Preschool Age Children's Learning Indonesian Language through Songs at Pgri Biru Kindergarten, Kahu District, Bone Regency

Muh. Safar

Muhammadiyah University of Bone, Indonesia

*email: [email protected]

Keywords

ABSTRACT

Learning, Indonesian, Preschool AGE, and Songs.

This research aims to describe 1) the process of learning Indonesian for preschool aged children through songs at PGRI Biru Kindergarten, Kahu District, Bone Regency and 2) Indonesian vocabulary whose meaning can be understood by preschool aged children which is acquired through songs at the park. PGRI Biru Children, Kahu District, Bone Regency. This research is a qualitative descriptive study using all learning activities and all the vocabulary contained in the songs used in PGRI Biru Kindergarten learning, Kahu District, Bone Regency. The data source is oral data from teachers and children of PGRI Biru Kindergarten, Kahu District, and Bone Regency and from songs used in learning. Data collection techniques were carried out using library and field techniques consisting of direct observation, interviews and recording. The results of the research show that the process of learning Indonesian through songs at PGRI Biru Kindergarten, Kahu District, Bone Kabupaten shows that of the 96 Indonesian words taught through songs, there are 70 words or 66.04% whose meaning can be understood by all children and 26 words or 33.96% whose meaning some children cannot understand. Thus it can be concluded that 1) the process of learning Indonesian through songs at the PGRI Kindergarten, Kahu District, and Bone Regency is applied to preschool children using imitation and play techniques. 2) Some of the vocabulary can be understood by all children and some words cannot be understood by the meaning of some children.

INTRODUCTION

Language plays an important role in human life, both in formal and casual settings. Without language, a person cannot communicate with other people. Language is a means of communication used to maintain social life. Through language a person can express intentions, thoughts and feelings to other people. Based on this, it can be understood that language is born to create reciprocal relationships between someone and other people.

Language is a communication tool that humans acquire from birth. A child's mastery of a language begins with the acquisition of the first language which is often called the mother tongue. Language acquisition is a very long process from the time a child does not know a language until he is fluent in the language. Language acquisition or language acquisition is a process that takes place in a child's brain when he acquires his first language or mother tongue (Fatmawati, 2015). The first time a child acquires language is in the family environment. For this reason, parents and families play an important role in children's language development. That is why parents must have the responsibility to prepare the facilities, shape the child's personality and character, and parents must have language mastery skills. This is because language skills are capital l skills in social interaction. Thus, language skills play a very important role in a child�s healthy life (Yuswati & Setiawati, 2022).

Language is so important for human life that it needs to be learned. Studying language is impossible without studying humans as its users. The thing that can connect language as a system and humans as language users is language development. Language is the ability to communicate with other people. Language is a form of communication, whether spoken, written or signed, which is based on a system of symbols (Jahja, 2011). Language consists of the words used by society along with the rules for arranging various variations and combining them. Language is very important in everyday life, everyone needs language to speak and listen to other people

Talking about language development means having to depart from the problem of language acquisition. This is in line with the opinion expressed by Tarigan (2015) who said that talking about children's language development means talking about their language, the acquisition of words, phrases and sentences.

The first thing that is clearly visible in language development and acquisition is the growth and addition of a child's vocabulary. The vocabulary they first acquire is basic vocabulary. In accordance with children's growth and development, this basic vocabulary develops into more general and more concrete vocabulary. Mastery and acquisition of a language occurs because of strong social relationships with native speakers of the language environment (Khotijah, 2013).

Children who are born psychologically normal will learn language either through their parents, close friends or the surrounding environment. A baby is born without speaking immediately. A baby begins to learn to speak by trying to imitate the language sounds he hears. Language acquisition that occurs from childhood will influence language development. Natsir (2017) explains that there are four phases of language development in children, namely: 1) bababel level (starting from 0 to 1 year old), 2) holophrase period (starting at 1 to 2 years old), 3) two-word utterance period (starting at the age of 2 to 2 years 6 months), and (4) the beginning of grammar (starting at the age of 2 years 6 months � up to 3 years and above). These four phases are related to the child's vocabulary acquisition.

