Bilingual Education in Indonesia: Between Idealism and The Reality
Bilingual Education in Indonesia: Between Idealism and The Reality
Bilingual Education in Indonesia: Between Idealism and The Reality
php/Script
P-ISSN: 2477-1880; E-ISSN: 2502-6623
April 2019, Vol. 4 No. 1
Dwi Jayanti
UIN Syarif Hidayatullah Jakarta
[email protected]
Anton Sujarwo
UIN Syarif Hidayatullah Jakarta
[email protected]
Abstract
Today English plays an important role in the development of education. In response to
advances and develops the education in this globalization era, English bridges
communication among people around the world. The ability to communicate in English
becomes crucial. The development in education as an impact of globalization significantly
influence the English teaching and learning concept. Bilingual education becomes necessary,
it can stimulate the cognitive ability especially on cognitive function, it can also motivate the
bilingual program. Education as a conscious effort to build and develop the quality of human
resources and one popular education system promote bilingual education becomes a choice
by parents. Using bilingual education become popular and be needed. Indonesian educational
policies see this phenomenon as a new modern solution to be practiced in Indonesia's
education system for many years. The purpose of writing this library research article paper is
to elaborate and give understanding about bilingual education in Indonesia for certain time.
The article start with the differences between bilingual and bilingualism, the relation of the
bilingual process with executive function, the practice of bilingual education in Indonesia
compared by the national standardized school, the challenges and solutions concerning the
policy and practices in language teaching and learning focused on bilingual education in
Indonesia. The present article employ a descriptive qualitative approach from reputable
references which is relevant to the topics.
INTRODUCTION
The growth in science and technology as an impact of globalization greatly influence
the concept of English teaching and learning process. One of the most popular methods
nowadays is using bilingual education. Indonesia as one of developing country makes an
effort to face the global competition in which English considered as one of the important
factors by increasing the quality of education through implementing bilingual program.
In some countries, this program become crucial to implemented as well as in
Indonesia. However, in reality the implementation of bilingual program in Indonesia seems to
be hard where there are many problems arise during the program. One of them is that the
government of Indonesia should prepare professional bilingual teachers, also the programs
needs a lot of money to implemented. Moreover, the bilingual class and the students are
exclusively treated in terms of school facilities, academic issues, supporting the program like
sister school compared to regular class students or national standardized school. The
implementation of international standard school in Indonesia is very challenging.
For these reasons, this research paper discusses how far the effectiveness of bilingual
education implemented in Indonesia as well as the concept of bilingualism, the influenced
bilingualism on executive function, the practice of bilingual education in Indonesia and how
far the challenges and solutions concerning the policy and practises in language teaching and
learning in the field.
Furthermore, this reseach paper is intended to give picture of some factors influencing
the failure of bilingual programs in Indonesia as it is indicated that the goverment of
Indonesia only apply the bilingual program for national standard schools for six years
because of many problems and obstacles in the implementation.
Through this research paper as well, the government should aware that the degrees of
students competencies in Indonesia are such heterogeneous so that generalizing the bilingual
program for most of national standard school with different facilities in Indonesia is not
effective.
Bilingualism
Discussing bilingualism, according to Walner (2016), bilingualism is the ability to
communicate fluently in a language other than your native language. Bilingualism is complex
and multi-dimension phenomena. The process of bilingualism involves several factors that
make the bilingual experience deeply heterogeneous and potentially alter its consequences
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Script Journal: Journal of Linguistic and English Teaching
P-ISSN: 2477-1880; E-ISSN: 2502-6623
April 2019, Vol. 4 No. 1
(Bialystok, 2008). The definition of bilingualism does not come with the same ideas, but it
can be assessed along a continuum of the level of skill development and the frequency of use
of the language. It is related to social, psychological, and linguistic phenomena and needs to
be understood from a multidimensional aspect.
Following these facts, There are many different interpretations of the definition of
bilingualism among researchers and educators as it depends on which we approach this
phenomenon. This question also has been tried to be answered by other researchers, Grosjean
(1998) defines that bilingualism is regular use of two languages, according to Haugen (1953)
says that bilingualism is an individual condition when he or she starts to own the ability to
create meaningful statements in two languages.
In terms of proficiency in acquiring two languages, equal proficiency in both the
native and second language is usually uncommon. Typically, when an individual has an
increased proficiency in one language compared to the other, we called unbalanced
bilingualism, it is the most common type. However, it is important to say the native language
is not always stronger than their new language. Based on Owens, an individual can become
more fluently in their newly learned language than their native language if they rarely use
their native language (Owens, 2012). To sum up, the proficiency and fluently are depend on
how much their interaction with the language.
