Monday, November 4, 2024

Teaching Grammar Using The Genre-Based Approach In The Kurikulum 2013

TEACHING GRAMMAR USING THE GENRE-BASED APPROACH
IN THE KURIKULUM 2013

Oleh: Zulyetti, SS., M.Ed (zulyetti.zulyetti@gmail.com)

ABSTRACT

Peralihan fokus pengajaran grammar dari bentuk ke fungsi menuntut guru agar dapat menemukan pendekatan yang sesuai untuk pengajaran grammar. Tulisan ini membahas tentang pengajaran grammar menggunakan Pendekatan Genre. Pendekatan ini merupakan pengajaran grammar secara explisit akan tetapi berpusat pada fungsi grammar.

 

1.      Introduction

In recent years, there was a shifting from focusing on teaching grammar or language form to language function in English language classroom. This is also the case in Indonesia. This can be seen from the government’s effort of changing the English curriculum from focusing on teaching language form such as the 1975 curriculum to language function such as the  Kurikulum 2013.

This paper attempts to explore the principles of teaching grammar concerning with EFL classroom in Indonesian senior high school. It seeks to assess the possibility of integrating teaching grammar with genre-based approach as required by the kurikulum 2013. This paper is divided into two parts. The first part presents the theoretical definition of grammar, issues on teaching grammar, contemporary pedagogical practice of teaching grammar and the strategies of teaching grammar using genre-based approach. The second part provides a teaching grammar scenario for high school students in Indonesia using procedure type of texts that is in accordance with the Kurikulum 2013.

2.      Grammar teaching in EFL learning

To begin with, I will start with a definition of grammar. Conventionally, grammar is viewed as a set of rules governing the arrangement of words in sentences (Brown, 1994; Thornbury, 1999). However, it is inadequate defining grammar simply as the study of the syntax and morphology of sentences. Odlin (1994, as cited in Byrd, 1998) states that grammar can be seen:

as prescriptive rules that points out socially approved usage, as descriptive rules to give detailed information about a language, as explanation for an internalized aspect of human brain and as ‘generative’ system that seek to describe language in formal systems influenced by symbolic logic”.

This implies that definition of grammar is very complex and depends on its function to serve the purpose of the people who study it.

Traditionally, grammar teaching is defined as a way of presenting and practicing grammatical structure. However, Ellis (2006) argues that this definition can not cover all the practice of teaching grammar in the contemporary English language classroom.  He argues that teaching grammar is not merely presenting and practicing grammatical structure. It also involves learners’ discovering and exposure to grammatical structure and corrective feedback on learners’ error.

2.1.   Controversial Issues on Teaching Grammar

Teaching grammar in language classroom is not without its difficulties. The introduction of communicative language teaching has changed the objective of language learning from focusing on the language form to the function of language for communication.  This approach is considered the most appropriate one to teaching foreign language function (Brown, 1994, as cited in McKay 2003) because it provides learners with the better environments for language learning (Celce-Murcia & Hilles, 1988). It is an approach which focuses on negotiation of meaning by advocating communicative activities. It encourages interaction between the learners and other people. However, focusing on communicative activities alone can give rise to another problem for the learners. According to Richards (as cited in Celce-Murcia & Hilles, 1988, p. 2), “a communicative approach can lead to the development of a broken, ungrammatical, pidginized form of the language beyond which students can never really progress”. Therefore, he believes that grammar should be taught and should not be left out from language teaching. In addition, it is important to give attention to the language form such as grammar since it can help learner to acquire awareness of the nature of the language and its role in social communication (Joyce and Burns, 1999, p. 139)

If grammar still needed to be taught, it leads to another controversial question about how it should be taught.  Stephen Krashen (1982) claims that it is not necessary to teach grammar explicitly. He believes that by providing L2 learner with a ‘comprehensible input’ will help them unconsciously internalize the grammatical system of language the same way the first language learners do.

