T1 112008071 Full text

An Analysis of Three Student-teachers when dealing with Critical Incidents in a
Microteaching Class

THESIS
Submitted in Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirement for the Degree of
Sarjana Pendidikan

Annisa Liliyana
112008071

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT
FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE
SATYA WACANA CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY
SALATIGA
2013
An Analysis of Three Student-teachers when dealing with Critical Incidents in a
Microteaching Class
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COPYRIGHT STATEMENT

This thesis contains no such material as has been submitted for examination in any course or
accepted for the fulfillment of any degree or diploma in any university. To the best of my
knowledge and my belief, this contains no material previously published or written by any other
person except where due references is made in the text.

Copyright@2013.Annisa Liliyana and Nugraheny Zacharias Ph.D.

All rights reserved. No part of this thesis may be reproduced by any means without the
permission of at least one of the copyright owners or the English Department, Faculty of
Language and Literature, Satya Wacana Christian University.

Annisa Liliyana:

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PUBLICATION AGREEMENT DECLARATION
As a member of the (SWCU) Satya Wacana Christian University academic community, I verify

that:
Name

: Annisa Liliyana

Student ID Number

: 112008071

Study Program

: English Department

Faculty

: Language and Literature

Kind of Work

: Undergraduate Thesis

In developing my knowledge, I agree to provide SWCU with a non-exclusive royalty free right
for my intellectual property and the contents therein entitled:
AN ANALYSIS OF THREE STUDENT-TEACHERS WHEN DEALING WITH
CRITICAL INCIDENTS IN A MICROTEACHING CLASS
Along with any pertinent equipment.
With this non-exclusive royalty free right, SWCU maintains the right to copy, reproduce, print,
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This declaration is made according to the best of my knowledge.
Made in

: Salatiga

Date

: January 2013

Verified by Signee,

Annisa Liliyana
Approved by
Thesis Supervisor

Thesis Examiner

Nugrahenny Zacharias Ph.D.

Anita Kurniawati M. Hum.
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Table of Content
Cover Page .................................................................................................................. i
Approval Thesis Sheet...................................................................................................ii
Copyright Statement .................................................................................................... iii
Publication agreement declaration...............................................................................iv
Table of Content Table of Content ..............................................................................v
ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................. 1
INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................ 1
Definition of Critical incident ....................................................................................... 4

Why Critical Incidents occur ........................................................................................ 5
Coping Strategies of Critical Incidents ......................................................................... 6
The Benefits of Being Aware with Critical Incidents ................................................... 7
THE STUDY ................................................................................................................ 8
Context of the study ...................................................................................................... 8
Participants ................................................................................................................. 9
Instruments of data collection ..................................................................................... 10
Procedures of data collection ...................................................................................... 12
Data analysis ............................................................................................................... 13
FINDING AND DISCUSSION .................................................................................. 15
Language Proficiency Problem ................................................................................... 15
Reasons of Having Critical Incidents ................................................................... 15
Coping strategy to cope with critical incidents ..................................................... 17
The Lack of Class Participation .................................................................................. 19
Reasons of Having Critical Incidents ................................................................... 19
Coping strategy to cope with critical incidents ..................................................... 20
Classroom Management Issues ................................................................................... 22
Reasons of Having Critical Incidents ................................................................... 22
Coping strategy to cope with critical incidents ..................................................... 25
CONCLUSION ........................................................................................................... 27

ACKNOWLEDGMENT............................................................................................ 29
Reference ................................................................................................................... 30
Apendix 1: Data Analysis ...........................................................................................32
Apendix 2: Observation Form of Video Mini teaching...............................................33
List of Table
Table 1: Instruments of collecting data ......................................................................11
List of Figure
Figure 1: Emerging Themes of the Study ..................................................................14
Figure 2: The percentage of critical incidents occurrences........................................15

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An Analysis of Three Student-teachers when dealing with Critical Incidents in a
Microteaching Class
Annisa Liliyana
ABSTRACT
The paper aims to analyze student-teachers in a microteaching class when dealing with
critical incidents or unanticipated events that occur during a lesson and trigger insights about
some aspects of teaching and learning (Farrell, 2005, pp.114-115). A qualitative data based on
interviewing 3 participants who had passed a microteaching class shows three prominent themes:

language proficiency problem, the lack of class participation and classroom management issues.
Each theme has two items to be discussed: the reasons of having critical incidents and strategies
to cope with critical incidents. The result of this study is about some recommendations of critical
incidents‟ coping strategies such as resort back to the student‟s L1, use coercing English, use
teachers pauses, and eliminate some parts of the planning for dealing with critical incidents
caused by language proficiency problem. In addition, some strategies used to cope with the lack
of students‟ participation are reflecting on the students‟ interest, being more flexible with the
students, and giving more exposure to the students. However, adjusted the classroom condition
to the activity, attached the student‟s involvement, simplified the classroom activity, and
relocated the missing part to another time allocation used as critical incidents coping strategies
caused by classroom management issues.
Keywords: critical incidents, student-teacher, micro teaching.

