What is Learned in School Children?

Cica washing cups and plates"Wash your hands before eating, Cica," said Mrs."Yes, ma'am," replied Cica."Try to find your brother!" Cica to find her brother. Cica sister was reading."Your body is dirty, Yun. Clean your body first! ""Yes, brother," said Yuyun.They used to live clean. Net is healthy.
Text dialog without a title are included in the book I Love Indonesian issue of the Three Solo (2002). This book is owned by almost every class of students in several elementary schools in Yogyakarta and Central Java that make this book as a major in Indonesian Language. The text above is made for first-grade students who are learning to read the beginning, which is usually focused on the practice of reciting the express started reading the letters, syllables, words and sentences correctly, clearly and smoothly. But whether the text should thus be made arbitrarily without considering the logic of language? Just look at the description of the sequence of events. For most children, the logic of events that are easier to understand would wash cups and plates made after a meal, not before a meal as in the above passage. Also more easily understood if the entity's sister while playing dirty sand or soil, not when being read. Meanwhile, the Indonesian Language books for fifth grade students, Community Development grants Bandung Indonesian edition (2003) there is text reading as follows:


Compulsory educationVillage birth parents classified as barren Indri. Residents harvested only once a year. That is, if there is rain water. Agricultural population as a whole cassava and sweet potato.Such circumstances does not indicate a poor population. Precisely relatively affluent population. Many things they can do. Mothers form Home Industry or Home Industry If we go into the souvenir shop, almost all souvenirs there is the work of mothers. Similarly, if we buy traditional pastries. All of that results from the birth mother's village of Indri. What about the activities of fathers and adolescents? There are not we meet the people who sat in a corner of the alley or in a coffee shop. It is said that most teens work in another city. They send some salary to the village to buy rice and educate their younger siblings. If there are school-age children wandering on time, every person shall be reprimanded. If you find a parent or brother who told, would have sanctioned.
Text reading is in a chapter titled Reading Comprehension, the chapters are particularly designed to train students to understand the reading. After the text, is referred questions relating to the contents of a text such as: what mothers livelihood, what do the young, affluent villagers why, how conclusions about the struggle of the population. After that discussion to understand the text was completed. Even if students can answer all questions correctly in accordance with the contents of the reading, we are sure that they have learned to understand the reading is correct anyway? We certainly are not convinced of the success of learning if they read the text is the text as described above.
Taking into account the logic of the language of a text, should be questioned where we can find the main idea is meant by the title of the compulsory education, while most of the text discusses the domestic industry? Then if we look at paragraph last sentence, "they send some salary to the village to buy rice ...?", Surely the question arises, where rice is purchased? A sentence is contradictory to the description in the first paragraph. Where there is a field if the conditions described very barren village and can only produce cassava and sweet if there is rain?


