Fathur Rizqi Arifiani

8156112035
LTBI-B1
Language Planning
IMPLEMENTATION ENGLISH ACQUISITION PLANNING
IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL IN MEDAN
A. Introduction
Acquisition planning refers to members of the community actively planning language
revival programs to maintain or reclaim a language. In general terms, this is where decisions
about the types of programs suitable for teaching the language to the community will be
determined, such as whether it is possible to implement a school-based language revival
program. Such programs will need to be tailored to the unique and individual needs of each
language situation, as well as to the linguistic backgrounds of the students
English is taught as a foreign language from the fourth grade of primary school
through university. The internationalization of higher education has led to a noticeable
increase in the number of courses and degrees taught through the medium of English,
especially in school. Thus, there is a need to curricula as part of the strategy to planning the
acquisition of a language especially English as a subject matter in school. The reason is
because the nation needs to be active players in the knowledge economy and thus there is also
the need to be able to access and contribute to the latest advances in the field of science and
technology.Therefore, there is a great evidence of the importance ofenglish acquisition
planning.
The implication is the government as an institution to set out the planning within the
curriculum must be clear and innovative, then the teaching strategies in learning process to
struggling students. According to implementation of teaching English in Denpasar elementary
school were affected by globalization and tendency of economy, tour image of Bali and
government power, and prestige of the schools (Sukamerta, 2011). Therefore, every
institution has different strategies in implementing English as an acquisition planning.
Elementary school is one of instution that has been implemented English learning. In this
case, it describes how the implementation of English acquisition planning in

MIS Al

Kautsar. MIS Al Kautsar is choosen because this is elementary school in Medan, which is
supervised by the district office of the Ministry of Religious Affairs, which is planned to be
integrated Islamic school. Thus, this study is aimed to see how the implementation of English
acquisition planning in MIS Al Kautsar.

B. Method
The source of the data of this research was taken from one of elementary schools in
Medan. The school which is taken as sample for this research is MIS Al Kautsar with 13
classes from first grade until sixth grade. The policies which can be analyzed are curriculum
policy, personnel policy, methodology and material policy, community policy, and evaluation
policy.
C. Result and Discussion
1. Teaching English in Elementary School
Elementary school is the first stage in basic education level that has individual and
social characteristic, at age 7 years old to 12 years old that involve in teaching learning
process. Here, students learn some skill in order to develop their ability and prepare for the
next education stage in the basic education level.
The curriculum in elementary school is arranged to reach national educations
purposes. The important things in curriculum arrangement is that curriculum must be
appropriate with the students grow, circumstance of environment and also develop of
technology. Elementary school curriculum consists of national curriculum and local content
curriculum. National curriculum is curriculum that arranged by education department. The
content of curriculum has to learn by students in Indonesia and the Indonesians school
students in abroad.
In curriculum there are standard competence and basic competence. It is use to
difference the level of learning achievement. One of the standard competences of English in
Fifth grade in Elementary school is understand the simple instruction with action in school
context. It means that students of elementary school were expected able to communicate with
simple instruction by using English in the school context. Every standard competence has
basics competence deal with the lesson that will learn.
According Educational Unit Curriculum, English is a local content subject for
elementary school and its applied in grade four until grade six. But in fact, MIS Al-Kautsar
Medan applied this lesson start from grade 1 until grade six. From the interviewing of the
Supervisor in that school, (Drs. H. Nazaruddin, S.Ag) he said that learning English in
elementary school is not operational yet, still need to be studied further, so that there is
uniformity with other elementary school. There was should be monitoring and evaluation
from elementary schools supervision. A policy should not be left to elementary school and it

is not effective and efficient. Elementary education units did not know how to implement this
policy. It make contrary with the government regulation.
He also said that, Based on quality assurance in elementary school, learning English
in elementary school starting from the fourth grade, but many elementary school starting
from first grade and in terms of teachers, infrastructure and teaching methods are contrary
with the philosophy of the KTSP and local content subject in elementary school. In this case,
the headmaster in MIS Al-Kautsar has some reason why he set this lesson has to learn start
from grade 1 until grade six. The first, the widespread assumption that the younger child
learn a new language better the result will be, the second, the fact that economic globalization
has pushed the demand of English in form of workforce who speak English to meet the need
of the international economic force. And the last, parents enthusiasm for their children to
learn English early in order to have social and economical benefit in the national context.
In Elementary school, students were taught about the basic of English. They will
learn about the simple subject such as things around them, the name of fruit, sport, game and
giving instruction, etc. In other word, they will learn a lot about vocabulary.
Vocabulary learning in Indonesia considered as one of base material taught to the
students before they learn other material in English domain. The recently developing,
vocabulary is taught integrally with other skills and elements of language as like: listening,
speaking, reading and structure. But teaching vocabulary in Indonesia, especially in
elementary school is mostly taught in conventional way.
The way to present the vocabulary is really influence the students achievement in
learning vocabulary. Unfortunately, many teachers do not understand how the good way to
deliver the material is. It is also to be reason why students ability in mastering English is still
less, although they have learnt it since in early age.
2. Teaching English in Elementary School
As stated before, MIS Al-Kautsar Medan applied English lesson as a local content
subject and it start from grade one until grade six. There were 13 classes consist of 20-30
students in one class. It makes the situation in the class not too crowded and the teacher can
master the class well. The number of teacher in that school only one teacher. Mrs. Husnah as
the teacher taught the students in 26 hours at once week. The background of the teacher was
graduated in English education department and already as GTY (Guru Tetap Yayasan). It is
suitable in government regulation that teachers must have graduated from education.

