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The 2 International Conference on Language and Language Teaching 2023 June 9-10, 2023

STUDENT’S PERCEPTION OF CHARACTER BUILDING IN THE ENGLISH TEXTBOOK “THINK GLOBALLY

ACT LOCALLY”

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Paula Margarina , Rahmad Hidayat
1
Institution Faculty of Social Science and Humanities, English Education Department, Universitas PGRI Adi Buana Surabaya
2
Institution Faculty of Social Science and Humanities, English Education Department, Universitas PGRI Adi Buana Surabaya
*Corresponding Author, E-mail: paulamargarina@gmail.com

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Abstract. The textbook is one of the media or tools that the character’s education can be integrated. So, this research aims to find out character-building values
entitled “Think Globally Act Locally” for Grade IX of Junior High School published by the Ministry of Education and Culture. The objective of the research was to
identify the character education values based on the 2013 curriculum that appears in texts or sentences of an English textbook entitled “Think Globally Act Locally”
for the Ninth Grade Junior High School, to describe how the student’s perceptions of characters building implemented in the texts or sentences. The study used
qualitative research. The character building in the textbook was used as the focus of this study. The data was taken from the students of SMP PGRI 1 Buduran
Sidoarjo. The data were collected by questionnaire, interview, and documentation. The data were analyzed using descriptive analysis. The results of the study revealed
that regarding the students’ perception of character-building in English textbooks, the students agreed that character-building is important and needed. Appreciative,
Social character, and responsible are the highest rate. This result showed that the author seemed to want to make it easy for students to comprehend the character-
building values in the texts or sentences.

Keywords: Character Building, Students’ Perceptions, English Text Book

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INTRODUCTION
Education is one of the solutions to strengthen the character of a nation as the goal of education itself is not only to make smart people but also to have
good character Lickona (2013). Similarly, Sharma and Prasad (2009) state that the goal of education is to form character building. As the second education center, the
school has an important role in building the character process.
Character building is an important part of the education field which has to be integrated into all subjects and skills. As cited in Ramly (2010) virtues of
character building are developed in three ways, those are integration with the subject, self-development, and school culture. Therefore, all of the subject materials in
English classes had to convey the qualities of character building based on the Indonesian Ministry of Education. Character building is the effort to help the soul
development of children in the matter of inner self and outer world. Character-building education is the effort to sprout and develop good values for the child based on
the prevailing moral.
Moreover, building a learner’s character is the responsibility of all elements in our circumstances. However, character education in Indonesia focuses
more on improving the quality within and between individuals and seems to neglect the characters, which shows a relationship with the environment.
The textbook is one of the elements used by teachers in learning resources that greatly supports the success of teaching and learning activities, also it is
very useful as a main source to guide the teacher in building students’ character. The influences of character education programs can have profound effects on
numerous problems that schools are facing today including increased drug or alcohol use, aggression, low school attendance, fights and suspensions, vandalism, and
low academic achievement.
Character-building values that can be found in texts and dialogs of the English textbook “Bahasa Inggris” for Grade IX Junior High School are described
in this part by providing examples and explanations from the data. Those are the character-building values religion, honesty, tolerance, discipline, hard work,
creativity, autonomy, democratic, curious, nationalist, patriotic, respect for achievement, communication, peaceful, love to read, environmental care, social care, and
responsible that is described by Kemendiknas, while the other characters are gratitude, humble, confidence, cooperative, respect, healthy, courage and optimist that
aren’t described by Kemendiknas.
The importance of students to help good Character education and building to helps students to develop important human qualities such as justice,
diligence, compassion, respect, and courage, and to understand why it is important to live by them. It develops a positive and moral climate by engaging the
participation of students, teachers and staff, parents, and communities.
In reference to the above explanation, the researcher is motivated to conduct research to observe character values integrated into the content of English textbooks for
grade IX of Junior high school, particularly in the form of texts. English textbooks for grade IX Junior high school are chosen because of the students in Junior high
school who are in the transitional process.
Furthermore, as has been explained earlier, the data show that most of the misbehavior acts are performed by students who are in senior high school.
Therefore, the students need to get a good foundation of character values as early as possible to prevent them from doing such misbehavior acts. Meanwhile, the
textbook to be evaluated is entitled Pathway to English for Nine Grades of junior high school. The researcher used eighteen character values as the substance to apply