Vocabulary acquisition in early childhood is very important to pay attention to. Chaer (2011) stated that in the language acquisition process there is a competency process and a performance process. Language acquisition experienced by preschool children is a necessity so children need to try to learn the language around them even if they are not physically and mentally ready. Children's language acquisition is something substantive because it really helps the acquisition of a second language and will help create second language learning theories. Adnyani, et al (2016) in their research on children's bilingual acquisition was based on the contribution of verbal language input obtained from adults. Adnyani's research showed that children acquire new vocabulary from paying attention to words that are often spoken by adults or those around them.

Language is an essential need for children who in their development process need positive stimulation from the surrounding environment. Games are a positive stimulus for children's language development. Learning while playing is a good teaching method for children. This is because the game will provide fun, excitement and enjoyment for children.

Providing stimulation for language development will not be perfect if we do not yet have a picture of children's language and things that relate to the nature and nature of language acquisition at that time. For this reason, it is necessary to collect information about this matter. However, language acquisition in preschool children in Indonesia is still rarely researched. The results of research on the language acquisition of preschool-aged children are very necessary for educational staff in the field, curriculum compilers, and language teaching staff in achieving educational goals.

The reason why the author conducted research on children's language acquisition was due to the assumption that: a) preschool age children, especially during the first few years, show dramatic changes in terms of language abilities. Most preschool AGE children learn language very quickly. b) Preschool AGE children have a high ability to memorize songs.

Kindergarten, Kahu District, Bone Regency is one of the assisted kindergartens in Bone Regency. In addition to the teaching methods used by teachers, they are adjusted to the learning materials, learning facilities and infrastructure. Most of the students speak Indonesian so the teacher uses Indonesian as the language of instruction.

Singing activities at PGRI Biru Kindergarten are carried out for approximately 60 minutes per day. This makes it possible to learn Indonesian by integrating it with songs. The songs that are often sung are children's songs for kindergarten AGE which are adapted to the learning theme.

RESEARCH METHODS

��������������� Research methods are implementation steps that must be taken to obtain research results and objectives. According to Sugiyono (2015) qualitative research methods are research methods used to examine the natural conditions of objects, the researcher is the key instrument, data collection techniques are carried out using triangulation (combination), data analysis is inductive and the results of qualitative research emphasize meaning rather than generalization. The type of research used in this research is descriptive with a qualitative approach. This means describing or illustrating Indonesian vocabulary whose meaning can be understood by preschool children which is obtained through songs.

Research variables are attributes and traits or values of people, factors, treatment of objects or activities that have certain variations determined by researchers to be studied or conclusions drawn (Siyoto et al., 2015). The variable observed in this research is a single variable, namely learning Indonesian through songs. The data in this research are all activities carried out in learning and all the vocabulary contained in songs used in learning at PGRI Biru Kindergarten, Kahu District, Bone Regency. V. Wiratna Sujarweni (2018) data source is the subject from which the research data was obtained. Data sources are teachers and preschool AGE children at PGRI Biru Kindergarten, Kahu District, Bone Regency and the songs used in learning.

Table 1

Condition of Number of PGRI Blue Kindergarten Students

Kahu District, Bone Regency

Class	Man	Woman	Amount
A	6	6	12
B	5	12	17
Amount	11	18	29

Source: PGRI Biru Kindergarten Data for 2018/2019 Academic Year

��������������� Techniques in this research are field techniques and library techniques. Field techniques are carried out by means of direct observation, interviews and recording. Data analysis was carried out after all data was collected using descriptive analysis techniques. Analysis is carried out in steps, namely: identifying, classifying and analyzing.