Reading texts that bad in the setting of logic language like this is pretty much contained in the books Indonesian Language for elementary school children. Chaos logic looks ranging from texts that do not have a title, a title that describes the lack of text, paragraphs are not clear main idea, the sentences in a paragraph that is not coherent, and so on. Text dialogue is full of questions and answers meaningless small talk. "Good morning Word"."Good morning Indri". "You've read the announcement yet? '" Notice what? Where? I have not read 'em. "And so on. Text reading and dialogue with the quality of this text is generally made by the author of a book which usually are teachers or undergraduate science education.
Poor condition of the book reading texts Indonesian Language is not only happening on the logic of language, but also on the choice of themes. Hygiene and health themes ranging from bath, brush teeth, sweeping, mopping, taking out the trash, planting yard, communal work in the village, the eradication of mosquitoes, eating vegetables, appears many times in many passages, especially for students in grade one to grade three.
Theme is not interesting, do not take an interest such as this becomes increasingly tedious as discussed repeatedly. While the Indonesian Language text books for students in grade four to grade six, laden with the theme of government programs and concepts that are too complex to be taught to elementary school children such as urbanization and movement back to the village, resettlement, economic cooperatives, labor protection , financial crisis, ways to combat pests, and so on. Text passages with such themes presented by the language extension so that no impression is meaningful to students.Moreover, conditions in the field shows a tendency of teachers is also limited insights about the government programs.
One example of a text containing the theme of the government program is a text dialog bejudul Post Flood Victims in Indonesian language teaching book for third-grade elementary students. (Tim Bina Karya Teachers, Bina Indonesian 3A, publisher, 2000, p. 134-135). With a view to impress and meaning to students, the text of this dialogue shall be presented as role playing. The background of the dialogue is a meeting in the village hall, a character played by the village head, village secretary, and health center. Text contains questions and answers between the three figures surrounding the condition of refugees, readiness centers, soup kitchens and readiness. Can we imagine how awkward children aged 10 years in third grade playing the role of government officials of the village.Also imagine how busy the teachers guide the students entered the atmosphere of a village meeting that dialogue is the context. After the text, students are asked to name the characters, their traits and the reason why the properties mentioned. How can students be able to describe the nature of the character of a short dialogue is no more than 25 words, from an event at the Village Hall meeting that lasted just flat with no dynamics, and no depiction of the character of his characters? Impression and meaning of what can be expected to emerge from the children of the third grade reading and dialogue with the theme that did not invite this kind of interest? The examples above show us that the material language learning among elementary school students can hardly be expected to play a role in putting the language as a means of exercising thought and means of expression.


The children began to learn the concepts of social sciences at the time sitting in class 3 SD. Beginning with the familiar family environment, then the school environment, surrounding neighborhood and beyond. What is described by the social studies textbooks grade 3 SD about the neighborhood? RT region of one state may be different from the other state RT region. There is a region RT located on flat land, there are in the hilly land.RT in urban areas are generally located on the ground flat. RT region located in rural areas partly located on hilly land. Area of ​​RT 06 / RW 03 situated in urban areas. Its territory consists of flat land and flat. There was no hill. Also there is no river flowing. (IPS Integrated Class 3 SD, Tim Bina Karya Teacher publisher, 2000).
Two paragraphs above discussion about the environment opens RT, RW, Village, to the province. Without an adequate explanation of RT institutions, administrative agencies suddenly they are associated with conditions that are conceptually distinct geographical context. Description becomes more chaotic with the sentence: there is no hill and no rivers in urban areas. In introducing economic concepts, the textbooks start by mentioning the types of livelihood. Livelihoods of villagers farming, livestock breeding, gardening.Residents coastal livelihood as a fisherman. City residents mostly work as civil servants, employees of private companies and local businesses.
Various types of livelihood is mentioned as a list of types of work. The concept of "work" itself is not a lot of servings in the explanation. "Work" which is the production of economic activity, narrowed its meaning to be just the kind of work. There is no adequate description of the process. Teacher Role Description of the contents of the book above are just a small snapshot of the entire contents of textbooks used by children in elementary school.Textbooks are the most common instructional media used in schools in Indonesia. If the content of textbooks in very bad condition, we certainly hope that teachers can play a role close its weakness, for example by giving the other reading materials that are better or develop their own reading material diperlukan.Tetapi fact not the case. From the author's experience mix with primary school teachers and observe them in their daily teaching students, there is a worrying trend that teachers are very high dependence on textbooks in teaching and learning in the classroom. Turn off the power dependence is critical to the quality of teachers' textbook content.
Dependence occurs because of several factors. First, most teachers do not have an adequate understanding of a good text. Second, most teachers have a low interest in reading so difficult for them to develop their own creative learning materials to students.Third, their access to reading materials is very limited. There are no funds for books, school libraries are not available and the school did not have adequate references besides reading the newspaper. The condition becomes more severe as time outside of school hours is used more teachers to give private lessons in order to deal with low income.


