Social Interactions in Indonesian for Speakers of Other Languages
Classes
Evi Karlina Ambarwati
Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia, Jl. Dr. Setiabudhi No.229, Bandung, Indonesia
Keywords: CLT, ISOL, teachers’ beliefs and practices.
Abstract: Language serves a primary function as a tool for social communication and interaction. Therefore, language
learning should not only focus on the language forms, but also the opportunity to use the knowledge in
various social contexts. This study aimed at investigating the teachers’ beliefs and practices regarding
communicative language teaching (CLT) in their classrooms. This small-scaled investigation exploited the
benefit of technology to gather responses from nine teachers in a language centre via online questionnaires
and interview. The findings showed that the teacher’ beliefs and practices were constructed by teachers’
understanding of CLT principles. Albeit contextual constraints, they attempted to frequently stimulate the
students’ communication skills by providing opportunities for teacher-student and peer interactions in the
target language in the classrooms through ranges of classroom activities. This research demonstrates that
the alignment of curriculum, facilities, teachers’ cognition and students’ participant is likely to contribute to
the implementation of CLT in Indonesian for Speakers of Other Languages classes.
1 INTRODUCTION
Language is best acquired when it is used for its
main purpose: communication (Krashen, 2009;
Richards, 2006). The emergence of Communicative
Language Teaching (CLT) approach in the 1960s
marked the shift of language learning paradigm.
Language is not only acquired through a series of
exposure to the linguistic system, but also through
various opportunities to actively use the target
language in the classroom. Indeed, the crux of CLT
is social interactions (Savignon, 2007).
Investigations of interactions in various English as a
second language (ESL) and foreign language (EFL)
classrooms generally show that interactions in
various social contexts extend language learning
(Seo and Kim, 2011; Shehadeh, 2011). Likewise,
students had positive view on the interactive
classroom activities (Savignon and Wang, 2003).
The social spirit of language learning
subsequently affected language learning policy
across the globe, not to mention in Asian countries.
In Indonesia, the installment of CLT approach in
English curriculum has started since 1984
(Musthafa, 2001). Despite the popularity, CLT
raises some debates. This is because as an approach,
CLT is flexible that it does not refer to acquiring
specific language skills or utilizing an exclusive set
of teaching method. It is the language teacher
beliefs, knowledge, and thought systems that
underlay their pedagogical decisions (Borg, 2006).
Abundant research have involved teachers because
of their understanding of the learners’ needs
(Holliday, 1994; Savignon, 2007).
Surprisingly, despite the teachers’ approval on
the approach, teachers stated that there were
contextual constraints that limit their pedagogical
practice (Farooq, 2010; Hiep, 2007; Karim, 2004;
Mowlaie and Rahimi, 2010; Nishino, 2008;
Sholihah, 2012). These constraints were
inaccessible authentic materials, classroom size and
hours, limited teacher expertise in applying the
approach, traditional assessment and students’ low
level of the target language.
Presented these realities, the current research
aimed to balance the investigation by providing
insight from the Indonesian for Speakers of Other
Languages (ISOL) classrooms context. Indonesian
language is currently a popular foreign language
learned across the globe. Some research on CLT in
ISOL classrooms concentrated on creating integrated
452
Ambarwati, E.
Social Interactions in Indonesian for Speakers of Other Languages Classes.
In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Sociology Education (ICSE 2017) - Volume 1, pages 452-456
ISBN: 978-989-758-316-2
Copyright © 2018 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved

and interactive teaching materials to promote
students’ communicative competence
(Arumdyahsari, Widodo and Susanto, 2016; Jazeri,
2016; Oktriono, Ningsih and Pedo, 2017;
Ulumuddin and Ismanto, 2014; Siroj, 2015). While,
Waenawae and Suyata (2015) focused on comparing
the effectiveness of role play method and the group
discussion method in improving the Indonesian
speaking skill of the students of Thammasat
University, Thailand. Sopiah (2015) also pointed
that Communicative Language Teaching was
effective to improve a Korean student’s writing.
Nevertheless, none of these researches looked into
teachers’ perspective on the imported approach.
Therefore, it is necessary to shed light on the ISOL
teachers’ perspective. The next section will describe
the method of this research.
2 METHODS
This research used a qualitative methodology
including online questionnaire and interviews to
explore the ISOL teacher’s CLT beliefs and
classroom practices in a language centre in
Bandung, Indonesia. The language centre offers
private and regular classes as well as ICT programs
and scholarship programs, namely Darmasiswa and
Kemitraan Negara Berkembang for foreign students
from countries which have diplomatic relationship
with Indonesia to study Indonesian language and
language preparation for students from developing
countries to get their master degree in Indonesian
universities, respectively.
The participants were nine ISOL teachers. To
gather their perspective and teaching practices, an
online open-ended questionnaire was formulated in
Google Forms application and distributed via email.
