EMPOWERING EFL STUDENTS IN LEARNING ENGLISH THROUGH SONGS

Megha Chahya Risdeani

Email: meghachahya.r@gmail.com

Swadaya Gunung Jati University, Cirebon

Abstract
The study was a qualitative research. It was purposed to know the students’ awareness and
students’ motivation in learning English as a Foreign Language through songs. The respondents
were 7th grade students in junior high school. The observation, questionnaire, and interview
conducted to answer the students’ awareness that consists of three aspects: emotional, self-
assessment, and self-confidence. The results of observation showed that 70% or more than half
of the students have self-awareness. However, not all of the students who have self-awareness
were also aware to all of the aspects. The results of questionnaire and interview showed that the
emotional awareness was higher among the other aspects. The questionnaire and interview
conducted to answer the students’ motivation through songs. The results of the data showed that
songs can motivate the students and the students become more enthusiasts in learning English by
using songs. This result was confirmed by their behavior in the learning process.

Keywords: Students’ Awareness, Students’ Motivation, English as a Foreign Language (EFL),

songs.

INTRODUCTION
English has been called as the first foreign language in Indonesia. In Indonesia, foreign
language has been taught almost in all grade of schools, start from elementary school until high
school. English has been set as an international language, which means that the role of English is
important, so learning English as a foreign language has an important role in education in
Indonesia, but most of the students are less satisfied and less confident in their abilities in
English even though they have studied it for several years at school. They think that this
language is only a foreign language that is not too important to learn and there are various other
reasons in this issue, one of the reasons are the students’ interest in learning is lack. The students
need some empower to increase their enthusiastic in learning. Therefore, this study focuses on
students’ motivation that is influenced by encouragement through songs.

Empowerment of psychological has two components, there are intrapersonal and

interactional. Intrapersonal empowerment refers to self-efficacy, competence, and motivation,
while interactional empowerment is something that is related to the awareness and skills to
interact with others (Zimmerman, 1995 in Petrovcic & Petric, 2014). Students’ empowerment
fostered by the students’ active participation in the classroom, team members’ support, constant
reflection, and dialogical interactions. Empowering is not a static trait, however it can have
varies time by time therefore anyone can deal with situations of empowerment or disempowering
(Zimerman, 1995 cited in Owston, 2018). Empowerment has a positive impact that affects to
motivation. To give an empowerment, stimulus, or strengthen to the students, it takes the
students’ self-awareness in learning, so that the students will feel motivated.

Timucin (2013) defined that awareness is the term of board, can be defined as knowing that
certain quality is important. Raising awareness is to provide information and educate people
about a topic by influencing their behavior and vulnerability to achieve a predetermined goal.
Awareness also have a relationship with mental, and it can affect to their motivation and
attention. When the students are aware and have awareness of learning, they will be more
motivated to learn.

Motivation is an emotional reaction that can make someone more eager to do something.
According to Vero & Puka (2017 as cited from Merriam-Webster, 1997) defined that motivation
is process of motivating; conditions motivating; strength influence; stimulus; something desires
or needs that cause a person to act and also stated that motivation is an attempt to achieve a
desired outcome (DuBrin, 2008; Williams & Williams, 2011 as cited in Vero & Puka, 2017).
Motivation in learning itself is an emotion that can encourage students to be more excited and
interested in learning, so that they can actively participate in learning activities.

Student especially young learners still have a childish nature and what they think is just
playing and having fun. Lee & Lin (2015) stated that using songs on learning in the young
learner classroom allows them to be more happy and relaxed. Most of the children really like
singing and it is also one of the factors that will make them happy. Besides that, there are other
benefits that can increase student interest and motivate them to pay more attention to the learning
process. In addition songs also create a relaxed classroom atmosphere, so the students are not too
tense in learning. Students often assume that songs can reduce anxiety and make them more
relaxed, therefore learning through songs will make the students more enjoy the classroom
activities and they will more interested in learning (Nadera, 2015). This has been reviewed from
a several journals that investigated the use of songs towards the students’ motivation and showed
positive result that songs can motivated in the young learner classrooms.

