THIS SEMESTER FINALLY ENDS

This semester is finally over. Honestly, from all courses I have taken this semester, the one that needed most of my attention and gave me very much development this semester is academic writing. I spent most of my time doing many kind of academic writing assignment this semester. This course also gives me very much knowledge that I didn’t understood before. I could also differently understand what is writing before and after this course. Before this course, I only wrote everything I want to and I wrote without any aim, I mean I just wrote simple thing that can be said “unimportant” for other people. But, after I joined this class, my ability and knowledge in writing developed very significantly and I became a writer that have a purpose to make my writing useful for other people. , I get very much knowledge. It makes me understand how to write an academic journal. I came to this class with nothing and now I get something from this class.

            Throughout this class, I can learn about myself as a writer and as an English learner. I learn a lot as a writer, I got everything that I have never known before such as making construct, citation, quotation and subheading. I learn a lot as writer here, before I took this class, I never thought that become a writer needs very much efforts and sacrifices to make a good writing. From this moment I respect writers more than before because they are very brilliant and hard workers. I realize that being a writer is not easy. From my LLH I also learn myself as an English learner. I learn that learning foreign language is not an easy thing. I need a process in learning until I can reach my dream mastering English. And now I am still in that process of learning.

In this class I feel that I have my weakest point and strongest point as a writer. In my opinion, my weakest point in writing is getting idea. I always confused when I want to decide what is going to be written on my notebook. I spent very long time to get the idea which is appropriate and easy to be developed. One more thing that I am very weak in, I am not good in searching for references. It is very hard for me to find a reference that is suitable for my topic. And the point which I am confident on is in my creativity to arrange words by words to make my writing more interesting. Another strongest point in my writing is the grammar. Although I am not a master of grammar yet, I am confident with my grammar because I think my writing are lack of wrong grammar. Aspects of the course that help me a lot in this course are the explanation from my teacher. it is the main help in the process of writing my draft.

My writing process was not smooth at all, I have to revise and sometimes change a big part of my draft many times. My journey in this class was begun when I was commanded to make my language learning history from I was a child. I had to provide some topics of inquiry. That’s the first think that makes me got headache. Then my LLH had to be included in the draft which must be suitable with the construct and developed it into 8 pages, this part was the most difficult thing to do. I didn’t know that I had to develop my LLH into 8 pages draft. My LLH was not prepared to be developed, I made it like a past narrative which is not too academic. So I got very much difficult to do it and changed my LLH almost half of it.

For me, my development process as a writer in this course is almost the same with the metamorphosis process of a butterfly. When it hatches from its egg, there will be an ugly caterpillar which is not good to see. It represents my writing before I took academic writing class. My writing was very ugly and not good to see. After several months the caterpillar becomes a cocoon due to the process of becoming a butterfly. It describes my process of learning how to write an academic writing in one semester to be a good writer. When the right time comes, a cocoon becomes a beautiful butterfly and it flies freely to the sun. if I could pass my academic writing class nicely, I can be a good writer and reach my success. I guess that’s all, I give special thanks to Mrs. Nugrahaeny T. Zacharias for her  helps and guidance during my academic writing class. Happy holiday! J

THE SEMESTER OF ASSIGNMENT

I have to face a presentation next Monday. This time I got number 8 from the lottery, it means I must present my LLH presentation this week on Monday,  October 11^th 2010. I hope 8 is my lucky number and I hope my presentation would be done in its way. Lucky me I didn’t have to present it in the first time, so I can see my friends’ presentation before I do it myself. It makes me not really nervous to do it.

The problem is: I found this presentation quite confusing. It makes me got headache every time I think of it. Honestly, I don’t know what exactly I am going to present this Monday. I feel so blind of it. Actually my teacher has explained it to me but I can catch what she explained last week. That’s my fault, last week I was not feeling well, I got influenza and I had to study in an air-conditioned-class, so I couldn’t fully concentrate at that time. But it’s OK, “confusion is a part of learning” that’s what my teacher said last week.

This week is the week of assignments, every course forces me to awake all night in front of my notebook. Every day I feel like I am haunted by deadline. This feeling of confusion and phobia of deadline are really burdening me in the process of making my LLH presentation. I have asked my friends to help me explaining what I have to do in this presentation, but majority of them also confused with it. In this case, confusion is really a part of our learning process. So, I made this presentation assignment in confusion. no matter how bad is it, I will show it this Monday.

MY LANGUAGE LEARNING HISTORY

I was born in a family that didn’t have any English basic. In my family, there was no one who can speak English in a good structure. I was born in Semarang regency on December 16^th, 1990. I grew up in bilinguals family which was using Javanese language and Indonesian language. At that time, English wasn’t as famous as English nowadays. Maybe it’s because my family lived in a small village, so they didn’t think that English is a universal and very useful language.

