HOW CHARACTER BUILDING CAN BE INTEGRATED IN THE TOTAL PHYSICAL RESPONSE (TPR) ON THE SPEAKING ABILITY OF THE BLIND THIRD GRADERS Cindy Irawati, S.Pd cent.dhee@gmail.com State University of Malang, East Java ABSTRACT. It was realized that everyone has the right to get the learning especially language. It has no exception for children with special needed, more over for the blind children. On their learning process, it can be sure that the process will be different to the other common children because they must be given special behavior. Although inclusive learning is developed, recently, it still has some lacks on its application. Indonesian rules (UUD’45) guarantee its people to get their right on education and no discrimination for every single human, but there is a special behavior that given to the some cases. On its application, the teachers have to have the ability to reach the goal which is stated on the curriculum, so they must have a skill to develop the content of that curriculum. Basically, the learning of every languages, especially English, has the purpose to make someone has ability to communicate with that language fluently and correctly. For the blind children case, the English learning cannot be taught with common model but it must be given with suitable model in order to make learning process effectively. This is a descriptive bibliography method. The writer tries to differentiate between references in some books and articles which are written by the experts and also add some ideas here. The purpose of this research is to find some sub topics which have connection to children with special need, the learning model of TPR and also the application of TPR model on speaking learning for blind children in order to get application of character building on self confidence and learning successfully. Keywords: character building, TPR and speaking ability INTRODUCTION According to Howard Gardner, one of the intelligence that the human being has is a Language Intelligent. Every culture of them has their own language which depend on the environment and the harmoniously of the people around there. People get the spoken ability empirically. It depends on what language that is used around them. mailto:cent.dhee@gmail.com Language is a necessity for every human being because it is a mean to communicate. English as a global language around the world, so every nation who wants to fill the globalization pursuit requisite English as the one language that have to master beside the mother tongue or the first language. In Indonesia, English is as the foreign language, not as a daily language. It is just to complete a certain condition. So we need English learning effectively and efficiently to improve the quality of the nations through language intelligence. Method or model of language learning as a foreign language has developed, especially for disability learners, in this case is for blind learners. The method for disability learners is different with the normal one.According to Hidayat (Lecture of PLB & Psychology FIP UPI) “Disability children are they who have special needs, whether it is permanent or for a while, which is caused by social-economic condition, and/or, economic condition, politic situation, and/or disability from the newborn.” Actually, disability learners are slow learners and they still specific behavior in the classroom both from the teacher or their friends. Environment has many contributions on making the character of each individual. From the background, the writer interests to try explaining how character building can be integrated in the TPR on speaking ability for blind learners to improve their self confidence and learning successful. DEFINITION OF SPEAKING Jones (1989: 14) stated, Speaking is a form of communication.” We can say that the speaker must consider the person they are talking to as listeners. The activity that the speaker must consider the person does primary based on a particular goal. Then, it is very important which everything we needs to say is conveyed in an effective way, because speaking is not only producing sounds but also a process of achieving goals that involves transferring message across. Still according to Jones, how we say something could be important as what we say to get our meaning across. Therefore, speaking process should pay attention how to say as well as to whom appropriately. Brown and Yule (1989: 14) stated in their book, “Speaking is to express the needs request, information, service, etc.” the speakers say word to listener not only to express what in their mind but also to express what he needs whether information service. Therefore, communication involves at least two people where both sender and receiver need communicate to exchange information, ideas, opinions, views, or feelings. It takes place in everywhere and has become part of our daily activities. When someone speaks, he or she interacts and uses the language to express his or her ideas, feelings, and thought. He or she also shares information to other through communication. DEFINITION OF TOTAL PHYSICAL RESPONSE (TPR) Total physical response (TPR)is a method of teaching language using physical movement to react verbally, input in order to reduce student inhibitions and lower their affective filter (TPR World http://www.tpr-world.com/). It allows students to react towards the language without thinking too much, facilitates long term retention, and reduces students’ anxiety and stress. In order to implement TPR effectively, it is necessary to plan regular sessions that progress in a logical order, and to keep several principles in mind. TPR is not: Simon says, gesture based songs, simply using commands to practice English.TPR instruction requires no translation or L1 support. It can help students andteachers make the transition to an English language environment. It is also as a new playing field with no disadvantage for academically weaker students. TPR does not depend on left-brain, “academic” skills. This gives all students a chanceto shine in a new environment. It can train students to react to language and not think about it too much. This method requires an instant reaction. As there is no time to think during TPR practice,students can break the bad habit of over-analyzing language and become morecomfortable with “going with the flow”, or guessing from context. The advantage of TPR is that it reduces pressure and stress for students. In the learning process, this method does not require a spoken response from students. Also, if implemented properly,students always understand what is happening during TPR practice, resulting inincreased confidence and a lowering of the affective filter.TPR can be a break for students and teachers, a refreshingly different style ofteaching. Judiciously used, it can break up a lesson or day and keep students alert.TPR results in long-term retention of language items, and the constant repetition andrecycling involved reinforces this leading to a “magic” learning experience. Dr. James J. Asher