Although the teacher was graduated in English education department, but her
knowledge about teaching technique English is not enough. As a result, she is unable to
manage the learning of English in the classroom becomes communicative. We can imagine
when English teacher who was not graduated in English department, they only have the
ability to speak English, but lacking in knowledge of pedagogy and classroom management.
They are not provided insight into child psychology, learning theory and teaching foreign
languages to children and also lack of understanding of language development and child
psychology which very different from adults.
Based on the observation in MIS Al-Kautsar Medan, Mrs. Husnah as the teacher
taught English lesson in grade 5 for elementary students. She taught about short descriptive
paragraph about places from English practice textbook published by Yudhistira. In this case,
when the researchers saw in her syllabus, the material that should be taught about expression
in agree and disagreement. Its mean that the material that she taught didnt suitable in
syllabus. According to her, the syllabus didnt match with textbook, it make the teacher
confused to determine the material, because of that the teachers just follow the material in the
textbook. The method or technique that the teacher used didnt varieties. Such as, when she
taught about short descriptive paragraph about places for grade 5, she ask to the students to
read the text, translate into bahasa, and answer the questions below. Its make the situation in
the class did not communicative. She didnt use some media or technique to make her
students interest to learn. Because of that, some of students tend to talk more rather than to
finish their assignment. According to her, when she taught in first and second grade, she tend
to use the singing method to make the students interest to learn. She told that in grade one
and grade two some of student are unable to read and write in Bahasa. Because of that the
teacher used the singing method, such as sing a song about number (one, two three, etc),
thing in the classroom, the name of fruit, etc.
Before teaching, the teacher read the syllabus of the Ministry of Education. There is
no provision for using a particular method, but she uses the communicative method. She also
used mixed methods, so that she can deliver learning materials and students can understand.
She hopes that there are provisions on the method used specifically for the beginner learners.
She expects that there are associations for primary school English teachers, so they can
exchange information or knowledge about the development of English language teaching in
the future.

But, unfortunately that school does not has the educational facilities such as visual
aids, language laboratories, and other book as references. The process of teaching and
learning English runs by using only the textbooks from Yudhistira, and also the teacher
required to bring the dictionary. Because of that, the teacher expects that the headmaster can
provide the educational facilities to create the interesting and comfortable in process of
teaching and learning English.
The statement above shows the importance of learning English to be given in
elementary school as local content subjects. The main goal of learning English in Elementary
School is to provide early knowledge before they continue their education to a higher level
and preparing the students to compete in the global era. But in fact, there was obstacle to
applied it, such as English language learning policy was not followed by providing learning
facilities and infrastructure. Without facilities and infrastructure from government it was
difficult run well. Such as, unavailability handbook both for teachers and children, besides
props (visualaids) wall chard, flash cards, text songs / chants and so forth.

D. Conclusion

Teaching and learning English didnt have same perception for applying it. In MIS AlKautsar Medan was applied English lesson start from grade one until grade six. In this case,
this school didnt follow the instruction from Educational Unit Curriculum (KTSP) that set
teaching and learning English applied from grade four until grade six. And also the syllabus
from government didnt match with the textbook in that school. That is way, the teacher
didnt follow the instruction from the syllabus, and she tends to follow the instruction from
the text book.
Beside that, the teachers knowledge about using media, technique or approach for
English lesson is not enough. She tends to use the conventional method when she taught her
student. Because of that, the situation in the class didnt communicative. Some of students
tend to talk more when the teacher explained the material. It is happen because, the teacher
didnt use the appropriate technique or media to make her students interest to learn.
In addition, that school does not have the educational facilities such as visual aids,
language laboratories, and other book as references. The process of teaching and learning
English runs by using only the textbooks from Yudhistira, and also the teacher required to
bring the dictionary. Because of that, the teacher expects that the headmaster can provide the

educational facilities to create the interesting and comfortable in process of teaching and
learning English.

REFERENCES
Ferguson, G. 2006. Language Planning and Education. Edinburgh : Edinburgh University
Press.
Hinkel, E. 2005. Handbook of Research in Second Language Teaching and Learning. New
Jersey : Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Lauder,A. 2008.

The Status And Function Of English In Indonesia: A

Review Of Key Factors. Makara, Sosial Humaniora, 12( 1), 9-20.

Kaplan,R.B and Baldauf, R.B. 1997. Language Planning From Practice to Theory. Bristol :
Mulltilingual Matter Ltd.
Sukamerta, I.M. 2011. Implementasi Kebijakan Pembelajaran Bahasa Inggris Pada Sekolah
Dasar Di Kota Denpasar. In Academic Year 2011/2012 : Universitas Udayana.
Riswanto, et.al. 2014. The Effect of Using KWL (Know, Want, Learned) Strategy on EFL
Students Reading Comprehension Achievement. International Journal of Humanities
and Social Science, 4, No 7( (I) 225-234.