INTRODUCTION
The purpose of the study is to find out how three student-teachers in microteaching class
deal with critical incidents. Life is full of plans and so is teaching. Lesson plans, materials, my
appearance, my behavior, and sometimes even my jokes were already planned beforehand. Being
a student of English Department in SWCU gave me a lot of opportunity learning how to plan my
teaching. Yet, I am still worried welcoming my teaching practicum this semester. I am worried
because when I looked at my previous mini teaching, I often found some parts of my planning

could not be done in the classroom because of some unexpected events like technological tools
problem. Those unexpected events usually labeled as critical incidents (Tripp, 1993, p.6).
According to Richard and Farrell (2005, p.113), critical incidents are any unplanned and
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unanticipated events that occurred during a lesson and serve trigger insights about some aspect of
teaching and learning.
However, being aware of critical incidents is not easy. As Tripp (1993, p.6) stated that
incidents happen, but critical incidents are produced by the way teachers look at a situation.
Thus, what comprises a critical incident is different for each student-teacher even in the same
situation. An event might become a critical incident for me but not for others. Take for example
in my last mini teaching, I found a critical incident that anyone might not know it was and
couldn‟t feel that there was something wrong with my teaching. The chronology begun when I
planned the student to create a commentary text based on their name, instead of political issue
which is commonly found in the commentary text. I thought it would be easier for them to write
something they knew than something that they were unfamiliar with. In fact, when I did my
planning some of my student said, “mam, what should I write? I haven‟t had any idea to write.
How about commenting other things?” The critical incident occurred when my students were not
as happy as I thought when I asked them to write about their selves and it made my teaching

didn‟t work well as my planning. Instead of giving them 5 minutes to finish their works, I gave
them 2 minutes for additional time finishing their writing. When some of my friends in the class
heard those words from my students, they might think that there was no problem with my
teaching because they didn‟t know my planning and my expectation. Nevertheless, for me it was
a critical incident since it was unexpected. At this point, it was clear enough to see that to take
something as a critical incident is a value judgment the teacher made, and the basis of the
judgment is the significance teacher attached to the meaning of the incident (Tripp, 1993, p.8).
After recognizing the critical incident, of course it needs a strategy to cope with it. As Serrat
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(2010) said that critical incidents might have a significant impact of teaching, the strategies
preferred will contribute to the success or the failure of individuals.
Since critical incidents can happen anytime in the classroom and it is difficult to take the
right actions immediately as stated by Brennon and Green (as cited in Finch 2010, p.2), critical
incidents become most nerves racking event for the beginning teacher like me. Ann (2007,
pp.58-59) figured that a critical incident is stressful for beginner teacher to deal with. Therefore,
this study aims to analyze student-teachers' strategies to deal with critical incidents during their
mini teachings in the microteaching class.
Because of the unpredictability of critical incidents, numbers of researches about critical

incidents have been done. Take for example, Mander (2008) in his study found that there may be
links between teachers‟ life experiences, personality and how teacher copes with critical
incidents and critical episodes. Richard and Farrell (2005) also conducted a research and the
result was being aware of critical incidents leads the teacher to have a good professional
development in the present and future. However, none of these studies concerned to examine the
strategies used to deal with critical incidents. Moreover, the previous study focused on how the
teacher faced critical incidents and less studies concern with student-teachers as a beginner
teacher who actually might have more difficulties in dealing with critical incidents. Therefore,
the research question of the paper will be “How do three student-teachers in a Microteaching
class deal with critical incidents when conducting their mini lessons?”
For answering the research question above, two aspects will be analyzed. Those are the
reasons of having critical incidents and the strategies used to cope with critical incidents. Three
student-teachers‟ critical incidents which occurred during their first, second and third mini

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teaching will be analyzed in order to understand their critical incidents better and at last find
alternative ways of responding to it.
Though people don‟t really pay attention to critical incidents, actually by examining

critical incidents, it has a potential to be effective in improving teaching as it reveals successful
behaviors (Khandelwal, 2009, p.1). Take for example, I begun to examine my critical incident by
having a reflection. From that reflection, I tried to find out why it happened, and how to cope
with those critical incidents. It gives me significant effects on handling my critical incidents. I
become calm down facing critical incidents and more equipped to face it. Having come to the
significant insights on the study, it will be clarified in literature review below.