first described the TPR method in his book “Learning Another Language through Actions”. He and other linguists observed the following characteristics about successful language learners: 1. Good language learners achieve fluency faster when they are immersed in activities that involve them in situational language use; 2. Good language learners often start their language learning with a period of silence as they watch the effect of language on others; 3. Good language learners show comprehension by successfully accomplishing language-generated tasks; 4. Good language learners focus on overall sentence meaning rather than a sentence’s grammatical parts; 5. Good language learners make faster progress when the language of instruction is consistent (though limited) on a daily basis, and 6. Good language learners make faster progress when the content involves language that is clearly usable or valuable outside the classroom. http://www.tpr-world.com/ DEFINITION OF DISABILITY CHILDREN We know that disability children are around us. They are not someone who strange for us, but we should be their friend and we can protect them. We must care and teach them in order to make them a better person and could be proud for everyone. Child with a disability means a child evaluated in accordance with Sec. Sec. 300.304 through 300.311 as having mental retardation, a hearing impairment (including deafness), a speech or language impairment, a visual impairment (including blindness), a serious emotional disturbance (referred to in this part as "emotional disturbance"), an orthopedic impairment, autism, traumatic brain injury, an other health impairment, a specific learning disability, deaf-blindness, or multiple disabilities, and who, by reason thereof, needs special education and related services (http://idea.ed.gov/explore/view/p/,root,regs,300,A,300%252E8,) Disability children need special treatment from us which is “normal" in all life aspect, though every person who is not defect wish to be special, because they wish to be same with others. Blind people are the one who have the permanent character. Basically they only cannot see but their brain performance/ their contemplative faculties most are normal, but it is rarely that they have low contemplative faculties. On the learning process, blind students have big opportunity although linked up with normal student, but the blind students still need more on this process. SAMPLE MATERIALS A. Topic : Parts of Body B. Aims : • To help students active speaking • To improve students’ self confidence • To enrich students’ vocabulary, especially know parts of their body • To improve students’ speaking and listening ability C. Level : Elementary graders This are some lists of parts of body that the teacher can give the students and the command for practice it. The teachers can add another parts of body and the verb. VERBS NOUNS Touch your Head Face Nose chest Hair Eye Mouth back Neck Chin Teeth Stomach Left Arm Hand Thumb http://idea.ed.gov/explore/view/p/,root,regs,300,A,300%252E8 Hold your Right Shoulder Leg wrist Elbow Foot Knee Hip Ear Ankle Open your mouth hand Leg TEACHING PROCEDURES On TPR application for blindness learners is commonly same with another method. The difference is that the teacher must actively to guide the students because of their disability make them can not respond what the teachers do visually. The students have to be guided directly to the object which is example by teacher. TPR is perfect for team- teaching classes, as with three teachers two can serve as the model or guiding the students to act while the other calls out commands. More specifically, the teacher can do the following activities: A. Warming up Activity 1. The teachers give asks the students some easy question about their parts of body, such as: ▪ Who have long hair? ▪ How many times you brush your teeth? ▪ What do you speak with? ▪ What do you smell something with? ▪ What do you hear some sounds with? ▪ Etc. 2. The teachers ask the students to sing a song titled “Head, Shoulder, Knees and Toes.” B. Pre-Teaching 1. Ask the children to work in group of 4 to collect some words they know for parts of body. Give them a couple a minute to do this. 2. Ask the children about some verb or command that relate to the topic, such as: touch, hold, open, close, etc. C. Whilst-Teaching 1. The teachers stand near the students in a small group of 6-10 students for each group. 2. The teachers move the students’ hand to touch their nose or another part of their body and said “Touch your nose”, then touch their lips and said “Touch your lips”. This activity is done three or four times for each part of the body. Then, the teachers can change the verb or command, such as: “Open your mouth.” 3. Next, the teachers repeat those words without giving them some helping to move their hands and do the teachers’ command. 4. The last, the students were asked to try by themselves and followed by teachers and another students. D. Post-Teaching 1. Ask the students to find another word of parts of body. 2. Ask the students to find another command or verb that relate to do act this topic. 3. Ask the students to practice in front of the class. Sample lesson plans form Teacher: __________________________ M O N D A Y Goal: students will able to identify 6 parts of the body (head, nose, chin, face, teeth, mouth) + Touch your Materials: Team-teaching New Vocabulary: as above Activities: Listen and point Outcome: Teacher will evaluate students’ proficiency by having them: Individually demonstrate competence by correctly identifying a minimum of four of the six words. Reflection Teaching English through TPR to improve speaking ability for the third blind graders is one way to integrate students’ self confidence on their character building. The teachers use the repeating model to make the students be usual to use those words. This model or theory based on the habitual action. Besides, the students were hoped can enrich their vocabulary building. CONCLUSION 1. Teachers have an important role to make the students, especially to the disability students, to integrate the character building, improve their self confidence, and their learning successful. So, the teachers should give more attention to them. 2. The aim of TPR for blind students is to make them move their body in doing certain activity which is relevant to the material, such as: knows the thing. The teachers as the instructor who help the students to move their body and touch something. Then, the teachers say it in English in many times for some objects, and the teachers let the students to try by themselves, (knowing, listening, speaking, and repeating). 3. The effect of TPR technique to integrate the character building especially to improve the students’ self confidence and their learning successful could be felt with some games which is in order to accept own self and show the ability by repeating many times so self confidence and learning successful could be reached. 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