Students’ Utterances in English Foreign Language Classes: A Case Study of Four Elementary Schools in Jakarta

Abstract

In foreign language classes, including English class, both teacher’s and students’ utterances play important role in classroom activity because they guide the activities and interactions during the lesson. Thus, by understanding the students’ utterance that occurred during the lesson, teacher will be able to conduct the lesson more effectively since they know how well the students’ understanding. The aim of this research is to acknowledge the relationship between the lesson given by the teacher and students utterances in the classroom. This research used quantitative methods to get the result related to its objective. The subjects of this research were the English language teachers and his/her students in four elementary schools in Jakarta. In collecting the data, this research used observation table to be filled in the class during teaching-learning activity in English Foreign Language class. Previous study by Davies (2011) about “Increasing students' L2 usage: An Analysis of Teacher Talk Time and Student Talk Time” was used a reference to make the observation scheme. The finding of this research showed that students’ utterance in the form of display responses is the highest type or most common utterance that was used in the class.