Definition of Critical incident
This study aims to analyze how three student-teachers in a Microteaching class deal with
critical incidents when conducting their mini lessons. Therefore, the definition of critical incident
needs to be clearly defined. According to Tripp (1993, p.8) a critical incident is a significance
interpretation of an unplanned event that is faced by teachers.
Thiel revealed that actually a critical incident could consist of two things, teaching low
and teaching high ( as cited in Richard &Farrell 2005, p.115). Teaching high might happen when
there is a spontaneous and unanticipated intervention or change in the lesson plan that has a
positive effect on the lesson. On the other hand, teaching low is a specific classroom incident that
is immediately problematic and perplexing and needs some struggle to cope with. Since teaching
high has a positive side and there might be no confusion to deal with, hence in this paper the
word “critical incident” might only represents teaching low which needs a strategy to deal with.
Here are two main characteristics of critical incidents:

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1. Unpredictability: Chell (as cited in Mander, 2008) stated critical incident is a significant
and unexpected occurrence (event, incident, or issue) identified by the respondent.
Therefore, critical incidents could not be predicted where and when it would happen.
2. Unplanned: Critical incidents might be seen when once the action taken by the teacher in
the classroom was different with it was written in the lesson plan and other plans
beforehand (Tripp, 1993).
After figuring out the definition of critical incident, the next thing should be discussed
is the reasons of having critical incidents inside the classroom.

Why Critical Incidents occur
Many things can set off the occurrence of critical incident. Farrell (2008), found eight
basic things which trigger critical incidents. Those are language proficiency, class participation,
behavior, gender, classroom space, lesson objectives, classroom activities and attention spans.
From all the reasons of having critical incidents while teaching, language proficiency problem
was the most occurrence triggered critical incidents. In contrast, my study showed that language
proficiency problem was the lowest occurrence causing critical incidents in teaching. In addition,
Khandelwal (2009), a researcher from university of Delhi found rapport with students, course
preparation and delivery, fairness, time spent with students outside of class, control could trigger
critical incidents while teaching.
Therefore, this paper will develop an analysis of student-teacher‟s strategies to deal with
critical incidents when conducting EIL class in the microteaching course. Some researchers have
done studies related to the things trigger critical incident. Since knowing the reasons of having
critical incidents might be helpful to find the strategies use to cope with it.

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Coping Strategies of Critical Incidents
When the things which triggered critical incidents had been found, it was easier for the
teacher to take an action. Unfortunately, the previous studies did not offer strategies to deal with
critical incidents. Take for example Mander (2008), preferred offering suggestion on what skills
should be had by the teachers in dealing with critical incidents. He suggested teachers to have
self-awareness when facing critical incidents, so teachers will know which part should be
adjusted to the unplanned events. Self-awareness is the ability to recognize one emotion and
drives as well as their effect on other (Mander, p.3). By having self-awareness skill, it will be
easier to analyze critical incidents while teaching. Therefore, this study has ARTJ (Action
Research Teaching Journal) as one of the instruments of data collection to get to know about
how to deal with critical incidents deeply. Mander (2008, p.3) also found other skills than self
awareness that are, self regulation, motivation, empathy and social skill.
While Sarna (as cited in Mander, 2008, p.3) argued that one‟s capacity and willingness
to deal with critical incidents effectively is underpinned by qualities of the teaching and it will
improve through training activities. As it is stated before, the previous studies like what Sarna
has done is not offering strategies in dealing with critical incidents. While a training activities
was a preventive way to minimize the occurrence of critical incidents while teaching. Another
finding by Flin (as cited in Mander, 2008, p.3) revealed that there are three skills commonly
needed by teachers who deal with critical incidents effectively. These are being able to cope with
stress, decision making and team management.
From the previous studies, none of them discussed the strategies to cope with critical
incidents concretely. The previous findings only offered such a general strategy and it was less

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narrow. It should be specified first before applying the strategies to cope with critical incidents
during teaching. Considering the lack of studies focused on critical incident coping strategies,
this paper will try to narrow down the previous findings to be more specific. Take for example
Flin, he found decision-making skill is needed to deal with critical incidents (as cited in Mander,
2008, p.3). Since this is too aboard, I tried to narrow it down and related it to the Sakui‟s finding
(2007). Sakui (2007) revealed that when facing critical incidents caused by classroom
management issue, the teacher would be better to decrease the complex of the activity.
Summarizing Sakui‟s finding and Flin(as cited in Mander, 2008, p.3), it could be said that
decrease the complex of the activity was one of decision making skills to cope with critical
incidents.
By narrowing down and specifying the strategies offered by the previous studies, this
study might be much helpful for teachers especially student-teachers to develop their strategies
in dealing with critical incidents. Although few researchers did studies in critical incident,
actually critical incidents give some advantages.