RESEARCH

1. Learning Process

��������������� Learning activities through songs at the PGRI Biru Kindergarten, Kahu District, and Bone Regency are routinely carried out for 60 minutes per day. Every day the teacher does not teach just one theme but the teacher presents several songs from various themes. However, the teacher still adjusts the students' abilities to the length of the song being sung. In the process of learning songs, teachers use various techniques. The techniques used by teachers are imitation and play.

��������������� Teachers go through several stages in the process of learning a song. First of all, the teacher sings the song in its entirety two or three times. After that, the teacher sings the song line by line and the children follow. After the song has been taught line by line, the teacher repeats the whole song once again. The final stage carried out is the same as the first stage. After that, the teacher sings the song in its entirety and the children follow.

��������������� This imitation technique is usually done by pointing to objects referred to in the song while singing. For example, in the song "Try Mentioning Friends", there are three types of objects that must be mentioned, namely: livestock, vegetables and fruit. For these types of objects, teachers use props such as pictures of livestock, pictures of vegetables, and pictures of fruit.

��������������� Another example, in the song "Nama-Nama Rasa", the teacher prepares things such as sugar, chilies, salt, coffee, pepper and vinegar. Each child tries or tastes each of these objects and then the teacher asks what it tastes like. Likewise, in the song "My Hands Are Two", the teacher lifts or points to the object referred to by each word sung. As in the words hand, right, left, foot, eye and ear. All these words are indicated while singing. Likewise, in the song "Vehicles and Drivers", the teacher continues to show the tools or media used in the learning process. Children often see the various types of vehicles mentioned in the song on social media or have heard of them. This really allows children to understand vehicle-themed words.

��������������� In contrast to the song "Nama- Nama Hari", the teacher uses memorization techniques. The teacher just teaches the order of the days each week.

2. Vocabulary Comprehension

��������������� Before presenting data analysis regarding vocabulary understanding, the background of the observation is first presented in a table listing the songs taught based on the learning theme.

Table 2

List of Learning Themes and Song Titles

No.	Theme	Song title	Understood Words	Ununderstood Words	Percentage (%)
1.	Living things	Try Mentioning Friends	14	3	82.35
2.	The five senses	Flavor Names	21	3	87.50
3.	I	I Have Two Hands	10	5	66.67
4.	Vehicle	Vehicles and Drivers	12	8	60
5	School	Names of Days	13	7	65
	Amount		70	26	66.04

��������������� Based on table 2, it can be seen that there are 5 (five) learning themes, each learning theme is represented by one song. Each song contains 15 � 20 words. For more details, it is explained as follows.

1. In the first lesson, the theme was "Living Creatures" with the song title "Try Mentioning Friends". For this song, there are 14 words whose meaning is understood by all children or 82.35% and 3 words whose meaning is not understood by children or 17.65%.

2. The second lesson raised the theme "Pancaindera" which was represented by a song entitled "Nama-Nama Rasa". In the second song, there are 21 or 87.50% of the words whose meaning the child understands and 3 or 12.50% of the words who�s meaning the child does not understand.

3. The third lesson has the theme "I", with the song title "My Hands Are Two". In this song there are 10 or 66.67% words whose meaning the child understands and 5 or 33.33% words whose meaning the child does not understand.

4. The fourth lesson has the theme "Vehicles" with the song title "Vehicles and Riders". In this song there are 12 or 60% of the words who�s meaning the child understands and 8 or 40% of the words whose meaning the child does not understand.

5. The fifth lesson has the theme "School" with the song title "Nama-Nama Hari". In this song there are 13 or 65% of the words who�s meaning the child understands and 7 or 35% of the words whose meaning the child does not understand.

Below we will present the data obtained from each song based on the learning themes taught during the lesson. For more details, please see the following table.

