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| Master of Education in Teaching English as a Foreign Language Faculty of Teacher Training and Education Tanjungpura University, Pontianak-Indonesia |
Who said that the quality of university in Pontianak is
not better than universities in Java or other places? In Tanjungpura university
especially Master of Education in Teaching English as a foreign Language
Faculty of Teaching Training and Education helps the students to have
international minded by facilitating the students to present at overseas
conference.
MICOLLAC PRESENTATION
The 9th Malaysia International Conference in Languages,
Literature, and Culture (MICOLLAC) 2016 was held for 3 days. It started on 16
to 18 August. It was in Rainbow Paradise Beach Resort, Tanjung Bungah, Penang.
It was organized by Department of English, Faculty of Modern Languages &
Communication, Universitas Putra Malaysia (UPM). By participating in this
conference, we were able to meet colleagues not only from Malaysia buat also
from other countries. There were many academics who shared their view and
research. If you were academics, teacher, graduate students, education
officers, language policy and program planner, or linguist, you might become
the participant in this conference. In this forum, the participants could have
meaningful discussion but still it was related to the theme of ‘Engaging
Threads and Trends.’
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| Tanjungpura University Students with Mark R. Freiermuth |
There were 10 people from Tanjungpura University,
Indonesia, who became the speaker in MICOLLAC 2016. They were Marwandi, Militansina Usman (Improving Speaking skill through
problem-based learning and environment education for middle school), Slamet Tumpal Manurung (In
transition: The students’ attitude towards the institutional policy regarding
the use of internet enabled devices in the classroom), Dudi Effendy, Isti Arbaniah (Developing supplementary material to
teach basic English Dialogue for EFL learners with value-based curriculum by
utilizing web-page maker), Umayrah
Tiffani (Improving vocabulary through
V-A-K Learning model for junior high school students), Nurrahmiani (The urgency of
developing midwifery reading materials using flash application), and Tri Mulyaningsih (An error analysis of overgeneralization, simplification, and
interlingual interference by EFL young learners in speaking comprehension).
They are still pursuing their master degree. Other two are Gatot Sutapa and
Regina. They are lecturers in Tanjungpura University. Besides the speaker,
there were 24 participant who are also the students in Language Faculty Untan.
In the paper presentation, the speakers were given 15
minutes to present and 5 minutes to ask and answer. In the question and answer
session, some participant asked about the opinion of the speaker about the
topics and some others gave their opinion and suggestion to improve the
research. It was great time to see people from different culture and background
presented their papers. It was also good time to open our mind for the
criticism and opinion from other researchers.
By opening our mind, we could learn many things about the
area of interest in our research, about the world, about research knowledge,
etc. We were also able to build our confidence to present in front of other
researchers from all over the world. Besides, we could get insight on other research
field. Smart people would use this time to learn as much as possible and meet
other researcher as many as possible.e
This conference was the first international conference I
attended. Before attending this conference I did not have any motivation to do
anything as I did not think that research would be interesting. But this
conference gave me insight that there were a lot of smart people with different
mind and different interest. They opened my mind that research can be so
interesting. We can also share it to others and know how other people respond
to it. We can also make contribution in our life from the research.
THE SPEAKERS IN PLENARY SESSION
There were many speaker in the plenary session. They are Adam Jaworsky, Yap Nge Thai, Cathy Carut,
Hu Guangwei, Johan bin Jaafar, and Ismail S. Talib. In the first plenary
session Associate Professor Dr. Yap Nge Thai presented about her three ongoing
research about 1) the acquisition of second language phonology, 2) the
development of the Malay cross-linguistic lexical task, and 3) multilingual
brain. Her explanation was very clear and impressive. But, great people would
never out from criticism. In the Q&A session there was some participants
who did not agree with her mind especially about the purpose of the research.
It is said that the problems of the research were not urgent and important due
to some reasons. But, impressively she could respond it in a humble way.
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| Keynote speaker: Professor Adam Jaworsky who presented about multilingual and globalization |
We learned a lot from those speaker. Most of their
researches were related to linguistics area. As My friend and I are from
Language Education faculty, we actually expected that there was also a topic
which discussed about language teaching in the classroom. We hope in the next
conference, if we get another opportunity to attend it, we can find some
researches related to that area so we can learn and apply it in the classroom.
FAVOURITE SPEAKERS
From all of speakers who attended MICOLLAC I personally
have my own favorite speakers. They are Angela Karsten and David Yoong. Angela Karsten presented about
Motivational Currents among L2 Learners in Japan. She said that there will be
contribution of her research in the area of education. By doing this research,
it is expected that this research will help professionals in the education area
to add the current to learners’ experience by knowing how DMCs are triggered,
sustained or even suppressed. It looked like this research would be difficult
to be conducted as it was really difficult to measure motivation. In small
number of students it is possible for the teacher to motivate them continuously
and intensively. But in large number of students, it will be difficult to be
applied. So, It think it will be a challenge for this kind of research.
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| David Yoong |
Different from Angela Karsten, David Yoong Soon Chye presented about integrative system called
MACRO (Management and Accounting of Learning Outcomes to help course
coordinator, instructors, and curriculum designer (CIC) to manage and account for
students’ learning outcomes. He looked so confident and could explain his
research in understandable words. As we know that LO is very important to get
more accurate picture about the topic that students should learn and about students’
learning experience. It then becomes a challenge for CIC. In the easy way, he
could explain about the challenge faced by CIC when there is differences
between expectation (for a specific course) and the actual results. When the
result for students accomplishing LO are below expectation, there is a need to
find out the reasons which in turn can be used to solve the problem before the
next semester. It is stated that there are many benefits from MACRO especially
in institutions located in developing nations or remote areas which make his
article more interesting.
PERSONAL VIEW
Who Do you want to be? I always ask my self that
question. I don’t want to be big fish in small pond. I want to be small fish in
big pond. That’s how I feel after attending the conference. It was really great
experience to be able to share your opinion and listen to others opinion from
other point of view. The more you learn, the more you develop yourself. Those
great people who I saw in the conference showed me that awesome people were not
arrogant. Instead they were very humble that they show themselves as empty
glass who are thirsty to knowledge even from people who haven’t had name.
I never regret the day I chose to be one of the students
in Tanjungpura University to get my master degree. It is a right decision. I am
really grateful for this faculty to introduce and facilitate me and my friends
to have this wonderful experience. I hope someday I can have more than this.
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| when we were having our lunch |
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| Mr Marwandy and Prof. Dr. Rosli Talif |
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| Mr. Gatot Sutapa, a lecturer in Tanjungpura university |
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| opening ceremony, day 2 |