The Benefits of Being Aware with Critical Incidents
Richard and Farrell (2005, p.115) mentioned some benefits analyzing critical incidents
which are it can serve as a form of reflective inquiry, help identify and resolve problems, serve to
identify good practice, and give a heightened sense of professional awareness. Besides, being
aware of critical incidents also helped the student-teachers and the real teachers to have a good
professional judgment.
Kwan and Simpson (2010) believed that critical incidents might become a clear guideline
for a student-teacher engage in reflective practice. Critical incidents are not at all obvious and
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often they can be straightforward accounts of very common place events that occur in routine
professional practice. The incident can happen a few minutes or a segment of the lesson. It can
also occur in a whole lesson or even a sequence of lessons. Moreover, there are critical incidents
characterized by an element of unplanned which can be problematic for the teacher, calling for
an on-the-spot adjustment (reflection-in-action) of the planned course of the lesson. All of them
are critical incidents that represent a point at which the lesson may take quite different directions
depending on the student-teacher‟s strategy to respond to them. As a result, the critical incident
forms valuable data for reflection.

THE STUDY
Context of the study
The setting of the study is a faculty of English language and literature or English
Department(ED) at Satya Wacana Christian University. This university is located in a small town
Salatiga, Central Java, Indonesia. English is not actively used in orally and directly with the
foreigners in the society. However, English has a role as a medium of instruction in ED‟s class
room and English is taught as foreign language (EFL). The subject of this small-scale study is
microteaching course. According to Hanna (2003), microteaching is a training context in which a
teacher‟s situation has been reduced in scope or simplified in some systematic ways.
In ED, microteaching is a pre-requisite course before enrolling teaching practicum. The
microteaching class was held once a week in the odd semester. This course spent 90 minutes. In
this microteaching class, the student-teachers were exposed to teach using EIL pedagogy. The
student-teachers were given maximum 20 minutes to conduct a mini teaching. During the whole

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semester, student-teachers were asked to do 3 mini teachings and they were recorded using video
recorder. To guide them in conducting their mini lesson, they had to make three lesson plans
before teaching. In addition, they were also asked to create three action research teaching journal
(ARTJ) based on their experiences doing their mini lessons.

Participants
Three ED student-teachers who have passed Microteaching class had been chosen to be
the participants in this study. Here I chose the participants purposively by having considered
their experiences in facing critical incidents. Then, I continued by choosing three studentteachers only because I used a stimulated-recall interview which needed more time to interview
and transcribe the data. Three participants were filtered by using convenient sampling strategy.
Since It might not be easy to convince people to share critical incidents (Serrat, 2010), the
participants were chosen based on the ease of accessible to be asked some information and based
on their willingness to be deeply interviewed about their experience in the microteaching class.
At last, I got Miranti (pseudonym), Mirua (pseudonym) and Miranda (pseudonym). All the
participants are 4th year students in SWCU and they are Javanese female student-teachers with
age ranged from 22 to 23 years old. They were chosen because they are willing to tell everything
even though their embarrassing experience and it might offer me richer information that I need.
From those participants that were chosen, I have planned to find out how three studentteachers in the microteaching class deal with critical incidents while conducting their mini
teachings.

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Instruments of data collection
In doing this study, there were 4 instruments were used to collect the data. The data
collected were analyzed to find out the strategies used by the student-teachers in dealing with
critical incidents during their mini teaching. Those fours instruments are in the following.
Lesson plan
In the microteaching class, student-teachers should make lesson plan before conducting
their first, second and third mini teaching. The lesson plan made should implement EIL
pedagogy. In the lesson plan, the student-teachers must write the level of students, subject of the
lesson, time allocation, lesson objectives, the reason of choosing the activity taught, the
procedure of lesson and teaching material. There are 9 lesson plans collected and used to observe
mini lessons recorded.
Video Recording
When conducting mini teaching, each student-teacher was recorded using video recorder
by the lecturer. The duration on the recording is about 16-20 minutes. The video recordings
gained were 9 videos from 3 student-teachers on their first, second and third mini teaching.
Teaching Journal
For supporting the data gained, the researcher also used the participants‟ Action Research
Teaching Journals (ARTJ). ARTJ is a reflective teaching journal which is made before and after
conducting their teaching which comprised in five sections: topic, planning, action, observation
and reflection (Burns 2010).
Action research teaching journal (ARTJ) was one of the requirements in this microteaching
class. All the student-teachers should make three ARTJ before doing a mini teaching which

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comprise of topic and planning. Then, all the student-teachers should continue their ARTJ which
includes action, observation and reflection. The average word of ARTJ is 1000-2000 words.
Stimulated-recall Interview
In attempting to answer the research question, the data was collected through stimulatedrecall interviews. Brown and Rogers, Nunan, defined Stimulated-recall interview as a technique
in which the researcher has recorded the lesson and then gets the participants to comment on
what was happening at the time the activity under study took place (as cited in Zacharias, 2011,
p. 88). Examining critical incidents, I need to know decision that the teacher makes during
teaching and decision that occurs before and after conducting mini teaching. Therefore,
Stimulated-recall interview accommodated since it can tap into both teachers‟ reflection-inaction and reflection-on-action (Zacharias, 2011, p. 88).
The interview scheduled to last around 15-30 minutes and the interview‟s questions
based on the videos, lesson plans and journal of their teaching practices in microteaching class.
The interviews were recorded by using audio recording.
In summary all data is seen in the following:
No. Kind of artifact

Total artifacts

1

Lesson plan

3 person x 3 mini teaching = 9 Lesson plans

2.

