Our society accustomed to an old-fashioned thought
which is believed that teaching was only the process of transferring knowledge.
This teaching method was implemented by explaining lessons, giving examination,
and marking students’ competence based on the result of the examination. As the
result, students were constructed to get the score instead of getting the
knowledge itself. Unlike in the past, now teachers are no longer using those
thoughts because they have realized their functions as facilitators.
Furthermore, there is an approach that can give solution in educating our
students, which is Humanistic. This approach deals with the ways how students
gain knowledge, experience and find the meaning personally (Hitipeuw, 2009).
We all know that a teacher is not only has duty to
teach students, but also to facilitate them. This is what Humanistic approach
plays its role. Considering that a student is different from one to another,
Honey and Mumford as two of several Humanistic experts discovered that there
were four types of students (Budiningsih, 2005) in studying. Moreover, they
also found that students will be more interested in lessons if teachers involve
students’ abilities in the learning process especially English. In my opinion,
the most suitable teaching method for applying Humanistic is in group
discussions because it can assemble all different students. However, some
people believe that Humanistic approach has been considered as a difficult
approach to carry out. In this essay, will deal with the types of students
including their characteristics and how this involvement can influence their
interest in studying English.
The first part of learning styles which we are going
to deal with is activists. In this case, those who are activists can be
distinguished based on the ways work in group discussions. Activist students
tend to involve themselves in any activities and participate actively to have
experiences. As an example, if a teacher assigns students to discuss a
material, the teacher can see their enthusiasm obviously. It can happen
considering they like and are capable of doing activities in groups. To be
known, Peter Honey and Alan Mumford consider them as gregarious students who
like involving themselves with others. Moreover, their philosophy is “I'll try anything once", so we can
figure out how they are.
While they have strength in group activity, they are
weak in considering consequences of their activities. In this case, they act
first and consider the consequences afterwards (Accessed on December 13, 2010; www.mftrou.com).
In the learning process, teachers can place those students as heads and
representatives of groups because they can believe in people easily and those
are open-minded students. As stated in www.mftrou.com, Honey and Mumford suggest
them as the agents in learning process. Talking about the teaching method which
can dig their abilities up, teachers also can use problem-solving and brainstorming
connected to current issues (Budiningsih, 2005).
The following type of students which is discovered by
Honey and Mumford are reflectors students. These students have strengths in
considering many perspectives. In contrasts to the activist students, they are
very careful and capable of concluding any determination. We can see obviously
in group discussion in which they consider any details which might occur
concerning about the material. For example, when a teacher assigns his/her
students to discuss about abortion,
these observer students will think hardly to find details from many angles
related to it and they will consider any decisions which are made by the
activists students as their leaders. Additionally, these observer students have
to be taught to believe in their friends through the group discussions because
they are difficult to be influenced. Therefore, the two experts propose to
include them as reviewers (www.mftrou.com). In my opinion, the
teachers can assign them to analyze their own groups, so they can sharpen their
abilities well and overcome their problems. Probably, teaching methods which
are suitable for the reflectors are paired
discussion and observing activities related
to western cultures.
Subsequently, let us jump to the third classification
of students which is theorist. Theorist students as its name are those who like
criticizing, analyzing, and thinking rationally. Unlike activist and observers
students, whatever in their mind is always brought back to concepts and laws
(Budiningsih, 2005). Theorists also have a philosophy which is, “If it is
logical then it is good.” They keen on analyzing topics step-by-step still in
logical way and their philosophies always based on rationality and logic (www2.le.ac.uk).
Thus, we can hardly classify students into theorist students only from the way
they behave because even though they like criticizing, they seem like skeptical
and do not care about their surroundings. In this case, when a teacher assigns
them to work in group activities, they cannot stand working with activists
because theorists are out of tune with them (www.peterhoney.com). As an
example, when an English teacher assigns them to discuss about simple present
tense, those theorist students will be keen on finding concepts of the
material, connect it to their logic thoughts, etc. Here, the quarrel occurs
between activists and theorist when they come to conclusion. It can be seen
when activists who are confidents to present their group discussion, while
theorists have not done yet with their analyses. However, English teachers can
explore and overcome those theorist students’ problems in learning by applying several teaching
methods such as reading short stories and finding background of information (www2.le.ac.uk).
