Reducing Students’ Use of Mother Tongue

by Creating Behavior Norms.

Ihsan Ibadurrahman

Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia

Learning English as a second language can be facilitated through a lot of

exposure to the language in a relaxed setting (Krashen, 1984). This means that

the class should only be conducted in English and that the use of mother tongue

should be diminished. To ensure that students speak English at all times,

teacher can negotiate norms of behavior with the students. The power of

negotiation and shared responsibility that the norms of behavior have will

ensure that the students abide by the rules they themselves created (Harmer,

2007). This classroom action research aims at finding out if this strategy works

on reducing students’ use of mother tongue. 25 senior high students were

involved, and a video recorder and two tape recorders were used to collect the

data and validate the findings based on observations. This study concludes that

this strategy is indeed effective at minimizing mother tongue use.

Keywords: mother tongue, behavior norms, learning English as second

language.

1 Background

The mastery of English as a second language is a long, cumbersome process.

With 12 years of English language learning, Indonesian students would still

often find it difficult to express themselves even at the level of sentence-

formation. Most of these learners complain of the lack of vocabulary, or

grammatical knowledge. This is not a surprising fact at all since the amount of

language input that the students acquire during those 12 years of learning is less

than the input that an infant acquires in natural settings (Thornburry, 2002: 20).

Moreover, the language input that Indonesian students get is cut down by the

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use of mother tongue in the classroom. To ensure that learning English is

facilitated, it is important that students are exposed to the language as much as

possible in a relaxed setting (Krashen, 1984). Armed with this knowledge, it is

then the teacher’s job to look for ways in which the class is conducted in

English and that no mother tongue is allowed while keeping that relaxed

classroom atmosphere intact.

In their attempts to expose students to the language in the classroom,

teachers may create an English environment where they should use English

most of the time to the extent of “anglicizing their students’ name too”

(Harmer, 1998: 130). However, even with this attempt, students might still use

their own language. To anticipate this problem, norms of behavior can be

conducted by a joint negotiation at the beginning of the course (Harmer 2007:

155). These norms of behavior should state what is acceptable and what is not,

which includes the use of mother tongue in the classroom and its consequences

of so-doing.

This research will investigate the problem that is formulated in the following

question:

a. How does the strategy help reduce the use of students’ mother tongue in the

classroom?

In the light of the above formulation of problem, this study aims at:

a. Finding out if the strategy helps reduce the use of students’ mother tongue in the

classroom.

This study was conducted at a senior high school in Bandung which involved second

grade 25 senior high students. Kemis and McTaggard’s action research procedure was

selected. To validate the findings, two audio recordings and one video recording were

used as the research instrument. Since classroom action research is, by its nature,

described as a qualitative study (Susilo, Chotimah, Dwita Sari 2008), a qualitative

research method was used to descriptively capture on the images of the class in two

lessons.

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Since the researcher himself is the teacher who taught the class where the research

was conducted, self-reflection was used, teaching journals were investigated to explain

classroom phenomena related to the findings of this research.

2 Theoretical Issues

In their endeavor to language learning, students may experience potentially humiliating

moments when they make mistakes. This error is sometimes caused by the interference of

the native language. Despite the fact that the native may actually facilitate the target

language such as rules governing, the interference effect can cause more problems than

solutions – a case of the negative outweighs the positive, as stated by Brown that:

The native language of learners exerts a strong influence on the

acquisition of the target language system. While that native system will

exercise both facilitating and interfering effects on the production and

comprehension of the new language, the interfering effects are likely to

be the most salient (2001: 66).

In dealing with this undesirable effect, he suggests that students should think

directly in the target language instead of “resorting to translation”. This would help if the

students produce the target language too instead of using the native language.

In the light of the above principle, we can conclude that English should be used at

all times in the classroom, even at the level of language conception just before the

language production. In fact, successful language learners are those that can

communicate in English as the target language (Davies & Pearse, 2000). Thus to help

students become successful language learners, teachers will have to give opportunities for

students to communicate with each other in English in a meaningful way. Fortunately,

most English classrooms nowadays are equipped with sound communicative language

teaching methodology that will enable students to develop their communicative skills that

they will closely encounter outside the classroom when they speak with native speakers

of English. However, in real spontaneous conversations we retrieve a stored chunk of

language that is instantly available as we need it and this language will not be available

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unless we acquire it (Krashen 1984). He further suggested that second language

acquisition may occur if learners are exposed to a large amount of comprehensible input.

This confirms the implication that learners have to get as much exposure to English as

possible so that they will be able to engage effectively in spontaneous conversations.

We can now arrive at the conclusions that the use of mother tongue should be

diminished due to its interfering effects and students should be exposed a lot to English

that they can understand, what would the teaching implications be then?

The most obvious answer is that English as the target language should be used at

all times so that students are exposed to it. To ensure that students use English all the

time, teachers may create class behavior norms where certain norms of behavior are

jointly negotiated with the students. Because the norms are discussed and shared by the

class, the students themselves will have the responsibility to maintain their self-made

policy and by so doing it will give enormous benefits to language learning (Harmer 2007,

155-156).

Harmer further suggested three important things to bear in mind when creating

these behavior norms:

1. Norms need to be explicitly discussed: It will be of vital

importance that students know the reasons why the norms are

there in the first place. In this case, students need to know why

speaking English at all the time in the class is beneficial.