Bilingualism and bilingual as a consequence of interaction among people overseas
which has advantages and disadvantage impact through a community both individually and
socially in the world. It is interesting to see that both bilingualism and bilingual have become
a phenomenon since ancient times for educators and researchers. Both of them influence
people from early childhood to adulthood consciously and unconsciously.
Bilingual
People can become bilingual anywhere and for many reasons. One of the popular ones
is due to cultural mixing among two immigrants such as states that are closer to Mexico have
increased Spanish-English bilingual populations than states further from Mexico (Walner,
2016). This experience mostly happens in America, but we can also become bilingual with
simultaneous efforts and practice of the language at home or our schools or even our
environment. Bilingualism also can be experienced from childhood toward adolescence.
These phenomena lead linguists to try to define what precisely bilingual means because this
phenomenon seems unique and complicated.
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Bilingual Education In Indonesia: Between Idealism and the Reality
Dwi Jayanti; Anton Sujarwo
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Script Journal: Journal of Linguistic and English Teaching
P-ISSN: 2477-1880; E-ISSN: 2502-6623
April 2019, Vol. 4 No. 1
reflect on our work, also ask for help or seek more information when we need it (Chan et.al,
2008).
Many years linguists and researchers have questioned and investigated the correlation
between bilingualism and executive function. Started from the research taken about 50 years
ago there was a popular assumption and scientific evidence that concluded exposing children
to more than one language was a potentially dangerous experience for them. The presumption
is that children will display "mental confusion" and show signs of "mental retardation." This
view was finally challenged by a study by Peal and Lambert in Bialystok (2015) which
English-French and English-bilingual monolingual children conducted a series of tests. The
researchers estimate that monolingual and bilingual children will be equivalent on measures
of nonverbal intelligence but bilingual will get a lower score on verbal intelligence. To their
surprise, the results of the tests bilingual children outperformed their monolingual peers in the
entire set of tests, including nonverbal intelligence. In contrast to the previous description,
Peal and Lambert argued that bilingual children showed they enhanced in "mental
flexibility", perhaps as a consequence of having to switch between languages (Bialystok,
2015).
At present, the view of bilingualism has changed because of the development of
modern scientific knowledge. During the second period, the language was seen by
researchers and educators as an interference such as barriers to children's academic and
intellectual development. The interference is more beneficial than defects. This is accepted as
a kind of training for the brain. The brain is in constant conflict and is challenged to resolve
internal conflicts. This mind exercise significantly strengthens the cognitive muscles of the
brain (Chilla, Solveig et all, 2010).
Another study had shown that bilingual is more proficient than monolingual in
solving several types of mental puzzles. Psychologists Ellen Bialystok and Michelle Martin-
Rhee tried to prove this in a survey. They ask for bilingual and monolingual preschoolers to
sort objects of various shapes and colors. The first task is relatively easy, but when tasks
become more challenging, bilingual is faster (Matter, 2012).
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Bilingual Education In Indonesia: Between Idealism and the Reality
Dwi Jayanti; Anton Sujarwo
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Script Journal: Journal of Linguistic and English Teaching
P-ISSN: 2477-1880; E-ISSN: 2502-6623
April 2019, Vol. 4 No. 1
to be accustomed to the use of English in educational contexts which could generate bilingual
mind on the part of students. It gives benefit for them as they have meaningful English
learning process to deal with the English materials of selected subjects classroom
communication practices. The use of the two languages packed in bilingual education
program strengthens the concept of the meaning of the subjects learned and establishes
automatic translating systems in the learners' brain (Romaine, 1995)
Regarding the progress, the implementation of the bilingual education officially
started in Indonesia in 2004 become more popular in 2006 and gained its popularity for about
six years establishing 1400 schools categorized as international standardized schools in 2012.
The Growth of Bilingual School in Indonesia Every Year
School 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010
Elementary 25 38 66 66 33
Junior 102 102 94 94
Senior 100 100 121 93
Vocational 179 74 42 138
Total 125 419 242 323 308
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Bilingual Education In Indonesia: Between Idealism and the Reality
Dwi Jayanti; Anton Sujarwo
There are eight standards required for the regular school of Indonesia; standard of
content, qualification of output, teaching and administration staff, infrastructures,
management, finance and assessment (Departemen Pendidikan Nasional, 2006). These eight
standard is called SNP (Standar Nasional Pendidikan). The school which has fulfilled the
eight standards is then named SSN (Sekolah Standard Nasional).
The Qualification of Bilingual School and National Standardized School in
Indonesia.
