THE ACQUISITION OF INDONESIAN WORDS BY FOUR-YEAR-OLD BATAK TOBA CHILDREN.

OF INDONESIAN

BY

A'THESIS

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OF INDONESIAN

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A THESIS
THE ACQUISITION OF INDONESIAN WORDS BY FOUR-YEAR-OLD
BATAK TOBA CHILDREN

BY

LEST ARI MALAU
Reptration Number: 08218833 OUtS
This them waa examined on May 19111, 2011 by the Board of Eumiaen

Approved by

Adviser Commision

Second Adviser

First Adviser

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Prot Dr. Lince SibombiDg. M.Pd

Prof. D. P. Tampuboloa

NIP. 19610425 1986 01 2 001

The Direetor of School of,
Postgraduate Studies

The Head of English
Linguistics Study Program

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APPROVAL

This thesis was examined on May 19th, 2011 by Board of Examiners

Board of Examiners

Prof. Dr. Lince Sihombing, M.Pd.
NIP. 19610425 198601 2 001

Prof. D. P. Tampubolon, Ph.D.

Prof. Dr. Busmin Gurning, M.Pd.
NIP. 19590713 1986011 001

Prof. Amrin Saragih, M.A., Ph.D.
NIP. 19550113 198203 1 002

Prof. Dr. Sumarsih, M.Pd.
NIP. 19581021198303 2 002

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Praise to God Almighty, the Merciful and the Most BeneficiaL
Now that this thesis is finally written in order to achieve the degree of Magister
Humaniora of the English Applied Linguistics Study Program at State University of Medan.
The researcher would like to extend her indebtedness to a number of people, without them the
completion of this thesis has been impossible.
Firstly, Prof. Dr. Lince Sihombing as the first adviser and as the Secretary of English
Applied Linguistics of the Postgraduate Program and Prof. D. P. Tampubolon, P.hD. as the
second adviser, for their guidance, encouragement, kindness, and advise that have greatly
improved her rough draft.
Secondly, Prof. Dr. Busmin Gurning, M.Pd., as the Head of English Applied
Lingustics of the Postgraduate Program and first examiner as well, Prof. Amrin Saragih,
M.A., P.hD. as the second adviser, and Prof. Dr. Sumarsih, M.Pd. as the third examiner, very
deepest thanks for them for their support, assistance, and advise in finishing this thesis.
Thirdly, the writer's indebtedness goes to all lecturers for transferring their precious

knowledge and experience and all staff of Postgraduate Program at the State University of
Medan for their kind service during her study.
Fourthly, the writer's never ending love also goes to to her beloved parents; R. M.
Malau and N. Sitanggang, her handsome brothers; Yansen Malau and wife, Ferdinand Malau
and Ricky Malau. Thanks for your love, encouragement, pray, mental support, and ideas
within the thesis.
Last but not least, her beloved friends Santy, Najla, Nova, Ayu, Adah and all friends
in LTBI-BIXV, thanks for being my friends and for supporting the writer in finishing this

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thesis. Her humble gratitude also goes to Anastasya, Rindu, Grego, Yosen and their parents
for being her subjects and giving her the data needed to complete this thesis.
The writer admit that the content of this thesis is still far from perfection, but she
warmly welcome any constructive ideas and critics that will improve the quality of this
thesis. And the writer also hope this thesis would be useful for those who read this thesis.

Medan, June 14th, 2011
The Writer,

Lestari Malau
0821 8833 0108

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ABSTRACT
Malan, Lestari. The Acquisition of Indonesian Words by Four-Year-Old
Batak Toba Children. Thesis. English Applied Linguistics, Post Graduate
Program, State University ofMedan. 2011.
This study deals with The Acquisition of Indonesian Words by Four Year Old
Batak. Toba Children. The focus of this study is to describe Indonesian content
words and structural words uttered by Four Year Old Batak. Toba children. There
are three questions to be answered namely: (l)what content words of Indonesian
are acquired by four year old Batak. Toba children, (2)what structural words of
Indonesian are acquired by four year old Batak Toba children, (3)how Batak Toba
children at the age of four acquire the Indonesian content and structural words the
way they are. A qualitative research was conducted to enable the researcher to
answer the questions. Observation and interview were earned out to the Batak