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national character education based on the Ministry of National Education., the title of this research is An Analysis of Character Values in the Texts of English
Textbook Entitled Pathway to English for Grade IX of Junior High School.
Based on the explanations above, the researcher is interested in this study intended to identify how the eighteen character-building values represented in
the English textbook “Bahasa Inggris” for Nine Grade IX Junior High School, and the research question is What are the character-building values that can be found in
Students’ Perceptions Character Building in English textbook Bahasa Inggris for Grade IX Junior High School. The objective of this study is to analyze character-
building values that can be found in English textbooks for Grade IX Junior High School.

LITERATURE REVIEW
a. Character Building
Characters become identities, distinctive features, and constant characteristics, that contend contingent experience that is always changing. So, the character is a
set of values that become habitual life and become constant characteristics inside the ones. For example, work hard, never give up, be honest, simple, and others.
Within character, individual quality is measured. Whereas, the aim of character education is to materialize the essential unity of the subject with behaviorism and
attitude/value of life that is possessed (Foester Soetarjo, 2012).
b. Values of Character Building
Character is the result of inner character. As God’s creation that has the right of free, in morality, humans have the freedom to choose the value and norms that
become an orientation of acting and behaving in their life together with others. So, it is very clear the correlation between character, values, norms, and morals.
The value taken is a higher value, glorious, noble, holy, and honest. The norm taken gets close to God. Moral gives direction, consideration, and demand to act
responsibly as well as value, the chosen norm. Furthermore, learning character is also learning values, norms, and morals(Muslih,2011).
c. Perception
Perception is the process of human thinking about certain phenomena. Perception is started from the sense of the organ. This process is related to the acceptance
of massage or information by the human brain. In this process, a person interacts with his/ her environment using five senses. (Walgito, 2010).
d. Textbook
The textbook is the most used and something overused source for determining the students should learn. The textbook is an important resource for teachers in
assisting students to learn from the explanation above, it can be concluded that the textbook is an instrument of school instruction and the primary source of
information for teachers and students.
(Mayasari et al, 2015).

METHOD
In this study researchers used qualitative research. Collecting data for this study came from questionnaires and interviews with participants about their
perceptions of character building in the textbook to make the analysis easier, the researcher needed to use data and data sources. For the data collection, the researcher
used open-ended questions and semi-structured interviews. The interviews are conducted face to face while questionnaires and shared through Google Forms. The data
that has been obtained is processed using collected using thematic analysis to pinpoint key themes in the data. To validate the data taken in the research, triangulation
is used to drive it all right.

RESULT
Character Building Social Care

Character Building Social

Care

Sangat Setuju
Setuju Setuju
Sangat 14% Netral
Tidak Setuju
Setuju Sangat Tidak
86% Setuju

Figure 1: Character Building Social Care

The following are answers from participants regarding Pie chart 4.1character building about social care which shows that there are 86% said the scale “strongly
agrees”, and 14 % said, “agrees”. That way, the researcher concludes that the strong agree scale is an outline response from students. People are social creatures that
can’t live individually. They need others to help their life. As a social creature, they have to help each other which are an embodiment of social care. Mcelmeel (2002)
states that social care is feeling or acting with compassion, concern, or empathy. From the student’s responses above regarding the students’ perceptions of character
building in the English textbook. The students thought that character building very was a process mental to make character building very important. The first is about

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appreciative they give perceptions. Student 1 stated "The picture shows a conversation talking well to a friend who win the competition. The student stated “Activities
that show concern for one's every effort, which will make them imitate to also care for their friends and of course to be more sensitive to the environment around
them”, moreover student 3 stated, “I agree that this attitude really fosters the character of a sensitive attitude towards others”.
Character building Responsible