The condition is less critical to the quality of teachers, among others, the text also looks at the results of faculty research FKIP Open University, Suparti et al about the perception of teachers towards the use of Indonesian primary school textbooks in Jombang. (Journal of Education Vol.3 No. 1, March 2002, Lemlit UT). In terms of perceptions of the content of the book, the teacher further highlighting the image quality is less attractive, than the quality of the text. What happens then, is more important for a teacher is a complete discussion of the material in the textbooks on time. If it could be faster so that more time can be devoted to invite students to practice work on the problems. The questions were taken from the textbook again, or a textbook published by other publishers whose content is almost the same. The discourse of teachers and students eventually develop only limited to what is in textbooks. For most teachers, the book has been fully considered representative curriculum content and organization of material so that they often feel less secure if you do not follow it. (Arsyar, 1989). Impact on Children of low quality content coupled with inadequate teacher skills, so do not support the development of literacy skills and student understanding.
Results of research conducted Team Program of International Student Assessment (PISA) Research and Development Ministry of Education show reading proficiency of children aged 15 years in Indonesia are alarming. Approximately 37.6 percent can only be read without being able to capture 24.8 percent of its meaning and can only link the text that is read by an information knowledge (Kompas July 2, 2003).
It is sad given the ability to read and write is the most basic competencies needed someone to develop knowledge and competence reach others. Reading books that are not interesting and difficult to digest its contents, becomes a heavy burden for the children.What then do it eventually just memorize the contents of the book. The habit of memorizing dull the power of reason and creativity in solving problems and produce creative works.Memorization is also lethal curiosity, but curiosity is the key to exploration in the development of science. Many studies have revealed that the greatest difficulty that dhadapi students in solving math story is shaped in making a model or map out the problem and create math sentences. (Hilum, 1997). This analysis shows that the ability of children is very low due to the development of logical thinking. The habit of memorizing reinforced by the encouragement given by teachers. Due to the limited knowledge about the material being taught, teachers are also always encouraged the children to memorize only what's in the book. "Do not just read the text. These exercises should be done about as well. Memorize the answer. Mother, you have repeatedly reminded the questions that will surely come out a test, "said a teacher CIVICS (civic education) to students in sixth grade.
A child could have memorized the hero's name and year of occurrence, but not necessarily understand what makes the heroes rebel against and fight. History textbooks only contained the names of the characters, the year event, the sequence of events, without giving a logical explanation for the occurrence of background events. Textbooks, Curriculum and Education Traditional As one instructional media, textbooks must meet the curricular validity of which is prepared in accordance with the established curriculum. It could be argued, textbooks reflect the curriculum.
If the condition of school textbooks, children are very concerned about such as exposure to the above, what about our education curriculum? New curriculum in Indonesia became popular in the 1950s, and used by those who acquire Western education. Definitions varied curriculum. In a narrow sense, curriculum is defined as "a plan for learning", something which is planned to be learned by children at school. But education experts currently defines curriculum more broadly, that is all the experience gained and the influence of children in school.
The concept of curriculum is the concept of modern education, formal education schools.The concept of curriculum is not recognized in traditional education in the community, either socialization or religious education or vocational education. Traditional education does not require a curriculum, does not require planning because the aim is to pass down values ​​and traditions, educational materials are relatively fixed from one generation to the next. Formal education requires school curriculum because the purpose of education is not simply pass on the knowledge and skills from generation to generation to the children.
The purpose of school education is more extensive and complex as always prosecuted in accordance with the changes. The curriculum should always be updated in line with the change. To achieve the educational goals established, the curriculum must be strategically developed and formulated into specific programs. Because it must always be relevant to changes in society, the preparation of curricula should take into consideration various aspects such as child development, developmental science, development and employment needs of society and so on.
Textbook material conditions of concern as described above, shows how the existing school curriculum has not been prepared and well planned. This happens probably caused by the first, the weakness of management planning at the operational level, in this Curriculum Center. Second, vision and purpose of education has not been formulated clearly giving rise to confusion in translating it into strategies and programs. Third, the strong influence of traditional education systems tend not to make the system responsive to changes in school education tended simply to adopt aspects of formality while the essence of dynamic systems that are not yet formed.