Table 3

Understanding the meaning of vocabulary in songs with the theme of living creatures

No.	Say	Word class	Children Who Understand Meaning	Naka who doesn't understand the meaning
1.	Try	Work	29 People	-
2.	Name it	Work	29 People	-
3.	Guys	Object	29 People	-
4.	Name	Object	29 People	-
5.	Animal	Object	29 People	-
6.	Cattle	Object	26 People	3 people
7.	Cow	Object	29 People	-
8.	Chicken	Object	29 People	-
9.	Goat	Object	29 People	-
10.	Vegetables	Object	29 People	-
11.	Beans	Object	7 People	22 People
12.	Mustard	Object	19 People	10 People
13.	Eggplant	Object	29 People	-
14.	Fruits	Object	29 People	-
15.	Guava	Object	29 People	-
16.	Orange	Object	29 People	-
17.	Banana	Object	29 People	-

Based on Table 3, understanding the meaning of vocabulary in songs with the theme "Living Creatures", there are two classes of words, namely nouns and verbs. There are 2 verbs and 15 nouns. The class of verbs referred to in the song are the words try and say. The meaning of these two words has been understood by all children. The classes of nouns in the theme of the song are: friends, names, animals, livestock, cows, chickens, goats, vegetables, beans, mustard greens, eggplants, fruits, guavas, oranges and bananas. From the class of nouns that have been mentioned, there are three words whose meaning children do not understand, namely the words livestock, beans, and mustard greens. There are 3 children who don't understand the word livestock, 22 children who don't understand the word mustard greens and 10 children who don't understand the word mustard greens.

Table 4

Understanding the Meaning of Vocabulary in Songs with Five Sensory Themes

No.	Say	Word class	Children Who Understand Meaning	Naka who doesn't understand the meaning
1.	Who	Pronouns	29 People
2.	Know	Work	29 People
3.	What	Pronouns	29 People	-
4.	Flavor	Object	29 People	-
5.	Sugar	Object	29 People	-
6.	Sweet	Characteristic	26 People	3 people
7.	That	Pronouns	29 People	-
8.	Chili	Object	24 People	5 People
9.	Spicy	Characteristic	29 People	-
10.	I	Pronouns	29 People	-
11.	Not	Task	29 People	-
12.	Salt	Object	29 People
13.	Salty	Characteristic	29 People	-
14.	All	Numeralia	29 People	-
15.	Name	Object	29 People	-
16.	We	Pronouns	1 person	28 People
17.	Must	Task	29 People	-
18.	Don't	Task	29 People	-
19.	Forget	Work	29 People	-
20.	Coffee	Object	29 People	-
21.	Bitter	Characteristic	29 People	-
22.	Pepper	Object	1 person	28 People
23.	Vinegar	Object	29 People	-
24.	Sour	Characteristic	29 People	-

��������������� Based on table 4, understanding the meaning of vocabulary in songs with the theme "Pancaindera", there are 6 classes of words which are divided into 2 verb classes, 8 noun classes, 5 adjective classes, 5 pronominal word classes, 3 task word classes, and class word numeralia 1 piece.

Table 5

Understanding the Meaning of Vocabulary in Songs with the Theme �I�

No.	Say	Word class	Children Who Understand Meaning	Naka who doesn't understand the meaning
1.	My hand	Object	29 People
2.	There is	Work	29 People
3.	Two	Numeralia	26 People	3 people
4.	Which	Task	27 People	2 persons
5.	Right	Object	26 People	3 people
6.	Left	Object	26 People	3 people
7.	Write	Work	29 People	-
8.	With	Task	27 People	2 persons
9.	Alone	Pronouns	29 People	-
10.	My feet	Object	29 People	-
11.	Walk	Work	29 People	-
12.	My eyes	Object	29 People
13.	See	Work	29 People	-
14.	My ears	Object	29 People	-
15.	Hear	Work	29 People	-

���������������

Based on table 5 regarding understanding the meaning of vocabulary in songs with the theme "I", it can be seen that in the song there are 6 nouns, 5 verbs, 1 numeral word, 2 task words, and 1 pronoun word.

