CODE SWITCHING IN INDONESIA BILINGUAL EDUCATION

Abstract

Indonesian government policy supports the international of education at the secondary level, consequently more institutions have commenced bilingual programs. Content is taught both in Bahasa Indonesia and English, making code-switching in classroom discourse. The study was conducted at a single International school in Semarang, East Java, Indonesia. This case study explored in what ways and under what circumstances Indonesian teachers and learners use code-switching in the selected bilingual classroom and semi structured interviews with six-bilingual class students and teachers at an International secondary school in Semarang, East Java in Indonesia are used to get the data. The finding shows Teachers’ and students’ codeswitching demonstrated collectivist phatic functions – for example, teachers codeswitched to build rapport, remind students and reduce students’ anxiety, and students code-switched to show their solidarity and concern for their peers. Thus, interconnectedness was a key characteristic of code-switching by both teachers and students. This study argues that code-switching is not just about language deficiency, but involves intentional communicative purposes which support teaching and learning. It can be concluded that code-switching can be a useful tool to bring about understanding of unfamiliar concepts and processes as well as the language associated with them.

Keywords

• code switching, bilingual education, international secondary school