Toba children twice a week for three months by using observation and interview
sheet. The findings indicate that the total number of uttered words is 1015 with
732 Indonesian content words and 283 Indonesian structural words. These four
year old Batak Toba children acquired their Indonesian words through their
interaction with their friends and families. Based on the findings, some
suggestions are made (a) for parents to assist their children in the process of
language acquisition so that the children can acquire the words correctly, (b) to
inform parents about language acquisition as the anticipation for them who are
worried about their children's language, (c) for the students to conduct another
research with other children with different age at different language so they have
much knowJedge about chiJdren Janguage acquisition at many different ages.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ................................................................................ i

ABSTRACT ..................................................................................................... iii
TABLE OF CONTENTS................................................................................ iv
LIST OF TABLES ......................................................................................... vii
LIST OF APPENDICES............................................................................... viii
CHAPTER I : INTRODUCTION .................................................................. 1
1.1 The Background of the Study ............................................ 1
1.2 The Problems of the Study ................................................ 5
1.3 The Objectives of the Study .............................................. 5
1.4 The Scope of the Study ..................................................... 6

1.5 The Significance of the Study ........................................... 6

CHAPTER ll : REVIEW OF LITERATURE .............................................. 8
2.1 Language .......................................................................... 8
2.1.1 Language Acquisition .......................................... 10
2.2 Characteristics ofFour Year Old Children .................... 12
2.3 Language Acquisition of Four Year Old Children ........ 14
2.4 Indonesian Language ..................................................... 17
2.4.1 The Acquisition of Indonesian Language of Four Year
Old Children .................................................................. 20

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2.5 Batak Language ............................................................... 22
2.5.1 The Acquisition ofBatak Language ..................... 24
2.6 Types ofWords ............................................................... 25
2.6.1 Content Words ...................................................... 27
2.6.2 Structural Words ................................................... 28
CHAPTER III : RESEARCH MEmOD AND IMPLEMENTATION •.. 30

3.1 Research Design ........................................................... 30
3.2 Subject of the Study ..................................................... 31
3 .3 Instruments of Data Collection .................................... 31
3.4 Technique of Collecting Data ...................................... 32

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3.4.1 Interview.............................................................. 32
3.4.2 Observation ......................................................... 32
3.5 Technique of Data Analysis ......................................... 34

CHAPTER IV : DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS ............................... 35
4.1 Data Analysis .................................................................. 35
4.1.1 Content Words oflnd. Acquired by ...................... 36
4.1.2 Structural Words of Ind. Acquired by ................... 50
4.1.3 The Way Batak Children Acquire Ind.................... 57
4.2 Findings ........................................................................... 58
4.3 Discussions ...................................................................... 59
CHAPTER V : CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS .......................... 65
5.1 Conclusions....................................................................... 65
5.2 Suggestions ....................................................................... 66

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REFERENCES ............................................................................................... 67
APPENDICES ................................................................................................ 70

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LIST OF TABLES
page

I. Table 3.4.2.1 Observation Sheet!... ............................................................. 34
II. Table 3.4.2.2 Observation Sheet II .............................................................. 34
III. Table 4.1.1.1 All Content Words of Ind...................................................... 45
IV Table 4.1.1.2 Number of Content Words of .............................................. 49
V Table 4.1.2.1 All Structural Words oflnd .................................................... 56
VI.Table 4.1.2.2 Number of Structural Words oflnd ...................................... 56
VII. Table 4.1.2.3 Number of Content and Structural Words of Ind ................ 57

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LIST OF APPENDIXES

APPENDIX I The Subjects .............................................................................. 70
APPENDIX II Interview & Observations of ................................................... 72
APPENDIX III Content and Structural Words .............................................. 106

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CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
1.1 The Background of the Study

Language is so basic to our existence that Iife without words is difficult to
envision. It stands at the center of human affairs, from the most prosaic to the

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most profound. Language is very complex. It has sound systems that allow the
production of words and sentences. There are about hundred thousands of terms
and constructions for relating the words, numerous distinct words, vocabularies of
some 50.000 to 100.000 terms for adults. A language has not only a structure what
linguists try to capture with their rules but also a function to which that structure

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is put. Language is fundamentally an instrument of communication. People talk as

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a way of conveying ideas to others - of getting them to grasp new facts, answer
questions, register promises, and so forth. It is the medium through which the
manners, morals, and mythology of a society are passed on to the next generation.
Indeed, it is a basic ingredient in virtually every social situation. The thread that
runs through all these activities is communication, where people trying to put their
ideas over to others. As the main vehicle of human communication, language is
indispensable.
One reason why human beings are superior to other creatures in the world is
their ability to communicate. They communicate by using language to express
their feelings and opinions. Therefore, language is a determining factor for
survival. Without language, there is no life in the world. How one can speak is

