42 English. The spoken English was mainly emphasized in one class only, namely the
English Conversation class which was taught by two teachers at one time. According to the teaching team of the international class of SMAN 3
Yogyakarta, the emphasis on written English rather than on spoken English was due to two reasons. The main reason was because according to the teaching team’s
assumption, the students would mainly deal with written English in their further education rather than the spoken English. The assumption came from the fact that
students would be dealing with many books, modules, or other scientific literature in English rather than dealing with oral communication in English, especially
when the students were planning to study abroad. Hence, the modules used in the teaching-learning activities in the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta were
written in English as a way to familiarize the students to written English. Another reason on putting the emphasis on written English rather than on
spoken English was due to the fact that the Science teachers of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta were not fully prepared to deliver their materials in English, whereas
guest lecturers who were supposed to teach in English only come to SMAN 3 Yogyakarta once a month. According to the teaching team, an improvement in the
implementation of the international class would be made every year. The improvement would cover the preparation made for the regular subject teachers to
teach in English, although its main concern would be to increase the exposure of English in the international class. Therefore, within the next few years, it is
expected that the regular subject teachers would have been ready to teach in English and thus lead the emphasis on the spoken English as well as the written
language. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
43
4.1.2 The Implemented Principles of Content-Based Instruction in the International Class of
SMAN 3 Yogyakarta
Based on the observations, the researcher could see that the teaching- learning activities taking place in the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta
reflected the implementation of the two main principles of Content-Based Instruction CBI as proposed by Richards Rodgers. The first principle, which
stated that “people learn a second language more successfully when they use the language as a means of acquiring information, rather than an end in itself”
Richards Rodgers, 2001 could already be seen in the teaching-learning activities taking place in the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta. This was
proven by the use of English as the instructional language, especially when lecturers from several notable universities in Yogyakarta come to teach in English
at least once a month. It was also proven by the use of English in the modules, handouts and exercises given in the classroom. However, since the regular subject
teachers did not employ English as the instructional language in daily classroom activities optimally, and thus could not give corrective feedback to the students,
the students’ acquisition of English could not be optimally achieved. The second principle of CBI, which stated that “CBI better reflects
learners’ needs for learning a second language” Richards Rodgers, 2001, could also be seen in the teaching-learning activities in the international class of SMAN 3
Yogyakarta. According to the teaching team, the international class was initially intended to support the increasing needs for students to study abroad. Therefore,
although it may seem that the international class was merely a preparation class, it aimed at improving students’ ability in English with the emphasis on the
44 effectiveness of English learning and improving the speed of learning and mastery
of the content areas.
4.1.3 The Role of Teacher and Learners
In Approaches and Methods in Language Teaching, Richards Rodgers 2001 discussed the role of teacher and learners in Content-Based Instruction
CBI implementation. According to their interpretation, the ideal roles of learners in CBI are as active interpreters of input, who are seen as autonomous beings
responsible for their own learning. From the observations conducted in the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta, the researcher could see that the
students have already regarded themselves as autonomous beings who were responsible for their own learning process. This is due to the fact that even though
the teachers have already given sufficient exposure on the target language, the teachers did not give the explanation on the language use, and thus left the students
having to master the language use by themselves. As autonomous learners, the students learnt and acquired the target
language subconsciously by using the language as the medium to obtain information from the modules or to write practicum reports in Science classes.
However, their role as active interpreters of input was not fulfilled yet. This is due to the fact that the teaching-learning activities in the international class possessed
the characteristic of teacher-centred style of teaching. This style of teaching left the students passively involved in the teaching-learning activities, whose roles were
mainly to provide satisfying answers whenever they were given questions by the teachers.
45 According to Brinton et al. 2003, the most ideal role for teacher or
instructor in a class implementing CBI is as the facilitator of the content learning. This role, however, was hardly found in the international class of SMAN 3
Yogyakarta. Ideally, as the facilitator of content learning, teacher should be responsible in keeping context and comprehensibility, analyzing students’ needs,
and creating a learner-centred class. However, based on the observations conducted in the international class, these roles were not optimally fulfilled yet.