Parameter Bilingual School National Standardized
School
SNP (Education Fulfilled Fulfilled
National Standard)
Teacher categorized Min S2/S3: 10% (SD), 20% (SMP), Min S1, There is no
30% (SMA/K) requirements for S2/S3
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Script Journal: Journal of Linguistic and English Teaching
P-ISSN: 2477-1880; E-ISSN: 2502-6623
April 2019, Vol. 4 No. 1
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Bilingual Education In Indonesia: Between Idealism and the Reality
Dwi Jayanti; Anton Sujarwo
target language (English) to use the two languages as a means of classroom communication
of selected subjects (Margana, 2015). This implies that the Indonesian government should
prepare professional bilingual teachers before implementing programs. The main problem
exists in Indonesia is that a great number of bilingual teachers have insufficient English
proficiency to utilize English as a means of classroom instructions. The bilingual teacher
finally only used English to do some opening, closing and instructional sentences in the
classroom rather than explore the subject with suitable terms. Added to this, some bilingual
teachers have little commitment to apply for the bilingual program. This drives some
opponent parties to take the case into judicial review of the implementation of the bilingual
class program. With regard to this, the Judicial Court came to the agreement that the bilingual
program was against to the basic laws of Indonesian Republic Year 1945. As the bilingual
class program has been only enjoyed by the rich, the implementation of the bilingual program
is believed to generate the degradation of the nationality among the young generations in the
sense that they are less proud of Indonesian as the national language (Nasional.kompas,
2011). Also, the label of the bilingual class program is believed to be a way of getting fund
from the students' parents and other related parties which, to some extent, violates the policy
of the compulsory education advocating that school fee of public elementary school to junior
high school becomes the responsibility of the Indonesian government.
In other words, the bilingual class program has been banned to be carried out since
January 2013 (Rakyat, 2013), in this case, National Ministry Education develop another
curriculum as we know curriculum 2013 as a solution from this banned. State bilingual
school slowly but sure following this policy put their position back, still, for some private
school they keep the international curriculum and inserted on their school curriculum.
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Script Journal: Journal of Linguistic and English Teaching
P-ISSN: 2477-1880; E-ISSN: 2502-6623
April 2019, Vol. 4 No. 1
• Bilingual school school are mostly enjoyed by the high class than the low and create
many strata and customization.
• There are some discrimination between bilingual class and regular class in term of
school facilities, academic issues, supporting program like sister school.
• Bilingual program tends to spend alot of money and designed only for certain class in
certain school categorized as bilingual school.
• Bilingual programs build social gap and social jelousy among the students and their
parents.
• Bilingual program requires some professional teachers who are aware of first
language and target language to use as a mean of classroom communication for
selected subjects.
• Alot of bilingual teachers do not have sufficient English proficiency to apply in
bilingual classroom.
• Most bilingual teachers have a little commitment to apply their English toward the
program.
In accordance with these problems, the government of Indonesia should develop
alternative programs or curriculum that support Indonesian students in facing a global era
such as curriculum 2013 which is initiated by Indonesia National Ministry of Education.
Even applying bilingual program is not simple but it still has many advantages for bilingual
individuals particularly on their executive function.
Discussion
This section discusses about the finding of the study. It is concerned about the
effectiveness of applying bilingual program toward national standardized school that shows
most of the application of bilingual programs toward national standard schools is not
effective. It was proven by so many negative responses as well as research and data which
gives negative effect and result of this program. For the next study, the researcher can find
the best strategies to established the appropriate bilingual program in Indonesia.
CONCLUSION
The present paper gives summarizing about the concept of bilingualism and bilingual
in many levels since the bilingual gives many benefits. The reviewed research examining the
effect of bilingualism on people's cognitive development, in a specific part, executive
function. Studies declared that bilingual advantages in various tasks are described with the
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Bilingual Education In Indonesia: Between Idealism and the Reality
Dwi Jayanti; Anton Sujarwo
purpose of identifying the process of executive function component that might be responsible
for this bilingual advantage. Bilingual experience improves the brain's executive function,
that refers to command system that directs the attention that we use for planning, problem-
solving and many various mentally demanding task.
This paper also looks at how crucial English implemented in Indonesia, trying to
settle in designing and applying one of bilingual education program RSBI and SBI as an
International Standardized School to gain high qualified level and competent bilingual
performance in their field to face global challenges. Communities responds are quite positive
about bilingual school, and for some of them feel these programs are quite useful. This
program has produced many bilingual schools that will enable them to create high-quality
learners output, improve skill and language competence at the same time. When considering
these some communities argument, another evidence shows that RSBI disproportionately
serves middle and upper-income families (80% from these strata). This situation is
contributed to many factors, a number of financial, social, and academic reasons more focus
by government is needed to ensure low-income compliance regulations are met. Finally,
suggestions are addressed to policymakers and stakeholders that preparing all the suitable
aspect to bilingual education in Indonesia, i.e., infrastructure, academic, facilities, and human
resources aspect as a base foundation to build strong bilingual education in Indonesia.
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P-ISSN: 2477-1880; E-ISSN: 2502-6623
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