Video recording

3 person x 3 mini teaching= 9 mini teaching videos

3.

Teaching Journal

3 person x 3 mini teaching = 9 journals

4.

Stimulated-recall interview

3 person x 2 interview= 6 recording of interviews

Total data

42 artifacts
Table 1 : Instruments of collecting data

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Procedures of data collection
The data for the study were collected using 4 instruments lesson plan, video recording,
teaching journal and stimulated-recall interview. The procedure was begun by finding the
participant. First, purposive sampling was conducted to ensure all the participants had ever faced
critical incident by reading thirty six lesson plans from twelve students in the microteaching class
and then watching their videos to find out the possibility of the critical incidents occurrences.
From choosing the participant purposively, I got eight students who fit with the criteria of the
participants. After that, I chose three student-teachers by using sample of convenience. The
participants were asked their willingness and their accessibility in giving information as detail as
possible whenever I need. At last I got Mirua (pseudonym), Miranti (pseudonym) and Miranda
(pseudonym) to be the participants.
Second, a stimulated-recall interview was adopted for the study. The interviews took
about 15-30 minutes and they were recorded using audio recorder. The interviews were done
twice. The first interview was done to make the participant become more aware and familiar with
critical incidents. Therefore, the questions addressed involved general questions to gain
background knowledge and to set the scene. For example the interview was questioning their
failure when teaching, what they knew about critical incidents in their mini teaching, and how
they reacted to that unpredictable event based on their first video of mini teachings. After
analyzing the result of the first interview, the second interview was conducted. In this interview,
few general questions was addressed and the questions concern on what triggered critical
incidents and what strategies used to cope with their critical incidents happen in the second and
third mini teaching.

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Third, the recordings were transcribed in the form of detail transcription using Express
Scribe. Then the transcription was analyzed using content analysis strategies which was focusing
on possible things trigger critical incidents and strategies used by student-teachers. The
descriptive data that I got from transcribing the interview were analyzed qualitatively by using
NVIVO. When analyzing the data, I got some emerging themes under those two big themes as
the following. See Appendix 1

Data analysis
A stimulated-recall interview was designed to elicit how student-teachers deal with
critical incidents while conducting their mini teaching. The data were analyzed and categorized
into reason of having critical incidents and strategies to cope with critical incidents. After coding,
some emerging themes appeared. Under the reason of having critical incidents, there are
student‟s lack of interest, student‟s lack of background knowledge, teacher‟s struggle in teaching
difficult words, teacher‟s struggle in giving instructions, less dedicate time in whilst-teaching,
the lack of material copies, less dedicate time in pre/whilst/post-teaching and technical problem.
While under the coping strategies, there are giving more exposure (addressing question,
giving more explanation), resort back to the student‟s L1, use teacher‟s pauses, use coercing
English, eliminate some detail of teaching, adjust classroom activity, simplify the activity,
eliminate some detail of teaching, foster the student‟s participation inside the class and fix the
technical problem.
Finding the results of coding the data was varied, the emerging themes were classified
into three categories. They are language proficiency problem, the lack of class participation and
classroom management issues. Each category has two items to be discussed which are reason of

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having critical incidents and strategies to cope with critical incidents while teaching. It is
outlined as the following:

Language
Proficiency
Problem

Reasons Having CI
tea her’s struggle i tea hi g English and/or Indonesian
difficult words, tea her’s struggle i explaning the
material and giving instructions using English,

Strategies to Cope with CI
resort a k to the stude t’s L1, use tea her’s pauses,
use coercing english, eliminate some detail of teaching,

Reasons Having CI
stude t’s la k of i terest toward the aretial, stude t’s
lack of background knowledge about the material

Critical
Incidents
(CI)

The Lack of
CLass
Participation
Strategies to Cope with CI
give more exposure (addressing question, giving more
explanation) about the material, be more flexible with
the students, be considered to the students' interest

Reasons Having CI
less dedicate time in pre/whilst/post-teaching, the lack
of material copies and technical problem.

Classroom
Management
Issues

Strategies to Cope with CI
adjust classroom condition to the activity, simplify the
activity, eliminate some detail of teaching, foster the
stude t’s parti ipatio and fix the technical problem.

