CULTURAL REPRESENTATION IN EFL TEXTBOOKS BY INDONESIAN GOVERNMENT: A STUDY OF "WHEN ENGLISH RINGS A BELL" IN THE INDONESIAN CONTEXT

Abstract

Teachers' attitudes toward English as a Foreign Language (EFL) textbooks significantly influence their effectiveness in the classroom. This study aims to examine Indonesian teachers’ attitudes in using government-provided EFL textbooks, particularly When English Rings a Bell (Rahimi et al., 2012; Amiruddin et al., 2021). However, these textbooks serve as essential resources, teachers often perceive them as supplementary rather than primary teaching materials due to concerns regarding content relevance, cultural representation, and student engagement (Latifah et al., 2023; Esa et al., 2021). There are 50 teachers participate in this study that provide and answer open-ended questionnaire that’s reflect teacher attitude on the use of EFL textbooks. A qualitative analyzed through axial, open, and preliminary coding to categorize the data into units of meaning. All teachers tend to modify and complement government textbooks with additional materials to better align with students' needs and classroom realities. After the reduction of the data, the researcher came up with major theme regarding to teachers attitudes in cultural elements represented in EFL textbooks namely When English Rings a Bell in 7^th and 8^th grade (Nurjanah, 2022; Herlina et al., 2020). Moreover, based on the reflection result shows that the teachers’ attitudes are shaped by their agreement with textbook content, teaching flexibility, and cultural integration and express teachers concerns about the textbooks’ lack of alignment with students’ needs, particularly in developing communicative competence and cultural awareness (Sari, 2023; Nguyen, 2017). The study highlights that while government textbooks aim to promote standardized learning; their effectiveness depends on how well they accommodate cultural diversity, foster intercultural competence, and engages students during learning. During learning process teachers referring on EFL textbooks. The findings suggest that a more teacher-inclusive approach in textbook development could enhance their usability and effectiveness in EFL education. Future research is recommended to explore how teacher feedback can be integrated into the textbook revision process to improve instructional quality and student outcomes and should focus on bridging the gap between curriculum policies and classroom realities to ensure that government textbooks adequately support language acquisition (Rashidi & Meihami, 2016).