ENGLISH TEACHING STRATEGIES OF THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL TEACHERS AT PEKALONGAN

English has been introduced in elementary schools in Indonesia for many years. However, English is only regarded as optional or additional subject. With the status of English only as an additional subject, the teaching of English in elementary schools is frequently done by the class teachers who have no English language education background. To see how non-English background teachers actually teach English, this study examined the strategies used and challenges experienced by teachers who were teaching English without any English teaching background in elementary schools in Pekalongan Regency, Central Java. The writers used a questionnaire and interviews to collect the data from five teachers. The findings showed that the teachers in this study had no specific strategies for teaching English. They also had no initiative to develop any teaching media. Further, these teachers perceived their poor English, the students’ poor English ability and the poor school facilities as the biggest challenges in teaching English. The findings suggest that trainings need to be given to help these teachers develop strategies and media for teaching English. Keywords: Teaching, strategies, difficulties, elementary school