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Abstrak
Most elementary schools children who enter schools with little or no Indonesian are, by necessity, expected to learn within the confines of very limited range of language – their current level of development in Indonesian. These children have full capacity for learning, but in Indonesian only class they are without the language which will allow them to do so. In this situation their cognitive and conceptual development may be slowed down or hampered while they are acquiring sufficient fluency in Indonesian. Because of that, the mother tongue is used to solve the problem above, especially in West Java.
There are many assumptions that can give for the uses of mother tongue in elementary school. The main reason is that the use of Sundanese as the mother tongue in the classroom can be tremendous support for children learning Indonesian as second language. Others reasons are using the mother tongue for learning allows children to draw on their total language experience and so continue their conceptual development, to provide a social-emotional environtment in which the basic condition for learning can occur, and it is sound educational system practice to build on learner's competencies and ability. To prove some assumption above, we necessary doing research. The aim of this research is to describe (1) the using Sundanese in Indonesian Classroom at elementary school in West Java, (2) the role of using Sundanese to supporting student's learning Indonesian as second language, (3) the role of using Sundanese in Indonesian classroom to improve student conceptual development, and (4) the role ofusing Sundanese in Indonesian classroom to building student's competencies and ability in all subject matter.
Method of this research is descriptive. The subject of this research is 20 of elementary school at West Java. The questioner used to collect the data. To analyze the data, this research uses statistic descriptive technique.
Result of this research concludes that (1) the most elementary school in West Jawa (85%) using Sundanese in Indonesian classroom, (2) the using Sundanese has significant role to supporting student's learning Indonesian as second language, (3) the using Sundanese in Indonesian classroom has role to improve student conceptual development, and (4) the Sundanese is used to building student's competencies and ability in all subject matter at the beginning years of elementary school at West Java.