Many studies have suggested that using songs in English learning has the advantages in the
various aspects such as pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar, and as well as aspects on their
English skills such as listening, reading, and speaking. In addition, songs also give the effect to
empower the students learning but this topic have not explored thoroughly especially for EFL
classroom. So that, the writer chose the topic of the study about empowering or motivating
English for a Foreign Language (EFL) students through songs especially for young learners and
focused on the situations in English Learning to explore the following research questions:
1. How are the students’ awareness in learning English through songs?
2. Do songs motivate the students in learning English as a Foreign Language?
 The result of this study benefit not only for the teacher and the students, but it can be used as
a reference for the other researcher who wants to conduct similar research topics and expected to
provide information about the students’ awareness and motivation in learning English through
songs.

LITERATURE REVIEW
A. English as a Foreign Language in Indonesia
English as a Foreign Language is the use of language that used by the speakers who have
different native languages. For example, Indonesia has Indonesian as the first language, so
English is one of the foreign languages, while the first language used in Australia is English
so the use of English is as the First language not the foreign language. Arung (2015)
explained the reasons why foreign language should be taught and what is the purpose of
foreign language learning. This is concerned to bring Indonesian people into global
challenges in any real sector so that Indonesia will not be a lagging country. The value of
knowledge is also the reason why English must be learned as a foreign language. English as a
foreign language is different with English as a Second language.
Chou (2014) said the influence of the first language must be considered and took into
account in teaching foreign languages. That is because if the knowledge of the first language
is still lack, it will also have an impact on the process of learning foreign languages, so that
the attraction of learning English language as a foreign language will decrease. There are
three factors that influence the effectiveness of English as foreign language learning, class
size, motivation, and teaching focus (Sulistiyo, 2009; Sulistiyo, 2016), Sulistiyo (2016 as
cited from Bradford, 2007) also said that the qualifications of the teacher is one of the factors
that affect learning English as a foreign language to be more effective. Therefore, it requires
supporting factors that can influence and attract students’ interest in learning English as a
foreign language itself.

Most of Indonesian people are less interested in learning foreign language and think that
for what they are learning a foreign language while their knowledge and abilities in the first
language are still lacking. Actually in some countries, English has become a second
language, but in Indonesia, English is still considered as a foreign language. So, why English
in Indonesia is still as a foreign language? It is because the role of the first language and
regional languages which may still be the second language in each region. The role of
 English in Indonesia also mostly as the language that learned only in the classroom, not as a
language used to communicate in daily activity. So that is why English in Indonesia still as a
Foreign Language.

B. Students’ Empowerment
Petrovcic & Petric (2014 as cited from Zimmerman, 1995) stated that empowerment of
psychological has two components, namely intrapersonal and interactional. Intrapersonal
empowerment refers to self-efficacy, competence, and motivation, while interactional
empowerment is something that is related to the awareness and skills to interact with others.
Student empowerment means giving young people the opportunity to actively participate in
school activities and decisions that will shape their lives, lives of their family and lives of
their peers. It is understood as the process that gives students the capacity to be in charge of
their individual and group work and improve their own and group performances (Leon &
Castro, 2017). Empowerment has a positive impact that affects to motivation. To give an
empowerment, stimulus, or strengthen to the students, it takes the students’ self-awareness in
learning, so that the students will feel motivated.