Figure 2: Character Building Responsible

The following is one of the items on the questionnaire that shows the responses of students with the results of the answers based on the pie chart 4.2 student’s
perceptions that 71 % of students chose to “agree”, and 29 % of students chose a “Agree” scale. Thus, the researcher concludes that judging from pie chart 4.2, the
“strongly agree” scale remains the most preferred of students which illustrates that students show good participation in the process of learning English through blended
learning Lickona (2013) mentions that responsible is morality active sides that fulfill the obligations and contributes in society.
Character Building Appreciative

Figure 3: Character Building Appreciative

The following is one of the items on the questionnaire that shows the responses of students with the results of the answers based on the pie chart 4.2 student’s
perceptions, that 64% of students chose to “agree”, and 36% of students chose a “strongly agree” scale. Thus, the researcher concludes that judging from pie chart 4.2,
the “agree” scale remains the most preferred of students which illustrates that Suyadi (2013) describes, respect for achievement as the open attitude toward the
achievement of others and acknowledgment of lack of self without reducing the spirit of achievement. This study discovered some of the related results from this
present study with the previous related studies and theories. There are some inferences from this research that could be found.
Discussion
The character education values that appear in the English textbook entitled “Think Globally Act Locally”
From the result analysis, an English textbook found character education values. The data shows character education values appear in the English textbook entitled
“Think Globally Act Locally” There are three character values that appear in the textbook. The researcher found only 3 character-building education appreciation,
social care, and responsible. Based on the regulation of the Ministry of National Education number 20/2003 about the National Education System, the function of
Indonesia education is to develop the capability, character, and civilization of the nation for enhancing its intellectual capacity, and is aimed at developing learners‟
potentials so that they become persons imbued with human values who are faithful and pious to one and only God; who possess morals and noble character; who are
healthy, knowledgeable, competent, creative, independent; and as citizens, are democratic and responsible. Related to that, the main programs of the Ministry of
Education are to develop students„ character education for the sake of improving national education quality. In short, the author of the book should include all
character values to help students to learn not only knowledge but also the educational character for them.
Students’ Perception of Character Building in the Textbooks
Students claimed that character education is related to an attitude and character education is essential in strengthening their characters. They believe that through
character education they will be able to choose what is good and right for themselves. In essence, students could learn character values everywhere, but learning in
school will be possible since students spent more than half a day in school. All students realized the existence of character values inside the textbooks that they were
using. It can be concluded that students understood and could give examples about the character values on it. It can be seen from their opinion which claimed that they
could find values Related to Self, Others, and Environment. Even though it confirmed that students knew about character values in the textbooks but it still needs to

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guide students to forge characters that they have now become a habit. The main goal of character education is not enough just knowing. As Lickona (2012a) said that
character education is about knowing, feeling, and acting. Again, in this case, it should be underlined that character education really depends on how teachers guide
students in attaching character values in the teaching and learning process.

Conclusion
This study was descriptive research conducted at Junior High School PGRI 1 Buduran Sidoarjo. This study aimed to examine the students’ perception of character
building in English textbooks. According to the research results that have been discussed before it can be concluded that regarding the students’ perceptions of
character building in the textbook. The students agreed that character-building is important and also found that character-building activities that are applied in
everyday life. The present is nine grade students‟ English textbook for Junior high school contains character education in the 2013 Curriculum and how those
character education values are represented in the textbook. The finding shows that three elements of character education values are represented in the textbook through
textual information with the limitation in categories, instructions, reading texts, dialogue texts, and quotes. Those character education values are appreciation, social
care, and responsibility, social care as one of the elements in character education, is found in two categories of textual information or written texts. Responsibility and
Social care, the second and the third elements of character education, are found in all four categories of textual information or written texts, instructions, reading texts,
dialogue texts, and quotes. Responsible, as the third element of character education, is found in instructions, reading texts, and quotes as 3 categories in textual
information. Above all, the students felt enthusiastic about the lesson. The students were given perceptions and opinions from character building about appreciation,
social care, and responsible.

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