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FINDING AND DISCUSSION

After conducting this research, it was found three emerging themes which are language
proficiency problem, the lack of class participation and classroom management issues. Those
themes were observed based on what things triggered critical incidents and how the participants
coped with critical incidents during their mini teaching. The finding was illustrated in this chart
Figure 2 : The percentage of critical incidents occurrences
13

The la k of stude t’s parti ipatio

21
Language proficiency problem
8
Classroom management issues

Language Proficiency Problem
Reasons of Having Critical Incidents
The first thing that set off the occurrence of a critical incident was language proficiency
problem. The occurrence of critical incidents caused by language proficiency problem was not
too high, only 8 per 42 occurrences. In the classroom, a critical incident commonly happened
because of the teacher‟s difficulty in explaining vocabularies using English (Farrell, 2008, p.6).
Almost all the participants found difficulty in explaining vocabulary using English and they
considered that their difficulties could trigger critical incidents. Take for example, Miranda in
her first mini teaching. She intended to use English all the time inside the classroom but, she was
in difficulty to explain some Indonesian vocabularies using English and this unplanned event
forced her to change her planning. At that time Miranda planned not to use student‟s L1 when
teaching. Since she found Indonesian traditional food couldn‟t be explained in English. Hence,
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Miranda chose Bahasa Indonesia because she was not able to find suitable English terms of
Indonesian traditional food such as arem-arem (Miranda, Interview1). Besides, in her first mini
teaching she also utilized Bahasa Indonesia when she was unable to find English words for
explaining English difficult words as she said in the interview:
They didn‟t understand „purvey‟ so, naturally I translated it into Bahasa
Indonesia to make them understand easily. (Miranda, Interview1, May
the 25th 2012).
In addition one of the participants also faced difficulty in explaining the materials which
triggered critical incidents. Take for example Mirua in the third mini teaching, she faced a
critical incident when she couldn‟t explain the material:
When I‟m nervous, it influences my language ability. What I have
planned in my mind, things that I am going to say to my students was
messed up. My language proficiency was decreasing because of the
previous problem (Technical problem) that I have. (Mirua, My
translation, Interview 2, Mini teaching 3, 9th august 2012)
From Mirua‟s experience, critical incidents happened because the teacher couldn‟t find the
suitable words to explain the material. Mirua in her ARTJ 2 wrote that she already planned all
the things that she wanted to explain. Since she didn‟t expect that there would be a technical
problem, she couldn‟t remember anything.
Another reason of having critical incidents in the case of language proficiency problem is
teacher‟s difficulty in giving instruction inside the class. As it was experienced by Miranti in
Mini teaching 3:
... I only gave the instruction without doing a grouping. I tried to be more
focus on my instruction because the instruction of the game was rather
difficult and a lot. (Miranti, my translation, Interview 2, Mini teaching 3,
September 18th 2012)
From Miranti‟s statement above, it can be seen that her difficulty in finding the right words in
giving the instruction led her to face critical incidents. She planned to do grouping first before
giving the instruction but, she crossed out her grouping planning.

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Therefore under language proficiency problem, there were teacher‟s struggle in teaching
English and/or Indonesian difficult words, teacher‟s struggle in explaining the material and
giving instructions using English as the reasons of having critical incidents. With all the reasons
of having critical incidents caused by language proficiency problem that were found in this
study, the coping strategies also displayed in this study according to the participants‟
experiences.
Coping Strategies of Critical Incidents
When finding difficulty in explaining vocabularies, both explaining Indonesian and
English, most of the participants decided to resort back to students‟ L1 as the strategy to cope
with critical incidents (Farrell, 2008).

In fact, explaining Indonesian difficult words using

Indonesia was done when it was the teacher who faced critical incident caused by language
proficiency problem. On the other hand, the use of Indonesian to explain English difficult word
usually happened because teacher felt that it was the students who faced language proficiency
problem which triggered critical incidents. For example Miranti, she indicated that the students
were lack of language proficiency problem when she was explaining English unfamiliar words.
At last, she decided to resort back to the student L1:
Actually I didn‟t plan to use Bahasa Indonesia in the mini teaching but, I
found my students didn‟t know the meaning of the words such as „Chayote
stew‟ and „fresh salad with peanut sauce‟, I decided to just translate it into
Indonesian .(Miranti, my translation, interview1, May the 25th 2012).
Analyzing what Miranti had stated above, the word “just” meant she did the easiest way to cope
with a critical incident caused by her difficulty in explaining English difficult word using
English. Therefore, the use of student‟s mother tongue was easier than finding the other English
phrases of Indonesian food. In other words, she would need more struggle if she forced herself
explaining vocabulary using English. Moreover, if she forced to use English, she would need