The last characteristic of student according to Peter
Honey and Alan Mumford is pragmatist students. Holistically, the pragmatist
students are practical students. As its name, practical here means that those
students do not like dealing with theories and concepts and prefer to try out
new ideas before coming to the conclusion. Let us suppose that an English
teacher engages his/her students to discuss about how to face transgender people. They will be eager
to find the solution of that problem. In this case, the pragmatist students
will thoroughly ask about the implementation of the solution starts from what
are those solutions, how to implement them, until who are those who must be
responsible for the existence of those transgender
people. Additionally, similar to activist and theorist students, pragmatist
students also have philosophies which are, “"There is always a better
way" and "If it works it is good" (www2.le.ac.uk).
Furthermore, if we talk about pragmatists’ weaknesses we can find facts where
they do not interested in lessons, especially activities which are distant from
reality and there is no obvious reward of the learning activities (www.peterhoney.com).
English teachers can use teaching methods such like case studies, project
learning, and problem solving to
explore these pragmatist students. Even though pragmatists appear to be so
practical, but actually they are good students. It can be perceived from their
thoughts which all things will be useful if they can be practiced and used to
the betterment of humankind (Budiningsih, 2005).
After knowing those classifications of students above
according to Honey and Mumford’s theory, let us have a look at the influence of
involving students’ abilities in learning process. Firstly, let us deals with
the effect to the students which is occurred by teachers. In this case, the
teachers’ actions in involving students’ abilities make students feel that they
are appreciated by their teachers (Hitipeuw, 2009). As stated in the first
paragraph that a student is different one to another, by dividing students into
four types then merging them into groups, can
make them find the real themselves. Secondly, we are going to find out
the impact if students feel that they are appreciated by teachers. In this
case, students will engage themselves to the lesson without having any pressure
from anything. As a result, students will enjoy studying the lesson. Thirdly,
let us have a look at the effect if students enjoy the lesson. Moreover, they
have expectation when they come to class. They expect that their teachers will
teach them well. It is indeed that the teachers who have abilities in involving
students’ abilities will create comfortable atmosphere to the students. In
short, the students will easily accept and comprehend the lesson. Lastly, let
us try to analyze the impact if the students comprehend the lesson. We can get
the idea that students can play their own roles and develop themselves. They
can participate in the lessons by using their own specialties. Moreover,
students are also faced by a lot of friends with different characteristics so
they can share each other. As a result, they can sharpen their strengths and
overcome their weaknesses.
In conclusion, we can interpret that actually a
thought which says the Humanistic approach is difficult to carry out has been
tackled down by those explanations above. We can infer that Honey and Mumford
as two Humanistic experts discovered that there are four types of learning
styles which are Activist, Reflector, Theorist, and Pragmatist and the teaching
methods which are suitable in learning English. Furthermore, now we know that
by involving students’ abilities, it can influence them to be interested in
studying English. In addition, let me try to put forward to teachers around the
world, “Try to find out who your students are if you want to engage them to
your lesson.” Teachers can do it by doing research to dig their students’
ability up. Additionally, the research is suggested to be done for senior high
school grade, perceive that students’ characteristics on that grade are in
progress to be constantly formed and easy to be observed. Furthermore, there
are several websites which are proposed to be implemented as the research,
three of which are; www.chaminade.org/inspire/learnstl/htm, www.ncsu.edu/felder-public/ILSdir/ilsweb.htm,
and www.msxtc.commnet.edu/clc/learnstl.htm. In
short, what Humanistic approach has offered to us that a student is different
from one to another has to be known as a stepping stone to treat students as
humans who want to be appreciated by other people.
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