Self-Awareness
Timucin (2013) defined that awareness is the term of board, can be defined as knowing
that certain quality is important. Raising awareness is to provide information and educate
people about a topic by influencing their behavior and vulnerability to achieve a
predetermined goal. Boyatzis (1999, cited from Nu’man, 2019) presents several components
in self-awareness. The first, emotional awareness is the ability to recognize the emotions and
the effects. The second is self-assessment, knowing the strength or ability and limitation of
self. The third is self-confidence, believe in the capabilities possessed.
According to Goleman (2009) in his book “Emotional Intelligence”, the students who
have emotional awareness will know what they are feeling and why they can occur and how
the effects on their learning activity. Besides that, they will realize and know how the
emotions affect their learning process, and they will aware to their goals in learning and the
values of learning. Self-assessment is able to know the abilities and limitations. Students who
have self-assessment will be able to know and aware to their strengths and weaknesses in
learning, they will learn from experience and introspect to continue developing their abilities
and improve their inability. The last is self-confidence. Students who have self-confidence
will believe in their abilities and they will tend to be brave to show their abilities.
Students’ awareness of learning has an impact that affect to their behavior when the
learning process take places, such as being more active in participating, enthusiasm in
learning and giving more attention. In addition, the improvement carried out by students’
self-awareness is that they will understand better and understand what they want from the
learning process and also what goals they will achieve. Awareness also have a relationship
with mental, and it can affect to their motivation and attention. When the students are aware
and have awareness of learning, they will be more motivated to learn.

Motivation
Motivation is process of motivating; conditions motivating; strength influence; stimulus;
something desires or needs that cause a person to act (Vero & Puka, 2017 as cited from
Merriam-Webster, 1997) and an attempt to achieve a desired outcome (DuBrin, 2008;
Williams & Williams, 2011, p. 2 as cited in Vero & Puka, 2017). Werang (2018, Gredler et.
al, 2004) defined that motivation is a movement that moves someone to do or not to do
anything, and motivation as the ability of someone to achieve they benefits goals (Johnson
and Johnson, 2003 in Werang, 2018).
Motivation consists of two factors, internal and external. The internal motivation is
defined as doing an activity because of the satisfaction to be gained by doing it, and this kind
of motivation also provides enjoyment and challenge for the people who do (Salikin, et. al.,
2017). Internal factor is based on their interests and enthusiasm (Shen, 2009). The external
motivation as factors related to the objective of doing an activity is to get some separated
results (Salikin, et. al., 2017) and the external factor is from the environment, friends or
teachers (Shen, 2009). When someone behavior is triggered by themselves to fulfill their own
needs or desires and their curiosity is arise it is called internal motivation. External
motivation is something that influence someone actions that comes from outside or the
environment such as punishment, appreciation, or social pressure (Arens, Morin, &
Watermann, 2015 in Riswanto & Aryani, 2017).
Those factors have a different impact on students’ motivation in learning. Internal
motivation influence the students where their quality in learning is better (Niemiec & Ryan,
2009 in Vibulphol, 2016), they will be more participate in the process (Garn & Jolly, 2014 in
 Vibulphol, 2016), more persistent and active (Cho, 2012; Deci & Ryan, 2008 in Vibulphol,
2016), and also more likely to develop and learn independently (Deci & Ryan, 2008; Ling
2013; Niemiec & Ryan, 2009; Taylor et. al., 2014 in Vibulphol, 2016). So from that, both
factors are very important and have relevance that can motivate the students. The students
not only need motivation from their internal but should be accompanied by external support
in the form of encouragement and strengthening of their environment, for example the
encouragement from the teachers.

C. Songs in Language Learning

The use of song has some impacts on learning foreign languages. Song can increase the
student ability in English skills such as Speaking skill, listening skill, pronunciation,
vocabulary mastery, and grammar (Shen, 2009). Davis (2017) stated that songs become one
of the most recommended media in learning English for young learners. Learning English
through songs can improve the students’ self-confidence and increasing students’ enthusiasm
(Wijayanti, 2016). Lee & Lin (2015) also argue that using songs makes students motivated
and interested to learn because learning by using song will make the students enjoying the
class activity. Using song has many benefits in learning English. Songs are one of a way to
learning English that can make relax and feel more fun, and also can increase the enthusiasm
in learning (Lee & Lin, 2015). Using songs can make the students who are shy or introverted
more open and active to participate in the learning process so that they can practice to
improve their self-confidence. Songs also help the students to develop their motoric skills.

