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It gives the students more places to put their creativities. Respondent 12 Project work can motivate us to work cooperatively in group or even
independently if it is individual project. Moreover, having project work automatically ask us to do research as we should read many books related
to the topic. Respondent 14
The last but not the least thing that makes PBL interesting for the students is because it is less monotonous. They like to have outside class activities rather than
lecturing activities. They wrote: Yes, because it will make the class activities less monotonous. Besides, I
can interact with my friends, making it more interesting. Respondent 19 It is interesting since I don’t do it by myself. I can cooperate with my
friends. In my opinion having friend’s presentation is more interesting than having lecturing all the time. Respondent 21
Yes, it’s more interesting than learning from lecturer’s presentation. It also helps me to prepare myself in term of presentation. Respondent 32
The students’ statements above give sufficient proofs that PBL is an interesting approach to be implemented in sociolinguistics class. Only one out of twenty
seven students consider that PBL is not an interesting approach to be implemented in class. The student wrote:
To be honest I prefer to choose individual works because we can manage our time based on our own activity which we can’t get such independence
in project-group work. Respondent 25
b. PBL helps the students to understand sociolinguistics deeply.
According to the result of the open-ended questions, the researcher found that PBL helps the students to understand the material because they learn from the
social life that they investigate. Based on Baron, 1998; Barrow Milburn, 1990;
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Blumenfeld et al., 1991; Breault Breault, 2005; Dewey, 1924, PBL promotes in-depth learning of subject matter. PBL also lets the students learn something by
experiencing it. It means that PBL gives the students’ opportunities to learn something naturally Guo, 2006. They wrote:
Yes, because from project work I can have more chance to develop my knowledge about the sociolinguistics topics, moreover if we can find the
samples from our surroundings. Respondent 1 Yes, it does. It is because sociolinguistics is the study examining the
society. As I am a part of the society, it means that I can understand more about it by exploring the case or problem surrounding me. Respondent 3
From the statements above, it can be clearly seen that society influences their understanding in sociolinguistics. This fact fits the theory stated Radford, et al.
1999. The theory says that sociolinguistics is the study of relationship between language use and the structure of the society. Looking at the students’ statements
above, it can be seen that the theory is proven. The society on the students’ surrounding, in fact, influences the students’ understanding about sociolinguistics.
PBL improves the students’ language ability, as well. It can be seen from the students answer below:
Yes, indirectly I have to master the topic deeply, so I can explain it to my friends. Respondent 21
The topics which the students choose are always dealing with society. In order to master the topic deeply, they have experience being in the society at least until the
problem is solved. There, society will influence them, including their language. When they have known all the aspects of their topics, they will have the language
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to convey their meaning to their friends in the presentation day. PBL lets the students to have integrative learning as well. Guo 2006 on her research found
that the professors in China agree that PBL is an effective tool for the integration of language, content, and skills. In making the project, the students have to search
for theories supporting their topics. It means that they have to search for anything related to their topics and integrate all the information they get to solve the
problem they have made. The student wrote: It gathers all the linguistic information I have, not only the one I obtained
from sociolinguistics class but also other linguistic courses morpho- syntax, etc. Respondent 26
Through experiencing PBL, the students are able to learn from their own experience. It is the thing that creates natural learning; because the students gain
knowledge by what they see, what they hear, and what they experience. The student wrote:
Learning by doing is more make sense than only listening. Respondent 36
Several students show negative responses toward this question. They consider that they can only understand deeply about the topic they investigate not all aspects of
sociolinguistics. They wrote: It only supports certain topics of sociolinguistics especially the topic that
I’m working on. Respondent 29
c. The benefits of PBL according to the students
