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Mastering English skill for students at a vocational institution of higher education is a mounting problem as the students are expected to develop practical English skills in specific disciplinary knowledge and internalize the attitudes and professional values. Implementation of project-based learning (PBL) in teaching speaking particularly the presentation skill can be seen as an alternative to cover both areas as it encourages students to develop higher critical thinking, enhances deep learning and motivates students to be independent learners with exceptional self-management. This article presents the results of the study on the impact of project-based learning on students speaking achievement particularly their presentation skills and students perceptions on the PBL stages. Participants were 19 fourth-semester students enrolled in a three-year undergraduate program in Electrical Engineering. The goal of this project was to drive students engagement in speaking activities and put students in the language-specific setting in which language was naturally used based on the project characteristics. This research employed mixed methods in which the quantitative data, i.e., pre-test and post-test were analyzed using SPSS statistic 21. The finding showed that the correlation coefficient (r) was 0,575. Based on the interpretation scale of correlation coefficient by Guilford (1965), the range of the correlation coefficients is between the range of 0,401-0,700 which means that the correlation is quite strong. Based on the result of analysis using SPSS statistics 21 with 95% level of confidence, it was revealed that -tcount -ttable (-6.269 -2,10092) and the significance value (pvalue) of 2-tailed was less than 0,05 (0,000 0,05). It can be concluded that H1 was accepted and H0 was rejected signifying that there was a significant effect of PBL implementation in improving students speaking achievement. In addition, this study also analyzed qualitative data collected from google form and focus group discussion to gain students perception towards the implementation of PBL using infographic. The results of online questionnaire revealed that students experienced deep and autonomous learning through the stages conducted in the project. They gained better understanding on grammar and vocabulary during peer review and showed positive attitude in designing infographics as they could revise the structure of their presentation while designing the infographics wireframes. Consequently, learning speaking through project-based learning using infographic helped to enhance students engagement to series of works within the projects and foster their collaborative and communicative skills while working together in groups. The results showed a significant effect of PBL on students presentation skills and improve soft skills compatible to workplace requirements. Considering the positive result of this study, PBL is recommended to be applied in teaching speaking for students in higher vocational education as it gives beneficial impact on students content learning and soft skills.DOI:doi.org/10.24071/ijiet.2019.030210

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Even though a dictionary is said to be more important to be used while students are reading and writing than speaking, but its existence among learners is undebatable. This need becomes much greater when learners are faced with specific terms in certain sciences, such as the science of Financial Accounting. This study aims to determine the students’ perceptions of the existence of the Bilingual Dictionary of Financial Accounting Terminology, entitled: Kamus Istilah Dwibahasa Akuntansi Keuangan. A questionnaire consisting of 17 questions was distributed to 28 students of a bilingual class in the Accounting Department of a state higher education institution in Bali. The questionnaire was distributed in the form of Google Form, while the dictionary that had been planned given in printed version, finally given in the form of a simple e-Dictionary, due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The results of the questionnaire obtained were then analyzed to determine students’ perceptions of this bilingual dictionary. It is found that students were very happy with the existence of this dictionary. This can be seen from the positive responses given to almost all statements raised, which involved 3 aspects, namely: dictionary design, dictionary content, and mechanical aspects, i.e.: matters related to writing, structure, and spelling. Furthermore, the result also shows that the dictionary is able to give bits of help in the students’ learning processes and to motivate students to be more creative in using vocabulary, especially the financial accounting terminology.

This article reports on a study investigating the perceptions of EFL teachers in schools and language courses (henceforth, teachers) and EFL lecturers in tertiary educational institutions (academic staff) from Indonesia regarding their definitions of and their engagements in teacher research. An online questionnaire was used to gather quantitative data from almost 400 EFL teachers and academic staff from Indonesia. The questionnaire was followed by in-depth interviews with some respondents who met the criteria set and agreed to be interviewed. Results from the study show that both teachers and academic staff align research with evidence-based practice, survey, literature-driven practice and professional communication, and observation-based popular article. In terms of engagements, most of the teachers and academic staff read research papers occasionally, and more academic staff did research compared to teachers. Research done by both teachers and academic staff is largely associated with internal and external factors, such as, professional awareness and professional obligation, with academic staff seem to receive more support to engage in research. The findings of the study provide insights for future continuous professional development (CPD) activities for English teachers and academic staff. The activities might involve exploring ways to integrate teacher research into teachers’ and academic staff’s teaching responsibilities and integrating teacher research into the short-term and long-term goals of CPD.