Celce-Murcia (1991) argues against Krashen’s claim. She believed that explicit grammar teaching is necessary to stimulate learners’ awareness of the features of the language. In line with this, Ellis (2006) finds that among many studies about instructed versus natural acquisition of second language, that some researchers concluded that teaching grammar was beneficial but that to be effective had to be taught in a way that was compatible with the natural process of acquisition. Ellis is referring to the way of teaching grammar by developing learners’ understanding about how the language works and its function and it should be relevant to the learners’ needs and skills.

2.2.   Definition of Genre

Derewianka (1946, p. 18) defines a genre as ‘particular text-type’. He refers texts to ‘any meaningful stretch of language – oral or written’ which become particular mainly because of its social purpose in the communication. For Swales (1990, p.58), ‘a genre comprises a class of communicative events, the members of which share the same set of communicative purposes’. Both Derewianka and Swales agree that what brings a genre into being is its purpose, specifically its communicative purpose.

However, genres are not only can be distinguished from their purposes. A genre is distinguished from other genres by its overall characteristics. The characteristics include its specific purpose, particular overall structure, specific linguistic features, context in use and the shared agreement between members of the culture on its social function for communication (Gibbon, 2002; Thornbury, 1999; Derewianka, 1946).

To provide a better understanding of genre characteristics, the following example is the characteristics of narratives genre. Narratives genre have a purpose which may be to entertain or perhaps to teach people about a particular social norm (as fables do). The overall thematic structure of narratives genre is orientation, events, complication, and resolution. The common linguistic features of narrative genre include the use of past time, often contain dialog, the use of many ‘action’ verbs that describe what people do and the use of sequence of time (Derewianka, 1946; Gibbon, 2002). These characteristics distinguish narratives genre form other genres such instruction genre that has purpose to tell someone how to do something.

2.3.   Genre-based teaching approach

Basically, genre-based teaching approach aims at developing students’ literacy skills focusing on the social processes such as explain, describe, and argue (Kay & Dudley-Evans, 1998). It consists of four stages (named curriculum cycle) through which a particular text type being taught to student. The first stage is Building the Field. This stage aims at providing students with background knowledge about the topic. The next stage is Modeling. In this stage, a particular genre is introduced through a model text. It aims at making student familiar with the purpose, structure and linguistic features the text type. Next stages, Joint Construction, teacher and students work together to construct a particular text type. Finally, in the last stages, Independent Construction, student work indepently to produce their own texts of the genre (Derewianka, 1946; Gibbon, 2002).

2.4.   The strategies of teaching grammar using genre-based approach

Firstly, to teach grammar using literary text, teacher of senior high school should consider the model text to be used.  Thornbury (1999) states that teacher should be selective in choosing the source of texts. He advocates using authentic texts because it is interesting, motivating and representing the way language is used in real-life context. .

However, not all authentic texts are suitable for all level of students. Thornbury (1999) exemplifies the use of a dense newspaper article with the linguistic load of unfamiliar vocabulary and syntactic complexity can be frustrating and demotivating for low level of students. To overcome this problem, he suggests ‘to take authentic texts and to simplify them in ways which retain their genuine flavour’ (p. 73). In line with this, Stern (1987, as cited in Hasan, 2001, p. 16) mentions that ‘simplifying and restructuring literary texts, along with using paraphrasing and restatement could be useful techniques for clarifying grammatical difficulties’.  He also adds these texts can help students mastering unfamiliar structure by analyzing them at the grammatical level and by manipulating the phrases and sentences in which they appear. In addition, Celce-Murcia & Hilles (1988) mentions that generating or manipulating texts, and use them as resources for creating a variety of activities is a primary technique of text-based grammar teaching.

Secondly, grammar teaching should be meaning focused rather than rules focused (Thornbury, 1999; Joyce & Burns, 1999; Celce-Murcia & Hilles, 1988). They further explain that ‘meaning focused grammar’ should be contextualized and presented beyond just a sentence. It implies the grammar can not be taught by using isolated sentences. It should be presented beyond sentence level, in this case in the level of text.

