PROSIDING ICTTE FKIP UNS 2015 ISSN: 2502-4124 Vol 1, Nomor 1, Januari 2016 Halaman: | 172 ARE THE GRADUATE STUDENTS OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING PROGRAM READY TO TEACH THE UNDERGRADUATES? Mirjam Anugerahwati Universitas Negeri Malang, Jl. Semarang 5, Malang 65145, Indonesia Corresponding e-mail: mirjamanugerah65@gmail.com Abstract: According to the curriculum of the Graduate Program, Universitas Negeri Malang, the graduate (S2) students of the English Language Teaching program have to take teaching practicum in their third semester, where they have to teach the undergraduate students. In the past, they could choose and apply for the subjects that they wanted to teach, either skill or content courses. Since the academic year 2012, however, the practice has changed. The students no longer have to teach at the undergraduate program; instead they only have to do Peer Teaching with their classmates. In the past, graduate students were mostly teachers or lecturers of English; while currently they enrol at the Graduate Program straight after graduating from their undergraduate (S1) degree. Some of them are teachers of private courses, some are junior lecturers with 1-5 years’ experience, while the rest are fresh graduates who have nevertaught. Questions then arise: are these students ready to teach the undergraduates? What difficulties do they have in the teaching practicum? What do they hope to get from the course? This paper presents the results of my mini research concerning the readiness of the students to do the teaching practicum, and their hopes and expectations regarding the conduct of the Teaching Practicum Course. Data were taken from observations and questionnaire to 35 students from two classes of the 2014 cohort. Most of them stated that they still needed further lessons, especially in Classroom management and materials selection to equip them. This is in line with the writer’s observations which show that many of their practicum are still teacher-centered, and there is some apparent difficulty in time management. Some suggestions on improving the curriculum for the graduate program are provided. Key words: teaching practicum, peer teaching, difficulties, readiness 1 INTRODUCTION Teaching practicum has always been considered one of the most important aspects that prepare students to be “real teachers” in the field. This is true not only for undergraduate students who will be teachers in Primary or Secondary schools, but also for Graduate students taking the Master’s program in Education, who are expected to be teachers in colleges/universities. According to the syllabus of the Graduate Program in English Language Teaching, Universitas Negeri Malang(2015), the Teaching Practicum Course is designed to help students in developing knowledge of practical teaching strategies to teach at the Tertiary level, particularly for the regular students. Students of the customized classes, who are teachers of elementary or secondary schools, do the teaching practicum in the level of the sudents they are teaching. The development covers the use of appropriate media and the development of lesson plans. Students should demonstrate their skills in the form of peer teaching which include different patterns of teaching and learning such as conducting pair and/or group work, giving drills and exercises, questioning, and managing the classroom. This mode of conducting peer teaching for the teaching practicum course as stated in the syllabus has only been implemented since the 2012 academic year. Previously, graduate students had to teach in real classes in undergraduate courses, where they were supervised by a mentor lecturer. The students could choose and apply for the course that they want to teach, either skills or content courses. Since 2012, however, there have been too many graduate students taking Teaching Practicum at the same time that there have not been enough classes that could be used for the practicum. The department therefore, decided to conduct the teaching practicum as peer teaching in the graduate program.