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realty amazing if it is searched thoroughly. Chomsky (in Papalia and Old,

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1990:75) defines children in a normal life from two until six years will acquire
language with structure and vocabulary. This is possible because since their birth,
they have been equipped with such a device called Language Acquisition Device
(LAD). A theory says that human has language devices in their mind seems
acceptable up to the present. It is the means by which the child learns input from
parents and babysitters. The LAD lets the children analyze the language they hear
and extract the rules of gran1mar that allow them to create new words to help them
to verbalize their intentions. Even since an infant, a baby starts to use a language.
Through his crying, the baby is trying to communicate his unhappiness, hunger
and so on.

In an increasingly diversified and multilingual world, more and more young
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children find more than one language is used. Many children grow up with more
than one language. This kind of condition may be acquired early by children in
regions where most people speak two languages. In infancy most people learn at
least one of the country's many local languages and later learn Indonesian at
school or in the streets of cities or from television and radio. Indonesian tends to
be most used in the modern environment of major urban areas. The local
languages tend to dominate in rural areas and small towns, and are most used in
homes.

Indonesia is the fourth most populous nation in the world and Indonesian
(Bahasa Indonesia) is the official language of Indonesia which is used most
extensively as a first language in urban areas and usually as a second or third
language in more rural parts of Indonesia. It is the language of education across

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the country from the primary school to the university. Most formal education, as
well as nearly all national media and other fom1s of communication, are
conducted in Indonesian. Indonesian is the language used in radio, television and
magazine. It is the language of government and business administration, media,
literature, and of everyday life in the big cities. There exist a huge number of
Indonesian words that can be classified into two types of words. They are content

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words and structural words. Content words are words that convey meanings and
can be understood. The meaning of a sentence will change if the content words
are omitted. Kinds of content words are nouns (like: kertas and uang), verbs (like:
lari and makan), adverbs (like: selalu and sekarang) and adjectives (like: kecil and
tinggi). Another type of words is structural words which mean words that exist to
create grammatical or structural relationship among words. They are simple and

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small words. They give the sentence its correct form or structure and make the
sentence gran1matically correct. The meaning of a sentence will not change if the
structural words are omitted. Kinds of structural words are prepositions (like: ke,
di), pronouns (like: aku, kamu), conjunctions (like: dan, sementara).

Indonesia as one of the big countries in the world consists of islands which are
separated by oceans and islands have many tribes as well as their languages. One
of the tribes is Batak. Batak is a collective ethnic term embracing five seemingly
different speech communities like Batak Toba, Batak Mandailing, Batak Karo,
Batak Dairi and Batak Simalungun which all of them live around the Lake of
Toba in North Sumatra. The Batak Toba language is one of regional languages in

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Indonesia. It is spoken by about one million people living on Samosir Island and
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to the east, south, and south-west of Lake Toba and henceforth in North Sumatra.

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There are many Indonesian children who lives in rural parts of Indonesia still
know a little about Indonesian. They speak their regional language in their daily
communication either with their family or friends. This condition can be seen in
some parts in Indonesia especially in Samosir. In Samosir, people speak Batak
Toba language as their first language and this Batak Toba language is used in their
daily communication. Even though Indonesia is the nation language, many of
Batak Toba children speak Batak language more often than Indonesian for they
master Batak language well than Indonesian. Imagine when a Batak child moves
to urban area, let say to Medan where Indonesian language is mostly spoken as
the first language. All community speak Indonesian and he cannot speak up his
language there. Especially when he comes to school, sadly speaking, no one speak
Batak language there. These kinds of situation lead him to learn the new language,
Indonesian language.

Viewing this phenomenon, the writer will conduct a research on four-yearold Batak speaking children on some aspects of Indonesian words because it can
give a great deal of knowledge about the psychological and intellectual
functioning of the children as they mature and the use of language is considered to
have a tremendous effect on the children's relationship and their environment.
There have been some previous researches related to the acquisition of words by
four-year-old children. The first is done by Bachtiar entitled "The Acquisition of
Indonesian Affixations by A Four-Year-Old Child" by. It was found out that the
four-year-old child was able to produce prefixes, confixes, suffixes and infixes.
And the second is done by Chaerul Sjah entitled "An Analysis of English Words
Acquired by Children of Four Years Old". It was found out that only a small

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number of English words acquired by the children of four years old in English
institution.