Throughout the observations, the researcher noticed that both teachers and guest lecturers focused only to the material fulfilment; their duty and obligation
were only to ensure that the materials were all delivered. Even when they were supposed to support the students’ acquisition of the target language, they failed to
provide the students with the opportunity to employ the target language during the classroom activities. In most teaching-learning activities, the question-and-answer
sessions were conducted mainly in Indonesian, in which teachers and lecturers did not encourage the students to ask or answer using English.
In relation with the facilitator’s duty to create a learner-centred class, the teachers and lecturers of the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta did not
fulfil this role optimally as well. This is due to the fact that the teaching-learning activities were mainly in the form of lecturing, in which the teachers or lecturers
stood in front of the class to deliver their materials. Their duty was considered finished when they could deliver all materials for the day. The students could only
participate in question-and-answer session or exercises without being encouraged to use English in conducting the sessions.
46 Besides serving as the facilitator in the classroom, teacher should serve as
good role model for the target language. This is due to the principle that in immersion classes, the speech taking place around the students is considered as the
comprehensible input for the students. However, most of the time both teachers and lecturers failed to optimally serve as good role models for the students,
especially in terms of the grammar and pronunciation of English. It happened mainly when the guest lecturers were supposed to teach in English, in which they
seemed to have problems with the pronunciation of several English words. This pronunciation problem might be harmful for the students, for they would imitate
the lecturers’ pronunciation and thus lead the students into incorrectness in English pronunciation. Also, the lecturers did not serve optimally as good role models
since they were unprepared to use the target language as the medium to convey the materials, which can be observed from the use of incorrect grammar or code
switching to Indonesian whenever they could not find an appropriate term in English.
4.1.4 Comprehensible Input: Material and Delivery
There were several types of input which were utilized in the teaching- learning activities taking place in the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta.
These types of input will be elaborated one by one thoroughly in accordance with the ideal nature of comprehensible input as proposed by Krashen 1985 and
Brinton et al. 2003. The elaboration covers the material delivery within the teacher’s class, the modules, the material delivery within the lecturer’s class, and
the handouts given within the lecturer’s class. The elaboration will be able to PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
47 provide a clear portrayal of the input within the material design utilized by the
international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta.
4.1.4.1 The Material Delivery within the Teacher’s Class
According to the interview with the teaching team of the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta, the material delivery within the teacher’s class was done
in Indonesian, although ideally English should be used as the language of instruction. The use of Indonesian in the classroom was not only in the material
delivery but also in the form of the notes made by the teacher. This was because the Science teachers of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta were unprepared in utilizing English
as the medium to deliver the content learning. Based on Krashen’s 1985 theory of comprehensible input, the speech
which takes place around the students is considered as the comprehensible input. The material delivery within the teacher’s class was understandable for the
students since it was done fully in Indonesian. However, it was not comprehensible according to Krashen’s theory of comprehensible input since the teachers did not
utilize English as the language of instruction.
4.1.4.2 The Modules
The modules for the teaching-learning activities in the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta were prepared by the regular subject teachers for the
classroom use. The modules were compiled from various written sources of the materials and written in English. Since the modules used many vocabulary items
48 which were not greatly different to the ones of Indonesian, the students would not
find many difficulties in mastering the materials in terms of the vocabulary. However, although the modules made use of simple vocabulary items, the
researcher found some parts of the materials to be rather difficult to understand in terms of the grammar or sentence structure. The researcher found many incorrect
sentence structures which might lead the students to face misconception of the sentence meaning. This kind of problem was mainly encountered when the
modules were compiled by the subject teacher himselfherself, not by the teaching team. One of the examples of the incorrect sentence structure found in the Physics
module was “The moment of inertia of an object about an axis is that property of the object that causes it to resist a change in its angular velocity about that axis”
see Appendix 4 page 79, in which the incorrectness might be caused by a wrong choice of conjunction or because of the teacher’s first language interference in the
translation process. Thus, the modules for the classroom used in the international class of
SMAN 3 Yogyakarta were hardly considered as comprehensible input since they did not serve as challenging language needed for the students to tap towards higher
linguistic level. In addition, despite the many incorrectness found in the modules, the modules did not employ Krashen’s 1985 i + 1 principle since the language
found in the modules were only slightly higher than the students’ linguistic level see Appendices 3 and 4 pp. 74-82.
