study Program at many teacher education faculties and institutions across the country, 4 including at Sanata Dharma University, have produced many learning design materials as the products of educational research and development RD undergraduate theses for formal education and commercial English courses. At Sanata Dharma University SDU for the past fifteen years students have produced a lot of learning materials which may be applied in the places where the studies were done. The most common product of a thesis on learning design is learning material units. The design process usually follows a standard set of procedures which are adapted from the steps of educational materials development written by several educational design writers, such as Banathy, Kemp 1977, Yalden 1987, and others. The adaptation of the steps produces the students ’ learning design models – their theoretical models. In the methodology a student’s model is usually matched with the steps of the arch-model of Borg and Gall’s 1983 educational research and design RD. Hisher model should be in line with that of Borg and Gall, which beco mes the umbrella of most students’ theoretical models, hence, the so-called RD methodology. Lesson units with several attachments, such as a syllabus, a set of lesson plans, pictures, cards, and a teacher’s manual, are usually the products of an undergraduate thesis on learning design. For the last seven years the syllabus and lesson plans developed have used terms taken from the 2004 Competency-Based Curriculum: competence standard, basic competence, learning indicator; hence the recognition of a certain educational philosophy a reconstructionism-oriented objectives model – term adapted from Finney, in Richards and Renandya, 2002, p. 72. The lesson units, syllabus, and lesson plans usually contain activities that reflect a certain teaching method or a certain type of instruction e.g., Task-Based Instruction that the designer 5 applies to the material units. The present writer, however, has long observed that the ELESP students of SDU who have written a thesis on learning design are not consistent in applying a teaching instruction or method to their design. Many mention one but do not apply it consistently in their lesson units. In general, they claim that their instructional materials are communicative or are based on communicative language teaching principles, and yet the products still tend to be quasi-communicative or even traditional. Any language learning material development is, in general, expected to subscribe to an educational philosophy that underlies the design development. The material development is usually based on a curriculum, in which a general description of goals is found. The goals, according to Dubin and Olshtain 1986, should contain a certain philosophical orientation. They state that general goals in a curriculum indicate three major viewpoints: an educational-cultural viewpoint or philosophy e.g., humanistic views of education, a viewpoint on the nature of language e.g., found in the communicative approach theory and a viewpoint on the nature of language learning p. 34. A teaching material designer, therefore, is expected to consider the general goals of a curriculum on which hisher design is based, and consequently subscribe to a certain educational-cultural viewpoint and the viewpoints of language and language learning to underpin hisher design development. B. PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION The writer sees that post-modernism influences the basic educational-cultural viewpoint, which is accompanied by and, in fact, underlies language and language learning viewpoints. The major consequence of post-modernism in education is learner- 6 centeredness J. Bismoko, personal communication, May 2011, which can be considered as the means for a learner to actualize himselfherself. Self-actualization becomes the main goal of post-modern education. Self-actualization here is reflected in the learner’s ability to express himselfherself in different modes of communication with whatever heshe has acquired; in other words, to achieve communicative competence which includes grammatical competence, sociolinguistic competence, discourse competence, and strategic competence Canale and Swain, as cited in Richards and Rodgers, 2001, p. 160. Using the framework suggested by Dubin and Olshtain 1986, the writer subscribes to post-modern education as the current educational-cultural viewpoint with the learner’s self-actualization being the main goal. This educational-cultural viewpoint, the concepts of communicative competence as the language viewpoint, and the post-methods era theories as the language learning viewpoint all are chosen to make up a major construct developed in this study. This study, accordingly, tries to produce a model of self-actualization language learning that may become a reference for ELESP students to develop their learning material products. In doing so, the writer tries to relate several major constructs found in the background that play a role in producing a model of self-actualization language learning. The first major construct is, therefore, a self-actualization post-modern educational-cultural viewpoint, that is, learner-centeredness combined with language and language learning viewpoints – communicative competence and post-methods era theories. The other constructs are instructional learning design models and English education itself, which includes RD undergraduate thesis writing. Relating these constructs and making them interconnected will produce a theoretical model of self- 7 actualization language learning for the RD undergraduate thesis writing. The theoretical model will be used by the writer to construct a validated design model of self-actualization language learning by using a methodology called educational research and development RD.

C. PROBLEM LIMITATION