Research in the primary English Classroom

    Educational research seeks to solve a problem. Research involves collecting new data from primary or first-hand sources or using existing data for new purposes. Research is based on observable experience or empirical evidence. Research demands accurate observations and descriptions. Basic English classes are English classes designed for young learners who are just starting to learn English from basic lessons.

    But teaching English in elementary schools is a new trend, even in Indonesia itself for elementary schools that are not taught English. In this case, Lando suggested that it is necessary to consider the implementation of teaching English since the initial education level, namely in elementary school, to achieve better results. in the English language skills of students at the higher education level. Teaching English in primary schools should be seen as an innovative way to improve English teaching in general (Liando, 2000).

 However, in its implementation, there are several obstacles. Problems arise when teacher recruitment is inadequate in terms of quality. Teachers have minimal skills in teaching English, so the lessons become uninteresting, students become bored and eventually become far from the goal. In fact, teaching English requires specific methods at each level. In fact, there are pros and cons to teaching and learning English in primary schools. This can give better results in the long run, but it must be taken into account that the syllabus must be well designed, teaching materials are well prepared, and teachers are well trained. Otherwise, teaching English at this level will only derail its goals (Alwasilah, 2000; Mustafa, 2008). 

    All of them perceived the use of English in classroom interaction as good and they support it. They regarded the practice of using English in classroom interactions as being useful in order to improve student's English ability. Based on the class observation, the teaching and learning activities at this school can be drawn as follows:

1. All the teachers used English in communication with the students, both inside and outside the class, in order to provoke students' English ability. To make it more understandable for students, they used English and Indonesian interchangeably. 
2. Teachers introduced some English vocabulary to develop listening and speaking skills, through singing songs and acting out poems. Observation shows that the teachers do such activity every day during the first term so that students are more familiar with English, particularly for listening comprehension. This repetition of the same routines makes students soon acquire the language involved and can begin to use it themselves to organize activities or games. This is proved by the explanation of parents. They described how their children in the First term acquired some simple English with their brothers/friends. 
3. Teachers made use of various exposures and techniques in explaining some topics. Classroom Observation showed how in the English lesson teacher explained the names of the animals through coloring the picture of some animals and writing the names and their colour. Then, students one by one was asked to mention the names and the color of the animals. Thus, they learn writing, naming animals, and coloring at the same time. 
4. Brown (2011) suggests that children at the beginning levels have "short attention spans" or immediate interest. This comes up only when a teacher presents the lesson that to them is boring, useless, or too difficult. Therefore, the teacher's job is to make them interesting, lively, and fun so that students would be involved actively (Paul, 2003). The teachers at this school are aware of this problem, and they use English material as their variety in order to engage students in learning English. 
5. The contents of subject matters were discussed in LI (Indonesian) to facilitate students' better understandings. The teachers made use of Indonesian teaching dealing with the content of subject matters. When teachers try to teach new concepts in English to the students who have not already learned the concepts in LI, instruction in the first language can give some benefits to the second one. When students do not have a not sufficient oral ability yet in L2, it is a good idea for the teachers not to teach a new concept in L2 until it has been taught in LI. Once it has been taught in LI, it may be quickly transferred to L2 (Cantony-Harvey, 2002; Nunan, 1995). 
6. In reading, the teacher translates sentence by sentence to help students understand the content. Actually, this technique makes the students understand the story better. 
7. Students had difficulty learning some abstract concepts. From this point of view, teachers play very important roles because students at this level have little or no prior knowledge of English and their learning success might, to some extent, depend on teachers' creativity. Teaching children a foreign language successfully requires specific skills that differ from that of teaching adults. In this case, when students have difficulties in learning the concept of “the Months", it is wise for the teachers to take into account the level of the students' knowledge. This is related to Krashen's theory mentioned before that teachers should ensure a close match between the level of delivery and the understanding level. Since the students had not known this term yet in LI, they found it more difficult in L2. 
8. Teachers made use of various exposures and techniques in explaining some topics. As Brown (2011) suggests, a variety of techniques are important because of limited language capacity. Students learned the Shapes, names of the animals by coloring them and writing their names. They developed their vocabulary through Total Physical Response. Then, students learned "Introducing" through Role Playing. The teacher-guided students in greeting and asking and answering questions about name and address. In line with this, Ellis (1988) claims that Asher's Total Physical Response and Terrel's Natural Method are likely to succeed because they can foster language acquisition. 
9. Students had difficulty in writing and reading English words. For the first grade students, understand some English vocabulary and can write the meaning in Indonesian, but they still have difficulty in writing and reading it in English. They find it difficult to transfer the spoken to the written words. It is because of the differences between the letter and the sound in English. In Indonesian, every single word is pronounced the same as its spelling, while in English is not. Furthermore, according to Krashen and Terrel, a natural approach is required in language teaching. Its main tenets are as follows: comprehension of language should precede production (listening should precede speaking); speaking and then writing will emerge when the language learner is ready and should not be forced (Krashen & Terrel in Baker, 2000; Ioannou-Georgiou & Pavlou. 2003). It is wise for the English teachers at Elementary Education to consider this psychological aspect that for the beginner the essential thing is "the association between the sound and the meaning", rather than "the association between the sound and the orthography". This present study revealed some findings of the teachers that not all of the teachers had a good proficiency in teaching English, like fluency and accuracy

    As a good teacher, we have to provide the students with a good basic in their early stage of learning English. Providing a misconception about English, e.g. pronunciation, will make the students grasp something wrongly that they may imitate continuously. In this case, it will be better to "unlearn” than to "undo". It also revealed that indicated that not all of the teachers had teachers training background. Refer to the teachers' educational background as mentioned above, there is a phenomenon that seems to be different from that in common sense: "the teachers of nonteacher training background will find themselves difficult in conducting the teaching and learning process".