Song has several effects that can affect students' learning motivation. Using English song
in EFL classrooms can successfully bring affective learning through providing a harmonious
classroom atmosphere, reducing students’ anxiety, fostering their interests and motivation to
learn (Shen, 2009). Therefore, by using songs it will help the students to be easier to interest
in learning English because it is make them feel more relax and enjoy the classroom activity.
Positive effects on songs can reduce stress and improve mood. If using the right song at the
time of learning, it will make them enjoy the learning process relaxed and can increase their
energy and enthusiasm for learning. Songs can also be used in learning by singing together
which will add to their pleasure.
METHODS
In this study the writer used a qualitative research to gain the data. The study conducted in
Junior High School. The class used as a classroom research was first grade students in Junior
High School. The data required for this study collected by used observation, questionnaire and
interview to got valid data. Observation is one of the data collection where data collector
observed in visual the indication of observed as well as the observation is in the form of a note so
validities data is heavily dependent on the ability to observed (Widyoko, 2013:46), and Nasution
(1991:152) defined observation is the basis of all the science, scientist just can work based on the
data.

In this research the writer used observation sheet to support the research. Observation sheet is
used to measure student learning awareness and motivation during the learning process. For the
questionnaire the writer decided to use Guttman scales. The sort of questionnaire is closed-ended
questions. The writer presents ten questions that incudes question about students’ awareness and
students’ motivation. There are two options in the questionnaire, the participant only needs to
choose ‘Yes’ or ‘No’. The writer used this questionnaire to answer the research questions since
this type of questionnaire will make the participant easier to answer the question and to make the
writer easier in analyzing the data. The type of interview that the writer used was semi-structured
interview. The type of question used open-ended question, which is in accordance with the
nature of qualitative research to find out the experiences of the participants (Creswell, 2012). The
writer will ask six questions for interviewing the participant and use audio recording while the
interview is running.

FINDING AND DISCUSSIONS

The objectives of this research are to analyze the students’ awareness and the students’
motivation in learning English through songs. In getting the data, the writer examines 35 students
of 7th grade in one of junior high school in Cirebon. The writer elaborated the data analysis based
on research question. The first is tells about the students’ awareness in learning English through
songs and the second is tells about the students motivation in learning English through songs
Students’ Awareness in Learning English through Songs
The Data used to answer the first research question are observation, questionnaire, and
interview. Based on the results of observation, showed that 80% or almost of the students have
self-awareness contain of the indicator of self-awareness, there were emotional, self-assessment,
and self-confidence. From that results also showed that the students’ self-confidence still lack
compared to emotional and self-assessment. Based on the questionnaire result, it showed that the
students who have an emotional awareness more than 80% however, the students who have self-
assessment only less of 60%. Almost all of the students already have awareness, the students
were aware of the emotion that affect to the learning process and also aware to their abilities.
Although there were some students who already have an emotional awareness, however they
were not aware on their abilities yet.
Questionnaire result of students’ awareness

100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
Awareness
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Emotional Self-Assessment

The writer transcribed the results of the interviews that have been conducted to five students
and reduced or summarized the data to bring out a clear picture.
Based on the data obtained from the observation sheet, questionnaire sheet, and interview on
the students’ awareness in learning English as a Foreign Language through songs showed that
almost all of the students already have self-awareness. Especially in the emotional aspect where
students already know the emotions they have in the learning process and know the value of
learning English. Meanwhile, the aspect of self-assessment was still not optimal because there
were some students or about half of the students that have self-awareness who were not aware of
their abilities. Most of the students known the goals and the values of learning English, and more
than half of the students were also aware of their abilities, especially in learning English through
songs. However, only a few students who could show their abilities, it means that the students’
awareness in self-confidence is still lacking. The writer found that the students who had self-
awareness may not necessarily have all of the indicators of awareness. There are students who
have optimal self-awareness by having all of three aspects of awareness and there are also the
students who were still not optimal yet and only aware on one of aspect or not aware on one of
aspect yet. Therefore the level of the students’ awareness was still less than optimal.

