I wrote this story to share my experience which I got when I was doing my teaching practicum class in SMA 1 Salatiga. I was there since I had to complete my study as a pre-service teacher education at Satya Wacana Christian University. I taught English for the first grade of senior high school with descriptive text as one of the material I had to teach to my students. Before I conducted the teaching practicum I had pass a micro teaching class – it is kind of teaching preparation class – which was English as an international language (EIL) orientation. Beside I also took some classes, included teaching method and material development class, and seminars about EIL.
Driven by my study background, I grew to be an EIL ideology English teacher who thinks that English is an international language and it must be affected by many international issues. One of the issues which bother me is the teaching methodology. I have an opinion that my students should not learn grammar or structure traditionally as it develops only the declarative knowledge of the students. I wanted to teach English to my students, not the science of English. So my goal is to make students able to use English in communication either in speaking, writing, or even reading and listening.
And then in one part of material I taught my students about compound adjective. I didn’t directly stated that I was going to teach them about compound adjective, but I paid attention to some examples of adjective phrases they used in describing people or animals in the previous activity. After the activity I wrote some sentences my students made on the board. These are the sentence I wrote on the white board ; She has blue eyes and It (my student’s dog) eats meet. I wrote them on the board and told my students that these were ordinary sentences people used to describe people or animal. In the next I asked them whether they could change the sentence into other pattern with the same meaning. One of my students (Raka, pseudo name) said one phrases; blue eyed.
I felt like Raka had known compound adjective before, and then I asked him how he could call that phrases to make sure whether he knew the term of compound adjective. He couldn’t answer my question. I thought he forgot the term compound adjective and I just kept going on teaching. I put the phrases of blue eyed into a sentence She is a blue eyed and wrote it exactly under the sentence She has blue eyes. After that I asked my students the sane question for the second sentence, but nobody answer my question. I looked at my students’ face expression; some of them were trying to make some phrases though I didn’t get what the phrases were.
I finally decided to write It is an meat-eating dog exactly under the sentence It eats meat. I kept questioning my students about the differences between the two compound adjective phrases without telling them that these were compound adjective. Another student, Muti (pseudo name), told me that the difference was at the –ing and –ed suffix. To make sure my students understand this language function I asked some of them, especially who sat at the back rows and who didn’t really actively participated in answering my questions, to make any examples which were similar to the sentences on the board. They made these following phrases:
- black haired
- open minded
- well prepared
I paid attention to the phrase well prepared. I loved that phrases, since it showed that my student made a different phrase compare to the example: blue eyed which is a mixture of an adjective and a noun, but well prepared is a mixture of adjective and adjective. Most of my student participated actively by giving many examples of compound adjective.
Here I got a point that my students had their own procedural knowledge about compound adjective since they were able to make and put it into right sentences. I thought it was good for them to learn compound adjective or any other language function unconsciously. After I thought most of my student made their own phrase or sentence with a compound adjective, I told them that they had just made a compound adjective. Some of them looked surprise as they thought they had learned compound adjective before, but they didn’t understand this.
At the end of the lesson I asked them whether any question about the lesson. They were quite for a while; some of them asked me to give more examples. And at the last of the class one of my students, Azam (pseudo name), asked me whether there’s a “formula” to make a compound adjective.
I was surprised by this question. I thought he was one of my students who understood the lesson very well, why did he need any “formula” to make something he had understood? I didn’t really like giving my students such a traditional grammar lesson where I had to explain the structure of a sentence by telling my students which one was the verb or the noun. I wanted my students learned it unconsciously to develop their procedural knowledge since my goal is to make them able to use English, not understand the science of English. Moreover, based on my experience, students, who are good at the grammar declarative knowledge, is not that good at the procedural one or at least not creative in making sentences.
However, I still told my students about the “formula” of compound adjective with further explanation that language is not math. It may have such kind of structure, but it doesn’t mean that we have to follow the rules strictly. And told him about the phrases well cooked and blue eyed his friends made before. Azam’s questions lead me to explain the passive and active meaning of compound adjective.
I thought about many reasons why Azam asked for the “formula” of compound adjective. It brought a lot of question to my mind:
1. Are my students accustomed to learn English with grammar translation method?
2. How long do they learn English with grammar traditional teaching?
3. Why do they always look for a firm “formula” in making any phrases or sentences?
I’m know still in process of researching this case
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