49
4.1.4.3 The Material Delivery within the Lecturer’s Class
According to the observations result, the material delivery within each lecturer’s class resulted in different kinds of output. In Biology and Chemistry
classes, the guest lecturers employed both spoken and written English in an adjusted linguistic level so that the students could understand the given materials
see Appendices 7 and 8 pp. 93-98. The adjusted linguistic level was expected to help the students tap towards higher linguistic level to eventually lead them to
acquire and master the target language more easily. However, the Physics lecturer did not employ English in an adjusted linguistic level. In the materials given from
the PowerPoint slides, the presented materials were taken from the textbooks for the university level, and thus could not help the students to understand the
materials and the target language more easily see Appendix 9 pp. 100-101.
4.1.4.4 The Handouts Given within the Lecturer’s Class
The given handouts contained neither misspelled words nor incorrectness in the sentence structure. This is due to the fact that the materials for the handouts
were taken from various authentic materials, mainly from textbooks for college level. Since the handouts contained no misspelled words or incorrectness in the
sentence structure, the students would not face any misconception related to the language use in understanding the materials. However, since the materials were
taken from textbooks for college level, the linguistic level of the materials was beyond the students’ English level see Appendix 5 pp. 84-88. Hence, the given
handouts were not comprehensible according to Krashen’s 1985 theory of comprehensible input because it did not fulfil the i + 1 principle.
50
4.1.5 Content-Based Instruction Teaching Models
Based on the classroom observations in the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta, the researcher noticed that none of the three Content-Based
Instruction CBI teaching models as stated by Brinton et al. 2003 was fully employed in the teaching-learning activities. The international class of SMAN 3
Yogyakarta only took little characteristics from each of CBI teaching models and combined them into the implementation of CBI in the international class.
Referring to the observations conducted by the researcher, the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta did not employ the first instruction, the Theme-Based
Language Instruction. This is due to the fact that there were no specific themes or topics used as the basis for the teaching-learning activities which provided rich
input for lessons to take place. Besides the absence of the theme or topic as the starting point for the teaching-learning activities, there were no efforts made by the
teachers to cover the language skills needed by the students, since the regular subject teachers were not fully prepared to use English as the medium of
instruction in the international class. The second teaching model, the Sheltered Content Instruction, was not
fully implemented in the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta as well. This is due to the fact that the regular subject teachers of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta were still in
the process of training related to the target language being used. The guest lecturers, who were expected to device English as the instructional language, were
quite successful in delivering the materials in the target language. However, they did not fulfil the objective of Sheltered Content Instruction to help the students
master the subject matter and help the students with language-related issue at the PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
51 same time. This is due to the fact that they did not encourage the students to use
English in classroom activities and did not provide the students with necessary feedback to help them improve their English. In fact, the guest lecturers did not
optimally serve as good role models for the students in terms of the target language use.
The third teaching model, the Adjunct Language Instruction, was not fully implemented in the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta as well. This is due
to the fact that in the ideal implementation of Adjunct Language Instruction there were two instructors teaching the same materials with two different points of
emphasis, namely the content matter and the language skills. In terms of the instructors, there were two instructors in the international class of SMAN 3
Yogyakarta, namely the teacher and the lecturer. However, although ideally they were expected to focus both on the content matter and the language skills, they
focused only on the content matter and did not cover the language skills.
4.2 The Influences of Content-Based Instruction Implementation on Students’ Reading Comprehension
This section addresses the second formulated problem in the Problem Formulation section. The discussion presented in this section covers three main
points, namely the correlation between reading comprehension and Content-Based Instruction CBI, the discussion on how reading is perceived in the international
class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta, and the influence of CBI implementation in the international class towards students’ reading comprehension.
52
4.2.1 The Correlation between Reading Comprehension and Content-Based Instruction
Seeing from the nature of both reading and Content-Based Instruction CBI, there is a strong correlation between reading comprehension and CBI. The
activity of reading requires the readers to possess the sub-skills in the ability to read critically, namely the ability to evaluate inferences and the strength of
arguments, to recognise hidden assumptions and author’s motives, to evaluate the soundness of generalisation, and to identify bias in statements Abdullah, 1994 as
quoted in Alderson, 2000. These sub-skills are important to possess in order to obtain a thorough comprehension of the reading materials. CBI, on the other hand,
requires the learners to possess problem-solving ability as a part of autonomous learning, in which CBI learners are expected to be responsible for their own
learning and try to solve the problems in their learning by themselves. The process of problem-solving takes place in reading activity. The seven
sub-skills presented by Abdullah 1994: 291 as quoted in Alderson, 2000: 21 explicitly mention the kinds of problem-solving activity which happens in the
process of reading. Furthermore, to present the strong correlation between reading comprehension and CBI, Alderson 2000: 21 stated that “many aspects of reading
represent problem-solving, and that problem-solving strategies are useful for the resolution of many difficulties in reading, for example the deduction of the
meaning of unknown words”. Hence, problem-solving is the key to the correlation between reading comprehension and CBI. Both reading and CBI require the person
engaged to the activity to possess problem-solving ability, which is also one of the characteristics of both reading comprehension and CBI.