Thirdly, it is suggested to use text-based exercise and activities. The following are some of the examples. The most obvious and traditional text based exercise is dictation, dicto-comp and dictogloss (Thornbury, 1999; Celce-Murcia & Hilles, 1988). Celce-Murcia and Hilles (1988, p. 150) group this activity as text replication. These activities focus on visually or aurally dictation of a text. Students create a replication of a text using the information that they get from the dictation.

Finally, teacher should be creative in arranging interesting communicative activities in which students can express themselves in real-life communication.

3.      EFL education in Indonesia

As an international language, English is one of compulsory subjects in Indonesia secondary and tertiary education. Some provinces in Indonesia decide to include English as one of local content subjects in their elementary education. It is believed that English is the key to access for global technology and information (McKay, 2003). As mentioned by the former Minister of Research and technology, A.S. Hikam, in his keynote speech at the ISTECS workshop, Japan, 2002, that English plays a very important role in a process of technological transfer. Hikam argues that without English language mastery, we will not be able to maximize the process.

However, English language teaching in Indonesia is not without problems. Yuwono (2005) states pessimistically that ‘foreign language education in Indonesia, particularly the teaching of English, seems to be always problematic’. He quotes Dardjowojoyo’s (2000) claim that the obvious factors that contribute to the ongoing problem in ELT in Indonesia are the large class sizes and teacher with a poor mastery of English.

Another problem is related to the teaching methodology. The most widely used methodology in ELT classroom in Indonesia is grammar based approach. As Hikam (2002) stated that EFL teaching in Indonesia only focuses on the language form such as grammar and syntax, not on the practical use of language to communicate. In line with this, Mushtafa (2001) argues that the preference to focus on the language form because of the national English language examination system (i.e. EBTANAS, UAN, UN). It is commonly dominated by questions which are form-focused and presented in multiple choice format. He argues that this kind of testing will lead students to the thought that mastering good English grammar is mastering English for communication.

Musthafa (2001) further explains other reasons that contribute to the problem of EFL in Indonesia. First is the limited time allocated for teaching English. Second is the limited opportunity to learn to speak English and to practise the social use of English outside classroom. The last is the lack of good and authentic learning material.

3.1.   English Teaching in the Kurikulum 2013

The Indonesian government commitment to develop the quality of English language teaching can be seen from the attempting to design a good English language curriculum.   Communicative approach to English language teaching has been introduced in Indonesia EFL classroom since 1994 by the introduction of the 1994 Curriculum (Mustafha, 2001). In the year of 2013, the government had launched a new curriculum named the Kurikulum 2013. It is a literacy oriented curriculum. It involves genre-based approach to teaching writing and suggested to use this approach for teaching other macroskills such as listening, reading, and speaking (Emilia, 2005). In addition, the kurikulum 2013 also offers the Scientific Approach to be combined with the genre based approach to teach English. Still, grammar is considered as important aspect of language learning. It involves functional grammar which is focused more on the meaning than the rules of language.

4.      The practical application for teaching grammar using procedure text

In this section, in order to provide better understanding of the practical application of teaching grammar using genre-based approach in Indonesian Secondary Education of EFL, I will  design a lesson plan for teaching English for year 10 using genre-based approach as required by the Kurikulum 2013.

4.1.   Learners background, curriculum content and classroom setting

The following activities are suggested for student at senior high school in Indonesia. The target students are year 10, aged range at 16 to 17, and are at an intermediate level of English. According to Kurikulum 2013 for Senior High Schools, specifically year 10 student (Ministry of Education, Republic of Indonesia, 2003), the communicative competence is emphasized. The aim is to develop students who are able to communicate and interact in a dialog or monolog, spoken or written text fluently and accurately through various kinds of genre such as narrative, procedure, recount, report and news item.   The following designed lesson plan exemplifies the strategies, tasks and activities used to teaching grammar using genre-based approach

This lesson plan is designed for a 90 minute lesson. The students are at the level of intermediate. There are about 44 students in a row seatting arrangement. Every two students share one desk and one bench. There are whiteboard and teacher’s desks in front of the classroom. There is approximately 2 meters empty space between the first rows of students’ desk to the whiteboard which sticks on to the classroom’s wall firmly. This arrangement is the typical characteristics of a public school classroom in Indonesia.