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longer time to think. Indeed, spending longer time to do one activity would bother the next
activity. Thus, what Farrell (2008) has revealed in his study that resorting back to the student‟s
L1 was the most effective way to cope with unplanned event caused by language proficiency
problem. Farrell (2008, p.6) suggested that rather than forcing the students to use English,
teacher should first try to build up the student‟s self confidence by letting the class used their L1,
as Miranti and Miranda have done in their mini teaching. Ethel (2003, p.12) also supported
teachers resorting back to the learner‟s L1 as one of the strategies in dealing with critical
incidents triggered by language proficiency problem, but teacher should used L1 only if
necessary.
Besides the difficulty in explaining difficult word, one of the participants also faced
difficulty in explaining the materials that triggered critical incidents. On the contrary, one of the
participants was reluctant to use their L1. Miranti preferred to use coercing English as a strategy
to deal with unplanned event caused by her difficulty in explaining the material. Although the
grammar was incorrect, Miranti tried to encourage the students to use English inside the
classroom as possible as she could under any situation, even when she was stuck in using
English. Coercing English is using grammatically incorrect English and it is aimed to avoid nonEnglish language used inside the classroom (Westbrook, 2008, p.3). Westbrook (2011, p.3)
found that there was a teacher who faces unpredictable events because of her struggle to explain
material using English. The teacher tried to cope with that critical incident by speaking in the
target language to explain the materials but she became grammatically incorrect because of
avoiding the use of mother tongue. Since it was believed that using only the target language in
the classroom helps the students to imitate the “real life” use of English (Westbrook, 2008, p.3).

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In addition, teacher‟s pause was the other strategy to cope with unexpected event caused
by language proficiency problem (Ethel, 2003, p.9). Mirua is the one who preferred using
teacher‟s pauses to deal with critical incident because of her difficulty in explaining the material.
She admitted such the following:
… So what I have planned before (Teacher‟s speech and explanation),
what I am going to teach to my student was mess up. What it is called. Oh
ya, my Language proficiency went down if I got such a problem
(Technical problem). That‟s why, my 3th mini teaching I use “eee” pauses
a lot. (Mirua, My translation, Interview2, Mini teaching 3, 9th august 2012)
From the statement above, Mirua didn‟t want her students knew her critical incidents caused by
language proficiency problem. She tried to cover it up by using teacher‟s pauses. However,
Ethel(2003, p.56) found the use of pauses is unwise solution for dealing with language
proficiency problem. Teacher‟s pauses could make the teacher sounds not fluent and students
will be difficult to understand the material delivered.
One last strategy to cope with critical incident caused by language proficiency problem
was eliminating some activities. Miranti tried to focus on her instruction and therefore she
decided to eliminate grouping activity. What made it became special was eliminating some
activities in teaching was usually done when teacher facing classroom management issues such
as running out of time and it was not commonly done for coping with language proficiency
problems. Some researchers such as Macaro (2001, p.4), suggested that the use of L1 can be very
helpful in clarifying instructions.

The Lack of Class Participation
Reasons of Having Critical Incidents
The lack of class participation was the other things trigger critical incidents. (Farrell, 2008,
p.6). It was found 13 per 42 occurrences of critical incidents caused by the lack of class
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participation. Under the lack of class participation, it was found two reasons of having critical
incidents: students‟ lack of interest and student‟s lack of background knowledge about the
material. Take for example Mirua in her third mini teaching, found the situation in classroom
was so quiet and it elicited the occurrence of an unexpected event. She thought that the students
already knew about the material so that she could directly jump to the activity without giving
more explanation. However, the student‟s won‟t participate inside the class because of their lack
of background knowledge about the material.
Besides, Miranda learned that critical incidents triggered by lack of class participation
were not always caused by the students‟ lack of material comprehension. However, it might be
the materials which discourage the students to participate actively inside the classroom. Miranda
found that her activity “drink Jamu” didn‟t work well because her students didn‟t want to drink
brotowali, because it tastes bitter. According to her, the students‟ lack of interest caused the lack