These data were complemented by audio-recorded,
semi structured interviews with the teachers of
approximately 20 minutes. These interviews queried
the obstacles they encountered in the classroom (i.e.,
What is your role in the classroom? What teaching
materials do you use and how to access them? What
are the obstacles you encounter in the teaching
process?).
The data were analyzed inductively (Creswell,
2012) and resulted in two groups: the first group
who incorporated social interactions to extend the
four language skills (n=3) and the second group who
focused merely on speaking skill (n=6). Teacher
interviews were coded line by line and compared to
the results of the previous studies to capture the
contextual constraints they encountered.
3 RESULT AND DISCUSSION
3.1 The Language Centre
The students learning Indonesian language in the
language centre represented almost all the
continents. Therefore, a classroom was likely to be
rich in cultural and first language background.
The curriculum used in the language centre gave
equal emphasise to the four language skills, i.e.,
listening, reading, writing and speaking. Each level
of a program was designed to be completed in 30
hours. The duration for each class was mostly 2
hours, except in the ICT and scholarship programs in
which students had a 2.5 hour-meeting. The main
learning material was the module written by a team
of instructors. However, teachers were encouraged
to modify and use supplementary materials that are
suitable to the learners’ need and lesson.
Throughout the programs, students were given
two tests to track their learning progress. The tests
assessed the students’ language skills in four areas,
i.e., listening, reading, writing and speaking, just as
reflected in the curriculum. However, students in
private program were opted not to take any test
because some did not concern on their learning
progress while some thought that the test reduced
their class hours.
3.2 Classroom Social Interactions:
Teacher Beliefs, Roles and Practice
The questionnaire reveals that the teachers favoured
CLT and attempted to apply it regularly. Each
group’s beliefs toward the communicative
competence and their teaching approach as well as
the subsequent language skills they concentrate on
are presented in Table 1.
Table 1: Teachers’ beliefs in CLT in ISOL classrooms.
Group
Communicative
competence belief
Approach
Skill
1
The ability to convey
idea orally and in
written as well as
verbally and non-
verbally on various
contexts which
appropriate culturally
and linguistically.
- CLT and
text-based
- CLT and
convention
al method
All
2
The ability to
exchange information
CLT
Speaking
As found in Table 1, the two-group held an
opposing view towards communicative competence
Social Interactions in Indonesian for Speakers of Other Languages Classes
453

and had different instructional decisions. The first
group. who viewed communicative competence as
the ability to deliver a linguistic and culture
appropriate idea, both orally and in written, has been
integrating CLT with the text-based approach and
conventional approach where teachers do most of
the talk. This group also has been giving a balanced
emphasize towards the four language skills.
Conversely, the second group, who viewed
communicative competence as the ability to obtain
from and give information to various sources, did
not integrate another teaching approach. They also
highlighted only speaking skill.
This finding shows that ISOL teachers’
instructional practice is shaped by their
understanding of the communicative competence
(Holliday, 1994). The first group who allows
students to engage in reading, writing and listening
activities as much as they do in the speaking
activities, believe that the Indonesian language skill
is beneficial in order to participate in the society. In
fact, they believe that a good language command
might affect the success at work, school and
relationship. On the other hand, the second group
seems to have a partial interpretation of
communicative competence proposed by Richards
(2006).
Despite their opposing belief, the teachers
encouraged students, regardless their current
language ability, to actively use the target language
in the classroom interactions. As summarized in
Figure 1, teachers created venue for social
interactions through different classroom activities.
They did not favour a certain activity over others,
but they creatively selected the activity according to
the learners’ need and the objective of the lesson.
Indeed, the objective of communicative approach
relies on the learner need in a given context
(Savignon, 2007).
Figure 1: Venues for classroom social interactions.
Throughout the activities, the teachers played
multiple roles. At the initial stage, they gave
instruction. During the activities, they mainly
withdrew their active participation but facilitated
students with guidance and response should there
were any conflict, misunderstanding or question.
They also provided feedback and correction. At all
stages, they promoted target language use.
Although the participants generally believed in
the students’ involvement in peer interactions, they
also provided rooms for teacher-students
interactions. They admitted to review the previous
lessons, check students’ understanding, summarize
the lessons and correct students’ pronunciation.
Also, they occasionally created non-formal
conversation to extend social interaction and
involved in the classroom discussion. Lastly, a
participant actively engaged in interpreting and
negotiating meaning of various texts.
The finding on the participants’ multiple roles in
CLT classroom reflects their understanding on CLT
principles. Teachers are organizers who organize
classroom activities and materials, facilitators who
facilitate the classroom elements’ interaction,
independent participants who monitors and pay
attention to errors during the interaction, and sources
who answers questions (Sholihah, 2012).
It can be concluded that the ISOL teachers’
beliefs about communicative competence shapes the
teaching approach they employ in the classroom and
the language skills they focus on. The roles they take
in the classroom and consideration in selecting
classroom activities reflect their understanding on
the CLT principles.