��������������� The classes of nouns found in songs with the theme "I" are the words my hand, right, left, my feet, my eyes, and my ears. There are 2 words in these six words whose meaning the child does not understand. The meaning of the other four words is understood by the child. While the verb classes are writing, walking, seeing, and hearing. The meaning of all these words is understood by the child. The other word classes are 2 task class words and 1 number word. For the task word class, there are words that and words with. In this word there are 2 children who do not understand the meaning of the word. Likewise with words where there are 2 children who do not understand the meaning of the word.

Table 6

Understanding the meaning of vocabulary in songs with vehicle themes

No.	Say	Word class	Children Who Understand Meaning	Naka who doesn't understand the meaning
1.	Hear	Work	29 People	-
2.	Hi	Task	29 People	-
3.	Guys	Object	29 People	-
4.	Name	Object	279People	-
5.	Vehicle	Object	29 People	-
6.	The rider	Object	29 People	-
7.	Car	Object	29 People	-
8.	Driver	Object	29 People	-
9.	Train	Object	29 People	-
10.	Machinist	Object	1 person	28 People
11.	Boat	Object	29 People	-
12.	Sea	Object	29 People	-
13.	Skipper	Object	1 person	28 People
14.	Aircraft	Object	29 People	-
15.	Pilot	Object	1 person	28 People
16.	Terminal	Object	3 people	26 People
17.	Station	Object	1 person	28 People
18.	Harbor	Object	3 people	26 People
19.	Airport	Object	3 people	26 People
20	Dismissal	Object	16 People	13 People

��������������� Based on table 6, in the song with the theme "Vehicles" there is 1 verb class, 1 task word class, and 18 noun classes. The word that belongs to the verb class is the word hear and for the class of task words is the word hi. Meanwhile, 18 words in the noun class are: friend, name, vehicle, driver, car, driver, train, engineer, ship, sea, captain, plane, pilot, terminal, station, port, airport and stop. Of the 18 nouns, there are 8 words whose meaning the child does not understand.

��������������� The meaning of the eight classes of nouns was not understood by 28 children. For the word machinist, there were 28 people who did not understand its meaning. Likewise with the word captain, there were 28 who did not understand its meaning. Meanwhile, for the words port and airport, there were 26 people who did not understand the meaning of these words. In contrast to the word dismissal, there were 13 people who did not understand the meaning of the word.

Table 7

Understanding the Meaning of Vocabulary in School-themed Songs

No.	Say	Word class	Children Who Understand Meaning	Naka who doesn't understand the meaning
1.	Monday	Object	29 People	-
2.	Tuesday	Object	27 People	2 persons
3.	Wednesday	Object	27 People	2 persons
4.	Thursday	Object	27 People	2 persons
5.	Friday	Object	27 People	2 persons
6.	Saturday	Object	27 People	2 persons
7.	Sunday	Object	29 People	-
8.	That	Pronouns	29 People	-
9.	Name	Object	29 People	-
10.	Day	Object	29 People	-
11.	Diligent	Characteristic	29 People	-
12.	School	Object	29 People	-
13.	Quick	Characteristic	27 People	2 persons
14.	Clever	Characteristic	29 People	-
15.	Child	Object	29 People	-
16.	Which	Task	27 People	2 persons
17.	Lazy person	Object	29 People	-
18.	No	Task	29 People	-
19.	Go on	Work	29 People	-
20	Class	Object	29 People	13 People

���������������

Based on table 6. Understanding the meaning of vocabulary in songs with the theme "School" there are 13 classes of nouns, 1 class of verbs, 3 classes of adjectives, 1 class of pronouns, and 2 classes of task words. The noun classes in the song are the words Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, name, day, school, child, lazy, and class. In the noun class there are 5 words whose meaning some children cannot understand, namely the words Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. There were 2 children who didn't understand the word. The verb class is up. The meaning of the word rise has been understood by children. The adjective class contained in table 6 consists of 3 words. The words in question are diligent, quick, and smart. These three words belong to the adjective class and there is 1 word whose meaning the 2 children do not understand, namely the word quickly. For the pronoun class there is 1 word, namely the word that. The meaning of this word was understood by 29 children. The last word is a word that is classified as a task word, consisting of 2 words. The words in question are the words that and the words that are not. For words there are 2 children who don't understand the meaning. Meanwhile, the meaning of the word no was understood by 29 children

