LEARNER FACTORS IN ELT Students’ Personality In English Language Teaching Oleh : Ismih Fajarsih Abstract : Happiest teaching....the biggest problem will be the nicest thing when it can be overcome. English Language Teaching in Indonesia seems still to be problematic, in term of curriculum, teacher and student. Regarding the students, possessing well self-esteem and willingness to take a risk in learning English are the two major aspects of personality factors from the affective domain that contribute much in the success of English Language Teaching.There are three agents influence in building the learners’ self-esteem and risk-taking; parent/family, teacher and school. It is actually a must for the parents to provide more space and time for their children to have a chance to show and develop their capability, thus they can have a high confidence. Teacher on the other side should try to always encourage the students to perform their English by creating and maintaining the learner’s involvement in every English activity.Making a deal of the teaching and learning activities in the very beginning of the meeting, creating both the rule and the fine during the period of study, making a class commitment to reach the goal of learning English, encouraging to perform just what they way they are, creating the fun and friendly environment and giving any compliment of any small progress are the possible solution to tackle the problems on students’ confidence and risk-taking.Providing a special space, teacher and program just for a student with very critical problem on their personality is another proposed solution to the school. A. INTRODUCTION Teaching is guiding and facilitating learning, enabling the learner to learn, setting the condition for learning. (Brown: 7). It involves both cognitive (processes, styles and strategies) and affective domain (intrinsic and extrinsic factors). On this occasion the writer would like to focus on the foreign language teaching in Indonesia, particularly the teaching of English. Teaching English seems to be always problematic due to the curriculum, teacher and student. The understanding of the students will determine the teaching style, the approach, methods and classroom techniques. As it can contribute the success of English Language Teaching This writing is intended to present a view about problems of English Language Teaching (ELT) in Indonesia. It is obvious that discussion about the ELT in Indonesia refers to a complicated matter because of involving many factors. Thus to specify this writing, the discussion will deal mainly with the problems due to students. Motivation, age, linguistic background, level of proficiency, learning experience, learning capacity, learning style, language aptitude, emotional intelligent, and personality are problems in ELT dealing with students. Whereas, the personality factors is the intrinsic affective domain of language learning which can contribute the success of ELT. The writer then will specify the discussion on this case only. Benjamin Bloom (Brown: 100) stated that affect refers to emotion or feeling. The affective domain is the emotional side of human behavior and it may put next to the cognitive side. The development of affective feelings involves a variety of personality factors. Further, Bloom provided the fundamental notions of affective domain as receiving, responding, and valuing. From the above explanation, the writer can say for sure that understanding how human beings feel, respond, believe and value is very important aspect of ELT. However, some teachers have severe problems with student behavior. What do you think are the causes of this? What personality factors will influence much to the success of ELT??? What solution can you suggest? B. DISCUSSION Theoretically, there are some personality factors from the students which can influence their success in learning foreign language. Below are the explanation of the factors as cited in Brown’s Principles of Language Learning and Teaching. 1. Self-Esteem Self-esteem is probably the most constant aspect of students’ behavior. It could be easily claimed that no successful cognitive or affective activities can be carried out without some degree of self-esteem. Coopersmith defines self-esteem as a personal judgment of worthiness that is expressed in the attitude that the individual hold toward himself. It is a subjective experience which the individual conveys to others by verbal reports and other overt expressive behavior (Brown: 102). Teachers should try to improve students’ self-esteem or simply improve students’ proficiency and let self-esteem take care of itself. Teachers really can have a positive and influential effect on both the linguistic performance and the emotional well-being of the students. Perhaps those good teachers succeeded because they gave optimal attention to linguistic goals and to the personality of the students. 