As I said before, I was growing up in a bilinguals family, my parents taught me in Javanese language and in Indonesian language.  In my opinion, learning those languages wasn’t too hard for me. I know that sometimes I met some obstacles,  such as in making short story and poetry in both languages. Nevertheless, it’s not a big interference and I feel that there is no problem in my learning process. It’s easy as smooth as the water flows. I don’t know why learning those languages seems easier than  learning English language, maybe that’s because I learned English later than Javanese and Indonesian language.

My parents taught me Javanese first, I think Javanese language is very important for me, because it was the first thing that introduced me to something called “communication”. My father thought that a Javanese person must be able to speak Javanese language whether in Javanese krama inggil or in Javanese ngoko. That’s what my father said to me when he taught me Javanese language. My father taught me in a simple way of learning. He said some words in javanese and I should immitate and memorize everything he said. I know that nowadays there are a lot of people who can’t speak Javanese krama inggil  in a good rule, so I thank to my parents who have taught me Javanese language so that I can speak Javanese krama inggil and Javanese ngoko quite good.

Then I learned Indonesian language almost at the same time I learned my Javanese language. My parents didn’t teach me Indonesian language as much as Javanese language. However, I still could use my Indonesian language without any problem. That’s because I learned my Indonesian language in elementary school. My indonesian language’s teacher forced me and other students to write a journal once a week. The journal was about giving some comments to a story book that I borrowed once a week at the school library.  As the time went by, my Javanese and Indonesian language increased. Slow but sure, I can say that I have mastered those two languages.

In elementary school too, I was introduced to English language by my English teacher. As I remember I got my first English learning in my 4^th grade of the elementary school. At that time,  my English teacher translate some simple words in English such as: book, pencil, blackboard, etc, into Indonesian words.  that was rather late I think. If I could ask, I want to learn English when I was in kindergarten. If I learned English when I was in kindergarten, maybe today I can practice my English better than I am now. Why do I think that way? Because based on the article I’ve read, 3 – 6 years old is the golden age of our brain development, that’s why.  But it’s ok I will learn more and more to increase my English and also to master it.

From that fact, I was motivated to learn one more language in my live. In junior high school, I learned English seriously. I was more interested in English because at that time I often listening to the western music which is using English. I was not only listened to that music, but also wanted to know the meaning of the lyrics. So, I used to open my dictionary to understand the meaning of the lyrics. Opening dictionary every time made my vocabulary knowledge increased. It was very useful when I entered my senior high school. I could understand what my teacher said, I can understand what was written in a guidebook and many more. In my opinion, vocabulary is the basic thing to learn English. Without knowing vocabulary, you couldn’t learn English nicely.

In senior high school, I learned English deeper. The willing to master English language was implanted in my mind. I learned very hard until I graduated from my high school with a quite good grade in my English lesson. After I graduated from senior high school I planned to go to a university that has a good English faculty. And finally, I found Satya Wacana Christian University that was recommended by my English teacher.And now in Satya Wacana Christian University, I feel like finding what I really wanted in the past. I can learn everything about English language in very detail way. This is a very right decision to study in Satya Wacana Christian University.  I hope my dream to master English would come true soon. Amen.

writing in L1 and L2 based on my experiences

I am used to write since I was in elementary school. At that time, my Bahasa Indonesia teacher forced me and other students to write a journal once a week. I still remember that the journal was about giving some comments to a story book that we borrowed once a week at the school library. In that case I was writing in my L1 which is Bahasa Indonesia. That was the first thing that introduced me to writing. As the time went by, I tried to write in english although it was very rough and very bad in the structure and the grammar. In the junior high school, I started to write a bit in English, for example in my note book and my rough book. Based on my experience, I found some differences between writing in L1 (Bahasa Indonesia) and writing in L2 (English).

The first thing is that writing in L2 is a bit harder for me than writing in my mother language. Since my mother language is Bahasa Indonesia, it is harder to me to write in English than in Bahasa Indonesia. I feel more confident when I write in Bahasa Indonesia than in English. But, I always learn hard to master my English as my L2 and now I still in that process. I hope I can master my L2 and I wish writing in L2 would not hard anymore for me soon.

Writing in L2 challenges me more than writing in my L1. As I said before that writing in L2 is a bit harder for me than writing in my mother language, so it is very challenging. I need to look at my dictionary every time I want to convert a difficult word from L1 to L2 and I often trapped when I can’t find the words that I need. It’s different when I am writing in my L1, I meet no obstacle and I feel that there is no challenge in it. I try to receive that challenge and make every effort to make writing in L2 easier for me and I try to make it my habit.

When I write in L2, which is English, there are more people who understand my writing on the internet. We all have known that English is a universal language. Due to that sentence, I often use English more than Bahasa Indonesia to communicate on the internet. Those are some comparison and contrast between writing in L1 and L2 based on my experiences.