4.2.   A procedure genre-based lesson to teaching grammar

This sample lesson plan uses procedure genre. The teacher, a female teacher at her early thirty, has chosen an authentic text taken from an internet website. It is not a text written specifically for language teaching purpose. This text was written to describe a procedure of papermaking in a pulp and paper company. The teacher uses the text as a tool to introduce the passive voice which is the grammar content of this lesson. The communicative aim of this lesson is describing a process or procedure of making something by using the passive voice.

Step 1

The teacher begins the class by asking student how to make a simple kite. At this stage, the teacher uses students’ background knowledge to introduce the simple spoken procedure text of making kite.  Students might answer to the teacher question using simple present tense that they have already learnt such as take two pieces of cane; bend the cane and tie it with thread; take large sheet of strong paper. In this stage, the teacher writes down these answers in the board under the heading of things you need and what to do. Then, the teacher repeats students’ sentences and presents the target language structure the passive voice by saying Yes. Two pieces of cane, thread and strong paper are required to make a kite. First, the cane is bent to desired shape, and then it is tied securely with thread. She also writes the sentences in the board. The teacher asks students to think of the different between the students’ sentences and her sentences. She then elicit the answer; the students’ sentences are used for giving instruction how to make a kite, while her sentences are used for describing a process of making kite. Therefore, they differ in the purpose.

Step 2

In this stage, the teacher moves to similar topic about making paper. She has chosen an authentic text taken from an internet website. Before handing out the text, the teacher tells the students that they are going to discuss the procedure of papermaking. The teacher asks the class about what they know about papermaking process. First, the teacher will ask student to think of and list vocabulary items related to the materials needed for papermaking, the methods and steps of papermaking. These are written on the board. Next, teacher uses this stage to feed in words from the text that might not have been mentioned by the students, e.g.  forestry, pulp, wood chips, debarking, chipping, recycling, log. The teacher asks students to guess the meaning of the words by providing the synonym or the meaning of the word in the right side.  Students work in pairs.

Step 3

The teacher asks the class to read the text silently for 5 minutes with a view to answering these questions: what materials are needed for papermaking? What to do next? The teacher asks students to check their answers in pairs before she checks in open class. Next, the teacher asks student further question about the texts such as How to begin the process of paper making; what is the pulp made from?

Step 4

The teacher asks the students to turn over the text and then writes two sentences on the board.

    1. Forest products companies specifically grow and harvest the trees used for papermaking like a crop.
    2. The trees used for paper making are specifically grown and harvested like a crop, by forest products companies.
    3. Trees used for paper making are specifically grown and harvested like a crop.

The teacher asks the class if they can remember which of these two sentences was used in the text. Students can check if they can not remember.  The teacher then asks student to describe the different in form between the two sentences. Based on the student answers, the teacher identifies sentence 1 as active construction and sentence 2 and 3 as passive. The teacher points out that in 1 the subject of the verb (forest products companies) is the agent, or actor and the object of the verb (trees used for papermaking). In sentence 2, the subject of the verbs (trees used for papermaking) is the thing which is affected by the action. The teacher explicitly explains the structure of the passive sentence: subject + auxiliary verb to + past participle. The teacher then asks the students to analyze the text again and decide why sentence 2 was considered appropriate in this context.  The teacher elicits the answer; because the tree used for making paper is the topic, or theme of the procedure of papermaking, not forest product companies. Sentence 3 is a passive construction where the agent is left out. The teacher asks the students to analyze the reason. The teacher elicits the answer; because in procedure text, the agent is commonly considered unimportant.