2. Inhibition Closely related to some cases included under the notion of self-esteem is the concept of inhibition. All human beings, in their understanding of themselves, build sets of defenses to protect the ego. The process of building defenses continuous on into adult. Some person those with higher self-esteem and ego strength are more able to withstand threats to their existence and thus their defenses are lower. Anyone who has learned a foreign language is aware of making mistakes. Let’s say that we test about language by trial and many errors, just like children learning their first language and adults learning a second can really only make progress by learning from making mistakes. If we never try to speak a sentence until absolutely certain of its total correctness, we would never likely communicate productively at all. But mistakes can be viewed as threats to one’s ego 3. Risk-Taking It is also an important characteristic of successful in ELT. Students have to be able to gamble a bit, to be willing to try out guesses about the language and take the risk of being wrong. Some cases might influenced for the students have no willingness to take a risk are , in the classroom, the consequence might include a bad grade in the course, a fail on the exam, and a criticism from the teacher, a mock from classmates, punishment or embarrassment imposed by one. Outside the classroom, they fear looking ridiculous, frustration, and moreover fear a loss of identity. 4. Anxiety The construct of anxiety plays also an important affective role in ELT. It is associated with feeling of uneasiness, self-doubt, apprehension, or worry as defined by Scovel (Brown: 106). A little nervous tension in the process is a good thing. A construct has an optimal point along its continuum. Both too much and too little anxiety may hinder the process of successful ELT. We may be inclined to view anxiety as a negative factor, something to be avoided at all costs. But the notion of facilitative anxiety is that some concern, some apprehension, over a task to be accomplished is a positive factor. The feeling of nervousness before giving a public speech is often a sign of facilitative anxiety, a symptom of just enough tension to get the job done. 5. Empathy It is usually described as the projection of one’s own personality into the personality of another in order to understand her/him better. Guiora defined empathy as a process of comprehending in which temporary fusion of self-object boundaries permits an immediate emotional apprehension of the affective experience of another. 6. Extroversion It is commonly thought to be related to empathy. The extroverted person may actually behave in an extroverted manner in order to protect his or her ego. 7. Characteristic Types People (in these case students/learners) are different in fundamental ways, and that an individual has preferences for functioning in ways that are characteristic or typical of that particular individual. The Myers-Briggs classified the characteristic types as introversion versus extroversion, sensing versus intuition, thinking versus feeling and judging versus perceiving. (Brown: 111) General Problem with Student Behavior We turn now to a consideration of specific personality factors in students’ behavior and how they relate to ELT and what possible solution to tackle the problems. It is now clearer that the success of ELT is determined not only from the cognitive domain but also from the affective domain. From the seven personality factors in students’ behavior, the writer noted merely the two factors which most frequent problems dealing with the students, they are: self-esteem, and risk-taking. 1. Self-esteem Students’ belief in their own capability contributes to their learning success. I find it is the essential point to take into account. As by having confidence, not only the learning success but also the teaching success can both be reached at once. But, what mostly I can find in my classroom is most students do not have such kind of self-worth. Just few of them who have, while the rest become teacher’s responsibility to build and maintain it as well. So it needs hard working sometimes to make my teaching and learning activities run smooth as my wish. This matter is because of some reasons. Modern life with higher speed makes people have to face to more changes and difficulties. One of the consequences is some parents are often lack of time for their children. It is very harmful as some children who grow up with insufficient care and love from parents often have low confident both at school and society. They might be isolated, selfish, aggressive, and dishonest. Though it is not the only factors can cause the students’ confidence, but it is the most critical point. School is often considered as a place to make the children being mature and smart. In such case, parents usually give fully responsibility to the school. The failure of their children in their education is just the failure of the teachers and school. However, NOT with the successful one. Lack of family role is crucial in a child's treatment. In a line with it, lack of confidence can be a bigger problem if it relates to the ELT, especially dealing with the students’ response to both spoken and written text. Teaching learning activities are supposed to involve and activate the students. But, with the students have less confidence seems quite hard to make them run smoothly. Another reason is students may have a bad experience when once they tried to use English. It could be, getting direct correction at anytime they made a mistake, being laughed from people surrounding them/ classmates. Besides, students rarely get compliment and appreciation of any good effort from them. This situation can cause them reluctant to practice using