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they are being treated at school. The choice of school is based on the environment which enables children to learn foreign language effectively. The school chosen,
MONDIAL Education, meets the requirements such as Lindfors’ argued about the environment which help the students learn a language.
1.2 Statement of the Problems
Concerning the background of the study above, the research questions of this study are:
1 What speech functions do children learning English as a foreign language
perform in their spoken interaction? 2
What linguistic features are used to realize the speech functions in children’s spoken interaction?
1.3 Limitation of the Study
This study focuses on the speech functions children perform in their spoken interaction and how children realize the speech functions. The term
children here means children learning English as a foreign language, specifically those at the primary level of school, or in this study they are on the second year of
primary school. The school chosen is MONDIAL Education Semarang for professional and practical reasons. However, this study does not pay any attention
to the factors influencing the process of learning so that the children under study performed such speech functions.
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The children’s speech functions are analyzed using Eggins and Slade casual conversation network. The network is a development of Halliday’s basic
speech functions. It gives delicate and detail description of types of speech functions.
The realization of speech functions is seen from the grammatical system of mood. Mood features are realized structurally at the grammatical level e.g.,
through the relative ordering of Subject and Finite but also prosodically at the phonological level by means of pitch movements such as fall vs. rise. However,
the grammatical errors children may produce in realizing the speech functions are not analyzed in this study. There are some errors, but errors are perceived as
children’s strategy in their communication. There is a switch from English to Indonesian in the data produced by children learning English as a foreign
language. The switch is analyzed when it relates to problems, but it is left unanalyzed when it does not have any relation with the problem.
1.4 Objectives of the Study
In line with the research questions, this study has the following purposes: 1
To describe speech functions that may occur in children’s spoken interaction;
2 To describe the linguistic features that are used by children – learning
English as a foreign language – to realize their speech functions in spoken
interaction.
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1.5 Significance of the Study
