QUALIFICATION EXAMINATION September 28, 2018

English Teaching Methodology and Curriculum

Systemic Functional Linguistics and the 21st Literacy

Mirza Fakhri Azmi
D05211016

It is undeniable that people in this world live with the existence of language. They
obviously need it for communication as they tend to live in social groups. They interact
with each other using language that is until now, there are so many spoken languages in
this universe. People use language on purpose for such as interacting with families,
reading articles, newspapers, and books, making appointments, promises, and so forth.

In this twenty-first century, being literate means that a person at least has to know
and understand all four basic skills of language that includes listening, reading, speaking,
and writing. All of those skills deal with language. In this writing, I want to address a
term ‘text’ that deals with all those four basic skills of language. A text stands as one of
various things that people deal with in their everyday life. To discuss it in the view of
systemic functional linguistics, Eggins (2004) stated that people have to negotiate with
texts to react and produce language that make sense. Halliday (2014), then stated that
because of text richness, it should have various meanings in many different ways. He also
argued that text, as an object, can be analyzed through its different meanings, ‘why is it
valued as it is?’ and ‘why does text mean what it does?’. For those purposes, Eggins
(2004) said that systemic functional analysis is needed to deeply explore a text. Along
with that statement by Eggins, Halliday (2014) introduced systemic functional grammar
(SFG) that detailly deals with the structural organization of English clauses, phrases, and
sentences. He interested to dig the true meanings of language that are used in the context
of social life.
 Looking at the fact that I will be a future teacher of English language, an example
of a text that I want to address is a recount text. Furthermore, considering that people are
September 28, 2018
now living in the rapid development of technology era, the development of Information
and Communication Technology (ICT) has greatly influenced EFL education for
successful learning and teaching (Hubbard, 2008; Prensky, 2001; Yang, 2011).
Interaction, cooperation, and networking in language learning and teaching have been
realized through the use of ICT and numerous learning management systems. To utilize
technology in English language teaching is not easy. If it is forcibly implemented in
English language teaching and learning, it will not only hinder and result bad teaching
and learning process, but also not help teachers and learners achieving learning
objectives. Therefore, many aspects need to be considered to result better experience of
teaching and learning, and achieve learning goals. For those reasons, teachers must pay
attention to technology not because it is either a boon or a threat, but because technology
inevitably affects language use (Chun, 2016). Technology can shape how people use
language in many cases, not as an autonomous, but in interaction with a range of factors
including individual decision, social conventions, situational contexts, and material
constraints (Kern, 2015).

This technology-based approach can be appropriately applied in schools.

Specifically, I come up with Instagram that is one of social media platforms that
functions as a tool to share moments, so that this function of Instagram can somehow be
related to the characteristic of recounts which is retelling experiences. Furthermore, as a
very simple and basic teaching material and focus, recounts will be properly applied
before teaching narrative text Christie (2002). Schleppegrell (2008) mentioned that
recounts are a text that delivers or retells personal experiences. Aligned with that, Knapp
(2005) stated that in making recounts for narrative text type, learners should take some
characteristics into account, which are characters, time, place and who, what, where,
when, and so forth. To conclude, Christie (2002) suggested that teaching a text for lower
grade students will be better to begin with recounts, it can train them to better write the
next step of a text which is narrative, such as a story text genre.
 Therefore, in this twenty first century, we can make benefits of systemic
functional linguistics to be applied to analyze a text as a part of literacies, and even we
can make use of the rapid development of technology to develop our teaching, so that
students will not get bored in the class. September 28, 2018

References

Christie, F. (2002). The development of abstraction in adolescence in subject English.

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Derewianka, B. (1990). Exploring how texts work. Sydney: Primary English Teaching
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Eggins, S. (2004). Introduction to systemic functional linguistics. A&C Black.
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