English. And has no well understanding of linguistic competence is also one of the reasons with students less confidence 2. Risk-taking Self-esteem seems to be closely connected to risk-taking. A person with high confidence is not scared by the possible consequences of being laughed at. My experience is a student with high self-esteem seems has high risk taking also. And it is considered no problem in ELT. Those who have no willingness to take a risk are one need to take into account. Some cases might influenced for the students have no willingness to take a risk are , in the classroom, the consequence might include a bad grade in the course, a fail on the exam, and a criticism from the teacher, a mock from classmates, punishment or embarrassment imposed by one. Outside the classroom, they fear looking ridiculous, frustration, and moreover fear a loss of identity. Some Possible Solutions There are some solutions to cope with this problem. · First, parents should spend more time for their children, sympathetic to them and help them to overcome difficulties in studying or in life. Providing space and time to show their capability is very important to create their confidence. · Second, teachers should keep in touch with family to associate each other in teaching children and guide them and be strict enough to maintain disciplines at school. However, the adults have to show their kindness to children, forgive for their mistakes, and encourage their strong points. It's the best way to help children. Giving compliment for any progress they made effects much also for their confidence. · Then, it will be more perfect if school manage to provide special guidance for the students who really considered as a special one. · From my point of view, both parents and teachers and school have to be careful and give serious attention to the learners’ attitude. Parents have to pay more attention to their children, as well as teachers. 'Speak in their language''. In this regard, I believe that in some cases, it would be better if both parents and teachers try to be in touch with the children. Furthermore, by using this way, they can easily know the child's problem and solution for this trouble. Some short and sweet tips of my own would be: make an effort to pay attention to the student. · It can be done by first making a deal of the teaching and learning activities in the very beginning of the meeting. · Let them create both the rule and the fine, under my control of course. Then make it as much as possible to be the class commitment to reach the goal of learning English. · The next is encouraging them to always perform just what they way they are by making them sure that yes, all of them will get the appropriate learning English and will find easily learning English from now and on. · After that, creating the fun and friendly environment has significant point also. · One thing that should be remembered is, giving any compliment of any small progress from them. · If there is a very special learner, adapt as I can, try not to put him or her on the spot if s/he is totally ‘different’, also keep in mind that a wrong answer is just that and not something to be ashamed of. · Especially in a private school, I think it’s fair to raise the issue with the student privately, though it also depends on something can be done about it. In ideal situations, the person would want to be in the correct level, or if that’s not possible, to work a little more at home to catch up as much as they can, but in practice there are many reasons why this doesn’t work out. C. CONCLUSION Based on all the above mentioned points, taking affective domain into account in our ELT is needed so much, as urgent as the cognitive one. I can say for sure that examines students’ personality is very important to get solutions to problems in ELT, especially those related to the learners. The most frequent problems appear in the classroom is dealing with self-esteem and risk-taking. Both are interrelated and influence much in the success of ELT. Problems with family make the students find difficulty in having self-confidence. Thus, in class, students will tend to be passive. Students’ bad experience also becomes one factors of having less confidence. And students’ linguistic competence seems has an impact too with their behavior. Unfortunately, students with less confidence do not have enough power to take a risk in their learning activities. So, teachers should be able to encourage the students to use their English. In short, I strongly believe that the success of ELT depends much on family, teacher and school. To solve the problems dealing with the students become the responsibility of the three agents. The important thing is we have to do everything by heart because children are our future. References Bachman, L.F. (1990). Fundamental Concepts of Language Testing. New York. Brown, H.D. (2000). Principles of Language Learning and Teaching. Cambridge. Brown, H.D. (2001). Teaching by Principles. Cambridge. Brown, G. & Yule, G. (1983). Discourse Analysis. Cambridge Grellet, F (1981). Developing Reading Skills. Cambridge. Kowalski, R. M. (2003). Complaining, teasing, and other annoying behaviors. New Haven, Yale University Press. Munby, J. (1981). Communicative Syllabus Design. Cambridge. Nunan, D. (1999). 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