DEALING WITH APPLICATION-BASED MATERIALS FOR GRAMMAR (A CASE STUDY OF USING NST TOEFL EXPLORER AND GENIUS TOEFL APPLICATION AS THE LEARNING MEDIA)

Abstract

The role of technology in education cannot be denied. Both lecturers and students believe that technology makes everything more effective and efficient. In the context of teaching and learning Grammar in Error Analysis Course at STKIP PGRI Pasuruan, the lecturer and the students agreed to use NST TOEFL Explorer and Genius TOEFL application as the learning Media. As the media, NST TOEFL Explorer provides Tutorial menu which contains parts of grammar materials with English explanatory. While Genius TOEFL discusses the grammar materials with Bahasa (Indonesian) in Kunci Structure (Keys on Structure) menu. It is not simply about the different language used in both applications. But, it is urgent to find out the students’ attitude; how the students should operate the applications and activate their cognition to review the materials in both applications. Furthermore, discovering the students’ difficulties in using both applications is also important since it could give instructional consideration for better learning achievement. The researchers also concerned on understanding how the students can deal with the difficulties so that both applications as the learning media could give cognitive effect and motivation to the students. This research was designed as descriptive research. This employed observation with field notes, open-questionnaire, interview, and documentation as the research instruments. The data were analyzed qualitatively by confirming the results with some relevant studies. This research concluded that application-based materials for grammar still need extra effort to understand in terms of technical and non- technical aspects. Based on the findings of the students’ attitude toward the use of NST TOEFL Explorer and Genius TOEFL Application, the researchers here could also review the claim of technology effectiveness and efficiency for teaching and learning grammar.