1.2 The Problems of the Study

In relation to the background that has been elaborated previously, the
problems of this study are fonnulated as follows:
I. What are the content words of Indonesian acquired by Batak Toba

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children at the age of four?
2. What are the structural words of Indonesian acquired by Batak Toba
children at the age of four?
3. How do Batak Toba children at the age of four acquire the Indonesian
content and structural words the way they are?

1.3 The Objectives of the Study

Based on the problems of the study, so the objectives ofthe study are:
1. To discover the content words of Indonesian acquired by Batak Toba

children at the age of four.
2. To discover the structural words of Indonesian acquired by Batak Toba
children at the age of four.
3. To elaborate how Batak Toba children at the age of four acquire the
Indonesian content and structural words the way they are.

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1.4 The Scope of the Study
The process of children's language acquisition is a broad area to be studied
because there are so many aspects to be discovered. In this study, the writer deals
only with the acquisition of Indonesian words. And the children who will be
observed are four-year-old Batak Toba children. They will be observed for three
months.

1.5 The Significance of the Study
A study which is conducted for academic purpose has a great importance for
the development of knowledge. The findings of this research certainly will
provide valuable inputs that can enrich the study on the development of language
acquisition. It is hoped that the findings would have valuable contributions to the
theoretical and practical aspects.
a. Theoretically, these findings can be made as guidelines for adults
especially parents who are interested in the process of introducing new
words to young children. It will be also very useful for references in
assisting of facilitating the children in the process of acquiring new words.
And for other language researchers who are interested in conducting a
more in-depth study on language acquisition, by comparing the result of
this research they can enrich the knowledge on language acquisition and
know how much knowledge of Indonesian language can be acquired by
Batak Toba children at the age of four. This also can provide a basis for
further research on the different stages of the children's words acquisition.
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b. Practically, these findings make the parents to be more active and creative
in introducing new language to their children. And for the babysitters, they
will be more aware of introducing a new language so that the children can
produce sentences naturally whatever they want to speak and it is better
for adult to make a conversation to children.

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CHAPTERV
CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS
5.1 Conclusions
To conclude the observation that has been conducted on this research, the
researcher has come to the following conclusions:

1. There are 544 Indonesian content words uttered by all subjects. Gregory
Saragih has uttered 163 Indonesian content words (30%) rather than the other
subjects. He was followed by Angelica Rindu Aritonang with 147 Indonesian
content words (27.02%). Then is Anastasya Tambunan with 124 Indonesian
content words (22.8%) and the last is Yosen Noverius Gultom (21.13%).
2. There are 34 Indonesian structural words uttered by all subjects. Gregory
Saragih has uttered 8 Indonesian structural words (23.5%) than other subjects.
He was followed by Angelica Rindu Aritonang with 6 Indonesian structural
words (17.6%). Then is Anastasya Tambunan with 10 Indonesian structural
words (29.4%) and the last is Yosen Noverius Gultom with 10 Indonesian
structural words (29.4%). It can be concluded that the dominant type of
Indonesian words uttered by the subjects is content words. The total number of
both content words and structural words of Indonesian language which had
been uttered by all subjects is 1015. The total words included the repetition
words occurred in the children conversation. They could be produced by other
subjects in different occasion.
3. It can be concluded that four year old Batak Toba children acquire Indonesian
language purely from their surroundings, whether they are influenced by their
family, friends or even media In the places in which content and structural

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words occurred, they expressed and uttered what they know, what they like or
what they want. It might be response of parent's statement, the response from
their friends or what they felt in their heart.

5.2 Suggestions

In the view of the research conducted on the Indonesian acquisition by
Batak children at the age of four year old, the following suggestions are put
forward to:
I. Assist the children in the process of LA. Allow the children to
communicate freely or to produce sentences or words in different
situations and there should be someone to converse with them in order to

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acquire many kinds of words they have heard because children produce
sentences or words based on what they hear and cannot produce words
they never heard.
2. Encourage the children to communicate politely and to produce the correct
words or sentences and if they make mistakes, give the exact words and
pronunciations.
3. Conduct another research to the children with other language at the other
age such as 6, 7, or 8 so that from the studies we can fmd out more
insights such as how many words Batak children can acquire at the certain
age and certain period of Indonesian learning and exposures.
4. Inform the parents who worried about children language acquisition in
uttering words because they have to know when and what factors can

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influence the children's ability to produce words and speech as the
anticipation for some parents who worried about their children.

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