“What is the function of a call?” : A Classroom Discourse Analysis in Pre-School at Kota Langsa

Abstract

Children in pre-school are in the golden age who need to practice their language to each participant in this area. Usually, the language used both by the children even the teachers is unformal. It is because the children are in the stage of learning how to interact with others, therefore, the language sometimes is used ungrammatically. Then the data is compiled from the field observation in pre-school at Kota Langsa to find out the linguistic phenomenon in the kinds of school. By using the theory of Systemic Functional Linguistic (SFL) analysis by Halliday, it is found that there is some minor clause used in the conversation among the children and the students. The minor clause in the theory is called “vocative” which is usually known as “calls”. There are twenty-eight (28) “calls” used in the instructional process at the pre-school. Some “calls” is form as a word but the other is form as a kind of vocalizations. The “calls”, however, have a different usage depending on the speakers and the addressee. It is different when the calls are used as the students talk to their friends when the calls are used by the teachers to the students, and vice versa. This kind of minor clause is interesting to be explored since there are only limited researches observed about this issue. Though, it can enrich the study of language especially for the function of a call (vocative).