of the class participation and it triggered critical incidents (Miranda, Interview 2).
After knowing some reasons of having critical incidents caused by the lack of class
participation, it is better to know coping strategies used by student-teachers to deal with them.
Coping Strategy of Critical Incidents
In dealing with critical incidents caused by the lack of participation inside the class,
Farrell (2008) revealed that teachers preferred to give more exposure about the material to the
students. For example, teacher gave more guidance to do classroom‟s activity, gave more
examples to clarify the material and addressed some questions for building student‟s
understanding when dealing with critical incidents caused by lack of class participation. Take a
look at Miranda, she attempted to deal with a critical incident caused by the lack of participation
in the class by giving more exposure to the students in the form of giving more example of
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picture related to the topic and addressing some questions for building students‟ understanding
about the topic:
(Miranda was showing the picture) Do you know the location of the
beach? Can you guess the location of the beach? Jogja. Can you guess the
name? This is Baron Beach. (Miranda, Video of first mini teaching,
October 11th 2011 )
Similar to Miranda, Mirua also addressed some questions written on the whiteboard for
building student‟s understanding as a strategy in facing critical incidents caused by lack of class
participation. (Mirua, interview 2, Mini teaching 3).
Besides addressing question, Mirua was also giving more exposure in the form of giving
examples to clarify the material when facing critical incidents caused by the passiveness of the
classroom (Farrell, 2008). She stated as the following:
Yes, I did (giving more examples acted in front of the class), Not only the
accent but also the language used. (Mirua, my translation, Mini teaching 2,
9th august 2012).
Sometimes giving more exposure toward the material didn‟t work well to encourage
student‟s participation in the class. In her third mini teaching, Miranda reported that she became
more flexible and didn‟t force her students to do what she wanted. She stated as the following:
One of my student shouted, “Poor you! You got the bitter one, Right? Will
you drink it?”. Then, I realized that I should find another way to teach
them that it (Brotowali) is bitter. At last I decided to drink it. (Miranda, my
translation, second interview, Mini teaching 3, September 18th 2012)
Miranda tried to build student‟s comfort inside the class by letting herself drunk the
bitter jamu instead of forcing the student to drink it (Miranda, interview 2, Mini teaching 3). It
made the student be more enthusiastic doing the activity. In her second mini teaching, Mirua also
be more flexible to deal with the student‟s poor participation:
I decided to be more flexible, I don‟t want the students do the same with
my expectation. Since I realize that they (the students) didn‟t have plenty
of time preparing it (Acting in front of the class). (Mirua, my translation,
interview 2, mini teaching 2, 9thaugust 2012).

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Another strategy to face critical incident triggered by the lack of class participation was
integrating the student‟s interest into teaching. Almost all the participants assumed integrating
the students‟ interest into teaching was a good way to deal with student‟s lack of participation.
From the interview, Mirua found the class was very passive. Then she integrated the student‟s
interest into teaching as a strategy to cope with the students‟ passiveness inside the class:
In my opinion, this (Repeat the teacher‟s utterance when discussing new
vocabulary) is the most effective ways to grab students‟ attention... Based
on my experience when I was in senior high, the students were very
enthusiastic repeating after the teacher. So, the students were happy when
they were asked to speak English together. From my past experience, I
think this technique worked well to grab student‟s interest and
automatically raise the students‟ participation too. So I think shouting out
aloud could become student‟s interest.(Mirua, My translation, Interview 2,
Mini teaching 3, 9th august 2012)
From Mirua‟s experience, we can see that there was a strong correlation between
student‟s interests and students‟ participation (Fu, X. Wang and Y. Wang, 2012, p. 116). Since
students‟ participation can be influenced by students‟ interest, Mirua dealt with critical incident
caused by the lack of students‟ participation by considering the student‟s interest. When students
were interested with the learning subject, their desire to participate in the class activities would
become more intense and thus it would form a good cycling (Fu, X. Wang and Y. Wang, 2012,
p. 116). Therefore, it can be inferred that one of the critical incidents coping strategies caused by
students‟ lack of participation is reflecting on the students‟ interest.

Classroom Management Issues
Reasons of Having Critical Incidents
Another important dimension in teaching which can trigger critical incidents was
Classroom Management issues. Duke (as cited in Yi, 2003, p.128) concluded that classroom
management issues were any crisis that occurred related to classroom management of time,
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space, materials, auxiliary personnel, and students. In this study, the occurrence of critical
incidents caused by classroom management issues was very high, 21 per 42 incidents. Different
with critical incidents caused by the lack of class participation, classroom management issues
have more reasons of triggering critical incidents. Those reasons are less dedicate time in
pre/whilst/post-teaching, the lack of material copies and technical problem.
Based on the research that I conducted, technical problem was the most frequent critical
incidents triggered by classroom management issues since all the participants had already faced
it more than once. Wood E. et al. (2005, p. 195) defined technical problem as the issues
concerned not the presence or absence of resources but problems using those resources in terms
of malfunctions, compatibility and change. Mirua was the person who faced three technical
problems in her third mini teaching. She couldn‟t play the recording on the laptop, the speaker
didn‟t work and the projector was broken. Those technical problems led them to face the critical
incidents. She couldn‟t did her plan in the pre-teaching smoothly and she spent longer time to
did her pre-teaching (Mirua, Interview 2).
Another classroom management issues which can lead critical incidents was the lack of
material copied. Miranti, in her second mini teaching was upset by the lack of handout for the
students. She changed her plan from giving individual assignment to be pair assignment
(Miranti, Interview 2, Mini teaching2).
Talking about classroom management, it always t