CHAPTER II: THE STUDY ON USING COMMUNICATIVE
2.6.5. Difficulties the teachers encounter when conducting
To have a deep look to the teaching process, the research also tries to discover the difficulties teachers encounter in using communicative activities to teach speaking skills to elementary students at Pasal English center.
The finding showed that students seem to be blamed for having poor ability of English (70%). That is true to some extent, however, teachers also have responsibility to improve this problem. Students need the help from their teachers who cooperate with them to fill up missing knowledge.
Additionally, many teachers expressed their impatience to students’
personal characteristics in speaking lessons (60%). Nevertheless, this is a natural reaction of students in acquisition. Young learners sometimes have the challenge of speaking before large groups. Then there comes the feeling of nervous and anxious. Duty of the teachers is to apply some appropriate ways to help them overcome anxiety and join in the lesson.
Class size was the main problem of 40% of teachers at Pasal center.
As discovered from the observation, a class at Pasal often contains 20 to 30 students. The teachers, therefore, thought that there is no chance of getting
so many students to learn or sometimes their students make too much noise.
Moreover, sometimes they did not have enough classroom so they had to hire some houses to teach, the size of each room in the house sometimes were too small for all students. However, it gives teachers the opportunity to show their ability of managing their class. This problem requires teachers more effort and time to carefully plan their lessons and its activities. In the lesson plan teachers need to identify activities in which all students can participate in.
A considerable number of teachers (30%) have trouble with the limitation of in-class time. This requires teachers to be careful in adapting appropriate and effective communicative activities for their classes. With most speaking activities, time limitation should be given. Normally, ten minutes is the maximum for most activities. Students can also start with a very small activity and then others that involve more of a dialogue and interaction based on authentic topics.
As for 30% of informants, their difficulty also derived from the lack ofteaching facilities and teaching aids. The main reason was that they had to hire some others houses which were not equipped enough projectors or boards for a speaking class. Furthermore, visual aids are useful for proving, explaining, or holding interest. Visual aids enable students to develop their imagination. Pictures are not the only visual aids available. There are many other kinds such as models, maps, mock-up, objects among the many kinds of visual aids available. In order to make their speaking lesson more vivid and attract their students some handmade aids can be used.
Briefly, with the help of teaching aids students can develop thinking skill such as forming an opinion, finding similarities or differences and using metaphors. Teaching aids are also flexible and easily adaptable to different
levels and teaching aims and they help creative expression, personalization and originality in speaking. Teachers, therefore, need to make full use of available aids as well as be aware of the importance of the use of teaching aids in conducting communicative activities in their speaking lessons.
2.6.6. Most effective communicative activities for elementary students at Pasal English center
Elementary students face a lot of difficulties with their listening comprehension and speaking skills, hence, the activities that appropriate for them have to ensure that easy to understand, to act and motivate them at the same time. Besides, from the results of survey questionnaire and class observation, games and role-play.Discussion is favorite activity of both teachers and students but it is hard for elementary students who have poor ability of English to do this effectively and easily.
There are a lot of advantages of using games in the class. The first advantage is the games arelearner centered. They promote communicative competence, create a meaningful context for language use thatincrease students’ learning motivation. Games are fun so they help students to reduce learning anxiety, encourage creative and construct a cooperative learning environment tofoster participatory attitudes of the students.
In term of role-play, it is widely agreed that learning takes place when activities are engaging and memorable. They are fun and motivating.
Moreover, quiet students get the chance to express themselves in a more forthright way. The world of the classroom is broadened to include the outside world, thus offering a much wider range of language opportunities. In addition to these reasons, students can have safe environment to practice real situations.
CHAPTER III: SOME SUGGESTIONS IN RESOLVING DIFFICULTIES THE ENCOUTERED BY THE TEACHERS AND
STUDENTS WHEN CONDUCTING COMMUNICATIVE ACTIVITIES