A. Background
Character education in English for Children (EFC), to some extent, limits its development on the role play application in the English teaching. The choice of role play application to deal with language teaching and learning and to bring a real life experience has always been a good one even since the first time Jacob L. Moreno applied it for his research on applying role play to resolve individual and family problems. Even in the scope of EFC in which character education is always open for a fusion, role play displays nothing than benefits. Priscillia Clarke in Supporting Children Learning English as a Second Language in the Early Years (birth to six years) proposes that the most appropriate program for children in the preschool years is a play based program (because) the way the indoor and outdoor space is arranged will convey messages about the value placed on the culture and language backgrounds of the families.[1] It implies that besides functioning as a bridge to learn English, play is also able to fuse cultural values the society in which the children live with English learning. Though possessing benefits, role play owns common significant problems teachers usually perform. Those problems are warming up, contextualization, and adjustment.[2]
Character education in English for Children (EFC), to some extent, limits its development on the role play application in the English teaching. The choice of role play application to deal with language teaching and learning and to bring a real life experience has always been a good one even since the first time Jacob L. Moreno applied it for his research on applying role play to resolve individual and family problems. Even in the scope of EFC in which character education is always open for a fusion, role play displays nothing than benefits. Priscillia Clarke in Supporting Children Learning English as a Second Language in the Early Years (birth to six years) proposes that the most appropriate program for children in the preschool years is a play based program (because) the way the indoor and outdoor space is arranged will convey messages about the value placed on the culture and language backgrounds of the families.[1] It implies that besides functioning as a bridge to learn English, play is also able to fuse cultural values the society in which the children live with English learning. Though possessing benefits, role play owns common significant problems teachers usually perform. Those problems are warming up, contextualization, and adjustment.[2]
Warming up refers to the lack of preparation from the teachers. Contextualization denotes the difficulties the students might face when encountered with specific requirements to play certain roles. Adjustment deals with the basic abilities students have to master before engaging themselves to a role play.[3] These problems basically revolve around what Stanislavski called Emotional Memory, an action which requires that an actor recreates an event from the distant past in order to regenerate the ‘feelings’ experienced at that time.[4] It denotes that the role play doers are demanded to feel what has been felt in a new circumstance. Linked to the aforementioned problems role play has, Emotional Memory contributes a significant role in the three of them. In the warming up problem, if the teachers focus only on asking students to memorize the dialogue, the essence of performing a role play is lost. The teachers should touch also the attempt to spark the feelings the roles the students have in order to let the students fill someone’s shoes. What implies by this statement is that besides learning English, the students can feel the roles they do; if one’s role is a beggar, the expected feelings coming out from the role are 1) I have to donate some money if I meet a beggar 2) I must work hard so that I will not be a beggar in the future. This implicative imagination is what is expected from Emotional Memory on the scope of warming up. Thus, the warming up should be done under the application of Emotional Memory. The same case also works for the second problem, contextualization. The difficulties of contextualization actually roots from the absence of Emotional Memory in the process. If a student is asked to play as a queen but the society in which the student lives is not a monarch, then, the difficulties of contextualization will rise up. If the teacher instructs the student to imagine how her parents spoil her and tell her that being a queen is being a spoiled woman: to get anything she wants, the similar feeling of being a queen will surface. In the contextualization aspect, Emotional Memory can be done also through regenerating what has been experienced virtually. Watching movie is one of the examples. By watching movie about a queen, the student can regenerate the same feeling she obtains when she watches the movie in the role play. What becomes a problem in the role play is that the teachers contextualize what the roles are from explanation only. The next contribution is on the adjustment level. This level engulfs mostly on the material mastery by the students. When it comes to material mastery, the effectiveness of the teaching learning process comes to question. Emotional Memory should take part in the teaching and learning process because Emotional Memory does not only equip the students with the content but also the context the material has. For example, when the teachers teach their students how to say ‘thank you’, it is not just the content which is the list of expressions of saying ‘thank you’ but also the context which is the way to say it to make it culturally acceptable. If the teachers focus on birthing Emotional Memory from their students before engaging themselves in a role play, the role play will beget an expected outcome. To do so, a specific role play, as foreseen by the researchers, would overcome those problems which might occur on children learning English also and that special role play is role playing video game (RPG).
[1] (2009). Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority.
[2] Blatner, Adam. (2009). Role Play in Education.
[3] ibid
[4] Sawoski, Perviz. The Stanislavski System: Growth and Methodology. p.18
[1] (2009). Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority.
[2] Blatner, Adam. (2009). Role Play in Education.
[3] ibid
[4] Sawoski, Perviz. The Stanislavski System: Growth and Methodology. p.18
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