Step 5

The teacher asks the students to find other examples of passive constructions in the text, to underline them, and to discuss in pairs the rationale for the use of passive in each case. In checking this task in open class, the following points about the characteristics of passive construction are made:

      1. Moving the theme or topic to the beginning of the sentence.
      2. The use of “by + agent” if the agent is mentioned
      3. The absent of the agent when it is unimportant or not known

Step 6

The teacher asks the student to cover the text and, working in pairs, to try and reconstruct it from memory. They then compare their version with the original.

Step 7

The teacher divides student into small groups. She then gives each group a picture or diagram of the way to make something. Students discuss the picture or diagram in group and create their group procedure text based on the picture or diagram. Each group then presents their text in open class by writing it in a big paper and sticks it on the wall. Then the group presentation reads it aloud in front of the class. Teacher takes note of students’ common mistakes without interruption or correction in the process of activity.

Step 8

When all groups have finished presenting their text, the teacher then present some sentences which include students’ common mistake made in the activity and asks students to discuss if these sentences are right. The teacher then elicits the correct one.

Step 9

The teacher asks the class to pick the most interesting text of all texts written by all group. Together with the whole class, teacher revises the text and fixes any grammatical mistakes. In this stage, teacher can feed in other features of procedure text such as connector to do with sequence ( to begin with, first, then ) as the additional aim of the lesson’s language content.

Step 10

The teacher then asks students to write their own procedure text based on the topic of their own interest.

5.      Evaluation

In the first step, the teacher builds the students’ knowledge of the field by using the students’ background knowledge. The topic was introduced in context. It focus on the meaning and the function of language use in the social context, for example, the instructions text is used for telling someone what to do, procedure text is used to tell someone a process of doing something.

The lesson follows the stages of the curriculum cycle of the genre-based approach. It starts with building student knowledge of the field (step 1). It then continues to modeling the text (step 2). Then, it move to joint construction where students and teacher work together to create new texts (step 7). The lesson ends with independent construction when students work on their own to create a new text independently (step 10).

The grammar is taught integrally with other skills, in this case, mainly with writing skills.  There are quite a lot of negotiations involved in most of the steps such as when the teacher ask students to think of   the difference between passive and active construction. It encourages the students to speak expressing their ideas. Reading activity also includes when the teacher asks student to read the given text and checks their comprehension on the text by questioning (step 3).

The grammatical rules were elicited explicitly from the students’ answers. In this case, explicit exposure to grammatical rules is used to stimulate students’ awareness of the rules. In addition, the eliciting of the grammatical rules was mostly in context and beyond a sentence level.

Students work mostly in pairs and small group. It is a good strategy to give them chances to interact with each other. Interaction is one of the central aim in communicative activities. Working in pairs and small groups can also stimulate students’ active participation, specifically in speaking since it provides student with the feeling of security in case of making mistake.

The way the teacher correcting students’ grammatical mistakes is particularly good. She avoids on the spot and individual error correction. Instead she corrects the error as whole class error collectively at the end of the activity. This way, the students may not be personally discouraged because of the correction of error.

The teacher makes effective of the text. Appropriate time is spent for identifying and explaining features of the text and creating new text on similar topic. The activities are also varied from text analysis to dictogloss technique. For example, in step 6, where students are ask to reconstruct a text based on the information they get from reading a given text (visual dictation) is a dictogloss technique.

 6.      Conclusion

To sum up, the extent to which grammar should be taught in EFL classroom has always been controversial. However, grammar can not be separated from language. Teaching grammar in EFL classroom is currently considered benefit students in term of stimulating their awareness of the language features.

There are many ways of teaching grammar. Teaching grammar using genre based approach is one example. This way of teaching grammar is required in the Kurikulum 2013. Selecting appropriate text, teaching grammar in context and beyond sentence level, and arranging interesting text-based and communicative activities are strategies suggested to teaching grammar using genre based approach in Indonesian EFL classroom.  Furthermore, this way provides the possibility to integrate grammar teaching with other skill such as writing, reading, speaking and listening.

7.      References

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