53
4.2.2 Reading Skill in the International Class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta
This section covers the description of the activity of reading in the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta. The description consists of the activity
of reading taking place in the English reading class and the ones in Science classes.
4.2.2.1 Reading in the English Reading Class
In SMAN 3 Yogyakarta, reading is taught separately from other English skills. There are three English classes in SMAN 3 Yogyakarta, namely Writing
class, Reading class, and English Conversation class, whereas grammar is only taught when the students require further explanation of the language use. However,
although ideally meaningful reading should take place in every subject in the international class, it only takes place in English reading class of SMAN 3
Yogyakarta. The activities in the reading class usually consist of the teacher distributing
some articles, then asking the students to answer some comprehension questions, explain the main idea of the articles or retell the content of the articles with the
students’ words. The articles were prepared by the teacher herself, which quite varied on the topic; from health, science, entertainment, and so on. However, the
class was more teacher-centred, in which the teacher merely chose the articles without asking the students’ opinion on what topic should be chosen next see
Appendix 6 pp. 90-91. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
54
4.2.2.2 Reading in Science Classes
The activity of meaningful reading did not optimally take place in the Science classes of the international class in SMAN 3 Yogyakarta. The activity
merely consisted of students reading the modules, which are written in English, without the assistance from the teacher or lecturer in charge of the class. The
teacher’s or lecturer’s explanation on the module covered only on the content or the registers used in the module, not on the language aspect. Students were then
given exercises which are written in English. However, the class discussion or the question-and-answer session made use of Indonesian rather than English.
Based on the observations made in Science classes, both teachers and lecturers did not make sufficient efforts in explaining the language aspect on the
subject, leaving students having to understand the modules by themselves. Only Physics and Biology teachers made some glossary of the subjects to help students
master the vocabulary items used in the subjects better. The lack of efforts by the teachers to explain the language aspect of the module and also the use of
Indonesian in the class discussion happened because the teachers were not ready to optimally employ English in the teaching-learning activities.
However, reading the modules without the assistance of the teachers or the lecturers was quite difficult for the students. This was not only because students
were left to understand the modules by themselves, both in the content and the language aspects, but also because they had to correct the mistakes found in the
modules by making prediction. As the researcher has elaborated on previous section, the modules were developed by the teacher in charge of a particular
subject by compiling from several source textbooks or translating some chapters PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
55 from Indonesian to English by himselfherself. This translation process was
imperfect due to the teacher’s unpreparedness of employing English, as proven by many typographical errors and mistakes in the sentence structures see Appendices
3 and 4 pp. 74-82. In dealing with the mistakes in the modules, the students usually correct the
mistakes by predicting the most appropriate term or meaning of the part being questioned. For example, when dealing with typographical errors, students looked
for a particular term which has the closest meaning or form with the term in question, whereas when dealing with the mistakes in sentence structure students
tried to find the most logical meaning of the sentence in question. Especially when dealing with the mistakes in the sentence structure, the students were not able to
ask the teacher to correct the mistakes for the teacher himselfherself was not usually aware that heshe made a mistake in translating the modules. This kind of
problem was harmful for the students, as stated by some students in the interview that during the examination they made several miscalculation on Physics and
Chemistry due to the mistranslation of some registers in the subjects.
4.2.3 The Influences of Content-Based Instruction on Students’ Reading Comprehension
From the elaboration given on the previous section, it can be seen how the activity of reading is done in the international class of SMAN 3 Yogyakarta, both in
English class and in Science classes. Furthermore, in accordance with one of the teacher’s responsibilities to keep context and responsibility Richards Rodgers,
2001 and one of the principles of teaching reading that teacher should teach for PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
