TEACHING ALPHABET FOR NON-NATIVE LEARNERS: A CASE STUDY OF FIRST GRADERS-AGNES WIDYANINGRUM, VINNA OCTAVIA-DBB V14 N2 JULI 2019 27 TEACHING ALPAHBET FOR NON NATIVE ENGLISH LEARNERS: A CASE STUDY OF FIRST GRADERS

Non-native English learners need time to learn English language since they just heard without knowing how to pronounce it correctly. This condition occurs in common Primary Schools because the students do not have foreign language background, at school as well as at home. The hidden curriculum focusing on students’ soft skills are not well administered as the school managements think that what they have to do in running the academic atmosphere is teaching well for their students. The first step in teaching English for young learners especially those who are non-native English learners is introducing English by getting to know it. Piaget’s child’s development contributes in helping teachers to know their student’s growth physically and mentally in order to help them learn better while they play different teacher’s roles. Piaget proves that cognitivism gives insight that is children’s develop through stages since they were born. First graders at their age is on the stage called preoperational with one of characteristics that is language development with the goal to create symbolic thought. One way to achieve this goal is by teaching alphabet for first graders.


INTRODUCTION
First graders of primary schools in Indonesia mostly do not have English lesson as one of school subject's that they have to learn. This condition is in accordance with government's regulation that gives opportunities for schools to have English lesson as one of the school's subject.
It is due to the school's capability and resources because the real condition of each school may differ one to another therefore the role of English for first graders is not a must thing to do for common primary school in Indonesia.
School is a place for students to learn something in order to get knowledge to improve their competence and performance and teachers are important element to deliver knowledge to their students. The role of teachers as well as educators are not an easy thing to do especially for the first graders. The first graders, at the age of 6-7 years old are still in their growth stage to develop their physical as well as mental. Based on Jean Piaget's theory about child's development is that the elementary students are in their stage of preoperational to concrete operations (Shaffer, David  For first graders, their school time is limited as they are categorized as early year students of elementary school so that they have a few school subjects only. The teaching and learning process is done with fun activities aimed at building students' motivation to schooling. Psychologically, the first graders are still immature in their thinking process because they move from their sensorimotor (birth to 2 years) with major development namely begin to internalize behavioral schemes to produce images or mental scheme to the preoperational stage (2 to 7 years) with the development that is beginning to recognize that other people may not always perceive the Piaget's stages is known as child cognitive development because he focuses his study on what children know and tell nothing about how they think (intelligence). In order to help young learners know something (objects), the teachers will use various strategies for examples, in teaching numbers or colours, the teachers will bring something (teaching aids like toys and coloring chart) to help their students can visualize what they have seen and internalize it into their brain and when they have known about it they will learn to name the object. At first, they use their five senses to learn but on the next step they will be able to use their memory and create symbolic thoughts.
This study is conducted in order to answer one problem due to English lesson for primary The learning process conducted in this study is by applying different strategies namely: a. using teaching aids like flash cards, using video and giving student's worksheet made by the researchers b. applying peer teaching that is giving the students chance to learn English alphabet in pairs with their peers c. teachers as facilitator applied drilling technique when they find that their students have difficulty in spelling and memorizing the English alphabet

FINDINGS
This study is conducted aimed at finding strategies to teach alphabet for first graders of non-native English learners. The focus of this study is on the teaching alphabet since the students do not have English knowledge means that they never learn English before. The results of the study are as follows: 1. The student's profile. There are 56 students of first graders of SDN Brumbungan Kota Semarang, academic year of 2018/2019, on their 2 nd semester of the academic year. The age range is between 7 to 9 years old. The data of the student's profile is available below: dan Part C 57%. The study reveals that more than 50% of students who can do all the test so that the teaching alphabet in different topics is effective.

CONCLUSION
From the study, we can conclude that: 1. First graders are enthusiastic in learning English alphabet especially if the learning process using video, they can learn the alphabet through the song.
2. The teaching aids like flash cards is effective to help the first graders to visualize the English alphabet so that they can learn also how to pronounce and memorize the objects.