DISCUSSION

��������������� In the noun class, there are several words whose meanings are not understood because children rarely see these objects, such as beans, mustard greens, machinist, captain, pilot, terminal, station, port and airport. The meaning of some words is also not understood because these objects have two names, such as the word chili, namely Lombok, and the word pepper, namely pepper. These two words (chili and pepper) are rarely used. There are other words that are included in the noun class whose meaning children do not understand, namely the words livestock, right, left, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and stop . The meaning of the words right and left is not understood by some children because they cannot differentiate between the three words. The meaning of the words Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday was not understood by 2 children because neither of them could memorize the order of the names of the days well. Meanwhile, the meaning of the word stop was not understood by 13 children because the word was a constructed word. The meaning of the word livestock is not understood because children rarely hear this word. Children can understand if it is said to be an animal or a pet animal. In contrast to the verb class, all children understand the meaning of the word. This is because the vocabulary belonging to the verb class in these five words is included in the basic verbs. The basic vocabulary included in the work class in the five songs is the words write, walk, see, hear, and ride. Meanwhile, the meaning of the word try can be understood because the word is the regional language of the local community, which means the same as the word try in Indonesian, so this word is often heard by children.

��������������� The class of adjectives whose meaning the 2 children did not understand was the word fast. The meaning of the word quickly is not understood by children because the word is rarely used in conversation. A frequently used word that has the same meaning is the word fast. Meanwhile, the meaning of other words, which are included in the adjective class, are understood by all children because this vocabulary is the basic vocabulary in the adjective class. The words in question are sweet, spicy, salty, bitter, sour, diligent, and smart.

The pronoun class contained 1 word whose meaning was not understood by 28 children, namely the word we. The meaning of our words is not understood because of the influence of regional languages which use our words as a form of appreciation for other people. Children do not understand the meaning of the words we as I and us. However, children are more familiar with the meaning of greetings of appreciation. Meanwhile, the meaning of other words belonging to the pronoun class in the five songs has been understood by all children because this vocabulary includes the basic vocabulary for the adjective class. The words in question are who, what, that, me, and myself.

��������������� The task word class contained 2 words whose meaning the 2 children did not understand, namely the word yang and the word with. The meaning of these two words is not understood by some children because the children rarely use these words due to the influence of regional language dialects. Meanwhile, children understand the meaning of other words which are included in the task word class, such as the words no, must, don�t, and hi. These four words include the basic vocabulary for the task word class.

��������������� The numeralia word class contained 1 word whose meaning was not understood by 3 children, namely the word two. The child does not understand the meaning of the word two because the child cannot memorize the sequence of numbers well even though the word is included in the basic vocabulary for the numeralia word class. Meanwhile, the meaning of other words, such as all, is understood by all children because this vocabulary is the basic vocabulary for the numeralia class. The meaning of the word all can be understood by children because the word does not require counting by ordering numbers. The meaning of the word all means everything without any remainder.

CONCLUSION

��������������� Based on the research results, it can be concluded that learning through the five song themes at PGRI Biru Kindergarten in Kahu District involves the teacher's use of imitation and play techniques for language acquisition. Out of the 96 Indonesian words introduced through songs, 70 words, or 66.04%, were comprehensible to all children, while 26 words, or 33.96%, were not understood by some of the children. Among the songs employed for learning, these 26 words were categorized into 20 noun classes, 1 verb class, 1 pronoun class, 3 task word classes, and 1 numeral word class.

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