Popularizing Indonesian scenes through picturebooks and digital animation software: a World Englishes teaching idea

Abstract

Teachers of English language in Indonesia are continually challenged to develop innovative and creative ways for students to learn and use the language well for communication. This article reports the researcher’s innovative bilingual (Indonesia–English) picturebook series used for a communicative service program. The books show cute colorful vegetable characters with simple English vocabularies and ways of pronunciation. The books are created to influence students to consume healthy vegetables that contain nutrients and vitamins. Finding that the Z generation are more motivated to learn English using media-related technology, the book idea is developed into a computer game for junior high school students. This article describes: why eighth graders are the target for the game; why digital animation stories are more popular than books; how the Indonesian culture scenes are preserved through the digital animation product; and how the TOEFL-like game software becomes an answer to a creative English classroom.

Keywords:

• English language learning in Indonesia
• picturebook
• Generation Z
• digital animation
• educational game software
• English language teaching materials

Acknowledgements

The researcher as writer of this manuscript especially thanks the Ministry of Research, Technology and Higher Education in Indonesia for the monetary support of carrying out this research to produce game software for the English classroom. Thanks also to the same sponsor for the opportunity to present some of the ideas of the research at the 5th Celt International Conference: Contextualizing the Trajectory of Language, Arts & Culture in Contemporary Society, 9–11 September 2017.