Students’ Motivation in Learning English through Songs

The results obtained from the questionnaire sheet for students’ motivation in learning English
as a Foreign Language through songs showed that the students felt more motivated during the
learning English process and the results also explained more from the data interview.

Table 4.3 The data of Questionnaire for Students’ Motivation

The Students’
Question Percentage
response
Number
Yes No Yes No

1 29 6 83% 17%

2 30 5 86% 14%

3 27 8 77% 23%

4 25 10 71% 29%

5 27 8 77% 23%

Based on the data, the students who agree or answered ‘yes’ more dominant than the students
who answered ‘no’. It means that songs can motivate the students. The students also explained in
the interview that songs motivated because the learning process became more fun and not boring.
In addition, there is much that can be learned through songs, which is it can increase vocabulary
mastery and pronunciation. The students also thought that using songs became easier to
remember the material. Based on the results above, the writer found that the students felt the
learning English through songs were fun, make the students more enthusiasm and enjoy the
learning process with relax and not bored. Indirectly, it was affects to the students’ internal
motivation. Therefore, the students were motivated and participate in the learning process.

Discussion
The writer observed the students’ awareness based on the indicators of self-awareness
according to Goleman (2009) in his book “Emotional Intelligence” that identified self-
awareness made up of emotional awareness, self-assessment, and self-confidence. Among
the three aspects of self-awareness that is more often or more widely realized and shown by
the students is emotional awareness, it indicated by their behavior in the classroom. The
students who have self-awareness showed their interest by gave more attention and focus on
the learning process. Nu’man (2019 cited from Mudana, 2014) also stated that the students’
awareness can be shown by their behavior during learning process. The findings above said
that the students who have self-awareness may not necessarily have all of three aspects of
awareness. The reason is the emergence of self-awareness is influenced by the students’
experience, as stated by Munoz (2014) that awareness begins to emerge and develop with
increasing students’ cognitive abilities and their experience. When the students experience
were increase, the students’ awareness also develops.
The use of songs in learning English increased the students’ interest and motivation, it
showed by the students’ behavior in the learning process. The students showed an interest
which causes the students participate more in their activities. According to Vero & Puka
(2017 as cited from Williams & Williams, 2011) that when the students were motivated, they
would pay attention to learning, participate in the learning process, and they would be more
enthusiastic and enjoy to learned. In addition, songs can motivate the students because fun
and enjoy, songs also can increase the students’ vocabulary and it is easier to remember. The
results of the study that conducted by Haghverdi (2015) in Iran showed that songs have
benefits for vocabulary mastery and improved the students memory of vocabulary, therefore
it was easier to remember.
This research showed the results that songs can motivates the students internally. Some
previous research also showed that songs can affect the students’ motivation, where songs
make the students more enthusiastic and develops a positive attitude in learning. Shen (2009)
carried out the study about the use of songs in language teaching, and showed the results that
songs encouraging and motivating the students, and increase the students learning awareness.
CONCLUSIONS
This study purposes to find out how the students’ awareness in learning English through
songs and whether the songs can motivate students in learning English. Related to the
research finding and discussion in the previous chapter, it can be concluded that most of the
students have awareness in learning English through songs. The writer found that the
students’ awareness that is more often or more widely realized and shown by the students is
emotional awareness. Learning English through songs is more interesting, fun, and it shows
that the students already have an emotional awareness. However, the students are still lack to
be aware in their abilities and not confident to show the abilities.

The use of songs in learning English increased the students’ interest and motivation.
Songs make the students more enthusiastic and enjoy the learning process in a relaxed and
fun way. In addition, the lyrics of the songs can also increase the students’ vocabulary
mastery and make the students easier to remember. Therefore, songs can motivate the
students in learning English as a Foreign Language.
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