The Importance of Teaching Young Adult Literature in EFL Classroom

Heri septiawan
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Curriculum and Material Development

The Importance of Teaching Young Adult Literature in EFL Classroom
As termed by linguists, language is a means of communication, so language study means study how to communicate by using the language. The sort of communication is that there must be more than one people; one as a sounds maker with his or her mouth (or hand movements in sign language, or pen marks in written language) and the other listening (or watching or reading). Therefore, communication appears in social context. Or it cannot appear in isolation.
In consideration of the language function, language study is not merely study grammar of formal language, but the way to use the language in communicating with others. By doing so, English teaching must not come back to the traditional point of view; that just emphasize the teaching of formal English grammar. However, it should be in relation to the nature of language itself, to communicate. Or it should be based on Communicative competence.
The main concern for EFL teachers is to build communicative competence. The competence is more than acquiring mastery of structure and form. It also involves acquiring the ability to interpret discourse in all its social and cultural contexts. Yet, in my experience, it is obvious that many EFL speakers cannot comprehend the creativity, resourcefulness, and the nature of English itself, even the Standard English. As a result, teaching literature in EFL classroom can be a useful tool to develop their linguistics knowledge of English.
The benefit of connecting this linguistic study to the literature is that students experience how their language works; the language awareness, through an attractive works, not boring and that can only be found in reading. Teaching English through boring works just carry them to the space where their creativity, critical thinking may not appear, and English literature an interesting way to build students’ linguistics knowledge.
In my experience, at least, literature has two benefits; firstly, from the content written within the literature, and secondly, from teachers’ creativity to manage the literature in classroom. The content of literature should project the way of what young adult lives. It may appear from the characteristics which young adult has. On the other word, the literature should be consistent with the needs, interests, developmental stages and intellectual level of the students. The fulfilment of the characteristics will draw young adult closer to interact fully with the chosen book.
When the young adult encounters an interesting book, it will make language study more fun and attractive. A writer may use colourful vocabularies in order to make their readers in a great spirit to read it. Many things can be learned from a book. It usually contains culture, which related to language varieties used in the book. As a result, students will have more language awareness. They will understand that English is not only from one variation, but it has so many varieties. Besides that, their orthographic and phonologic knowledge can be impacted through the study. In short, their linguistic development is really built.
However, the content of the book cannot be responded properly by the students, if the English teacher cannot manage the way to use the literature effectively and creatively in the classroom. If so, it may kill the enthusiasm of students in teaching the language. To overcome the problem, firstly, a teacher should use a wide range of authentic texts to introduce learners to a variety of types and difficulties of English language. Secondly, literary discourse sensitises readers to the processes of reading e.g. the use of schema, strategies for intensive and extensive reading etc. In this way let students give response of what they read; it is to show they understanding and quality of the book. And, lastly, literary texts prioritise the enjoyment of reading. Let them enjoy it and see the book as the way to improve their English.
There are many benefits to using literature in the EFL classroom. It can widen learners’ understanding of their own and other cultures; it can create opportunities for personal expression as well as reinforce learners’ knowledge of lexical and grammatical structure. Moreover, good strategies built by teacher can help students analyse and interpret language in context in order to recognize not only how language is manipulated but also why. the use of literature in the language classroom offers foreign language learners the opportunity to develop not only their linguistic and communicative skills but their knowledge about language in all its discourse types. The use of literary texts in the language classroom can be a potentially powerful pedagogic tool.