3.3 Classroom Social Interactions:
Contextual Constraints
A follow-up interview disclosed the obstacles in
implementing the CLT approach in ISOL
classrooms. Some contextual constraints, such as
class size and hours did not hinder the participants
from creating communicative activities. This is the
case because the class size was no more than 10
students. The teacher also said that the duration of
each lesson was sufficient for the students to engage
in various social interactions. This classroom
condition aligns with the “learning group ideal”
highlighted by Holliday (1994) in which a classroom
has fifteen or fewer students and promotes group
practice and teacher’s control over the students’
utterance and writing. This condition is ideal for
foreign language learners to extend their
communicative competence via various social
interactions.
The teachers further expressed their appreciation
for the curriculum which resonate their teaching
beliefs on language learning. Likewise, because the
curriculum advocated in the language centre
ICSE 2017 - 2nd International Conference on Sociology Education
454

highlight the development of all the language skills,
the teachers felt that they were guided to design
classroom practice accordingly. The form of
assessment also measured the four skills’
development, hence it resonates the CLT principle.
Teacher felt that they actually tested the materials
covered in the class.
This condition reflects a top-down and
comprehensive implementation of social spirit in
ISOL. The course program design, classroom
practice and assessment in the language centre
adhere to the principles of CLT. The alignment of
the language learning objectives and curriculum is
the most important pillar to extend the
communicative competence of students (Farooq,
2015; Nishino, 2008).
Another obstacle in CLT implementation was the
students’ characteristics. Hiep (2007) assumed that a
classroom with which students do not share a mother
tongue or be able to speak their mother tongue
outside the classroom might actively participate in
the classroom interaction, hence extend their
language competence in the target language. The
participants, though, put forward a rather
contradictory deduction. They claimed that some
students actually refused to participate or proposed a
rather “non-communicative” classroom activity. It is
due to the fact that an ISOL classroom consisted of
students from various linguistic and cultural
backgrounds that it is their perception of learning at
their home countries that contributes to their
willingness to participate. Also, despite the various
sources of Indonesian language outside the
classroom, the participants claimed that it did not
directly affect their students’ communicative
competence. They believed that the students’
characteristic and autonomy in language learning
that contribute to their communicative competence.
In fact, the essence of the communicative approach
centres at learners’ autonomy in their learning
(Ariatna, 2016; Farooq, 2015; Holliday, 1994;
Richards, 2006; Savignon and Wang, 2003). Also,
the participants did not find students’ low level of
Indonesian as a challenge to the classroom activities
as contrast to one of the participants’ views of study
in Taif language centre (Farooq, 2015).
Teachers participated in studies on CLT
implementation in ESL or EFL contexts complained
about the limited access to the authentic materials
restricted their pedagogical practices (Hiep, 2007;
Karim, 2004; Nishino, 2008; Sholihah, 2012).
Interestingly, the participants of this study admitted
that the reference books and ready-to-use
supplementary materials for ISOL context were
scarce. They adapted materials from EFL activity
books or teaching material source websites. There
was a handful amount of authentic materials, for
example newspaper and news excerpts, short stories,
novels or poems, but they were not necessarily
suitable for pedagogic activities. The participants,
hence, needed to modify the authentic materials to
make them suitable to the students’ level or
objective of the lesson.
The aforementioned findings lead the discussion
to the teachers’ expertise in promoting students’
social interactions in language classroom. Studies
across EFL contexts highlighted the limited teacher
expertise of the CLT implementation (Farooq, 2015;
Hiep, 2007; Karim, 2004; Mowlaie and Rahimi,
2010; Nishino, 2008; Sholihah, 2012). Whereas, the
teachers participated in this study were confident
about their pedagogical practices. They were aware
of their significant role and the challenges but
managed to overcome the difficulties. They
accentuated the teachers’ ability to recognize the
learners’ needs and characteristic as well as the
teachers’ creativity to rigorously plan, prepare, and
execute the activities and modify teaching materials.
So, the social approach to ISOL learning
concentrates at the dynamic relationship among the
curriculum, classroom practice, assessment, teaching
facilities, students and teachers.
4 CONCLUSIONS
The present study delineated the ISOL teachers’
belief and practices of CLT in a university language
centre. The participants are well aware of the
contextual constraints but are willing to overcome
the obstructions. The dynamic interconnection
among the stakeholders, i.e. the curriculum, teaching
facilities, students and teachers, plays a significant
role to support the implementation of
communicative approach in language learning.
Teachers ought to acknowldegde their own
significant role in order to function pertinently as the
theory builder and practitioners. Likewise, they
need to preserve and develop their personal and
professional growth in order to comply with the
dynamic growth of learners’ needs and language
development. Nevertheless, administrative support is
highly important to encourage the students’
communicative competence. All in all, the centre of
communicative approach in ISOL classrooms is the
alignment of curriculum, teaching facilities,
teachers’ cognition, and students’ participation.
Social Interactions in Indonesian for Speakers of Other Languages Classes
455

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