2. Norms can be jointly negotiated: If these rules are negotiated,

the outcome would produce a much more considerable power

than if it comes only from the teacher.

3. Norms need to be reviewed and revisited: Students may forget

or slip outside of the norms they created; it will be the teachers’

job to review those rules.

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Breen and Littlejohn confirmed Harmer’s view that this strategy helps student

become responsible for their own learning, they also stated that:

Any classroom, in its social composition, is a microcosm of the wider

society in which it is located. For it to function, a classroom community

realizes its own values and priorities through either implicitly or

explicitly accepted procedures or routines … The more explicitly ways

of working are agreed, the more likely a collaborative approach to

achieving shared goals can be fostered. (2000: 20)

From the view above it is clear that norms of behavior provide numerous benefits

to the class, one of which is functioning the classroom as a social composition known as

classroom community which otherwise would not exist.

3 Findings and Discussions

There were two meetings upon which this research was conducted. The first was when

the idea of behavior norms was not introduced. In other words, students were free to

speak in their own language. The second meeting was when the class had to create norms

of behavior that included speaking English all the time as part of a code of conduct.

Based on teacher’s self-reflection throughout the entire first meeting, students

kept using their mother tongue as if they hadn’t known they were in an English class.

This condition did not improve although the teacher attempted to reinforce students to

use English by teacher’s use of target language. Students were blissfully unaware of the

importance of speaking English, students had no idea that using mother tongue would

only hinder English learning, of all 25 students who attended the class, 16 of them used

Indonesian (64%) in long phrases.

In the second meeting, however, the researcher noticed some improvement on the

use of target language. Norms of behavior were explained and negotiated. It was at this

stage that students began to realize the importance of using English and stop using the

native language. With the norms being conducted, there would now be consequences to

those who step outside of those norms – that is they would have to tell their personal

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story to everyone in the class which will also be recorded and published on facebook for

the whole world to see. Students tried their best to speak in full English although was

produced in broken English. Among 25 who were present that day, only 8 students used

Indonesian (32%). Even more fortunate was the fact that these 8 students produced very

short Indonesian phrases, some were only a word as compared to the first meeting.

To validate the findings based on my observation, video and audio recordings

were used and below are the data taken in the first and second meeting; it described the

use of mother tongue during those two meetings.

Table 1

First meeting.

Name L1 words Name L1 words

S1

Apa kikituan, pasti facebook rea,

tidak dapat kursi, ujung sana tuh,

tadi mah irwansyah.

S10 Ketauan, selamat

S2

Pulau, ya seriusan, why apa, ga

ama pilot ma pina aja

mengkhayal, tapi dibalikin ini

mah.

S11

Yu ah kita nonton aja nanti,

bukan a lot of money itu mah

nge-date, gak.

S3 Bau bau, sehati. S12Ngapain, harus aku yang

mulainya.

S4 Kenapa Iffa diam aja S13Nama orang, atuh da kalian ga

maju-maju, imajinasi, sama

S5 Perancis S14 Abis ini, pasti, udah.

S6

Siapa, orang terkenal siapa,

boleh ngomong, makan-makan

aduh, biasa aja, emang ngapain,

tiga

S15Mr. Ihsan udah, kalow udah

gmana?

S7

Satu, dua, tiga.

S16 Kirain teh mau beli Cigar.

S8

S9

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Table 2

Second meeting.

Name L2 words

S2 Pindah ke sana

S17 Monyong, oh iya

S10 Oh jadi

S16 Kena muka

S18 Tadi

S20 Apa ya

S21 Bener tuh, tingali

S22 haram

Based on the findings described above, we can arrive at the conclusion that norms

of behavior did facilitate students to a lot of English exposure because they would keep

using English all the time and because this norms were negotiated, students have the

responsibility to maintain these norms as stated by Harmer (2007: 156).

From the observation, the class also began to function socially because everyone

had a share on the norms and they work co-operatively to maintain those norms. Again,

this is in line with the theory of classroom decision proposed by Breen and Littlejohn

(2000: 20).

4 Conclusion

It has been suggested that in order for students to become a successful language learners

they will need plenty of exposure to the language and that native language should be

diminished due to its interfering effects on the target language. This study seeks to find

out if establishing behavior norms help in reducing students’ use of mother tongue

thereby increasing potentials for English use. The study reveals that the strategy worked

not only to reduce the use of mother tongue but also help the class function as a social

composition.

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References

Breen, P. Michael., and Littljohn Andrew. (2000). Classroom Deicision-Making.

Cambridge: Cambridge

Brown, H.Douglas. (2001). Teaching by Principles (Second Ed.).

New York: Pearson Education

Davies, P., and Pearse, E. (2000). Success in English Teaching. Oxford: Oxford

Herawati, S., Chotimah, H., and Sari, Y. Dwita. (2008). Penelitian Tindakan Kelas.

Malang: Bayumedia Publishing..

Harmer, J. (1998). How to Teach English. Essex: Pearson Education Limited.

Harmer, J. (2007). The Practice of English Language Teaching (Fourth Ed.). Essex:

Pearson Education Limited.

Krashen, S. (1984). The Input Hypothesis. Longman.

Thornburry, S. (2002). How to Teach Vocabulary. Essex: Pearson Education Limited.

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