Local Wisdom as Learning Materials : Character Educational Values of Sundanese Pupuh

Received Mar 16, 2018 Revised May 15, 2018 Accepted May 29, 2018 As character educational values for elementary students deteriorated, the appreciation of Sundanese language by West Javanese people faded. One of many ways to be done was through the use of learning materials in the form of Sundanese pupuh for elementay school students. Pupuh is a literary work in the form of poem in Sundanese language which contains character educational values. This study aimed to describe character educational values in Sundanese pupuh and their relevance as learning materials for elementary school students. Data collection was conducted using the techniques of reading and taking notes of Sundanese pupuh lyrics which contain character educational values, and then identifying the compatibility as elementary school learning materials. The data were analyzed qualitatively, with the steps of: (1) data comparison; (2) data categorization; (3) data presentation; dan (4) inferencing. This study resulted in teamwork as the most occurring value in pupuh Asmarandana, Sinom, Balakbak, Ladrang, Pucung, Lambang, Gambuh, Gurisa, dan Magatru. Thus, this study concluded that Sundanese pupuh had many character educational values relevant to be taught and to be used as learning materials in elementary school.


INTRODUCTION
Nowadays, technology and science advance so rapidly that they can ease cultural exchange between Indonesia and other countries. Subconsciously, cultural exchange without any filters has become a problem for young generation. This results in two more problems in education: the young generation becomes easily affected by foreign cultures which do not always concur with Indonesian culture and they become more interested in learning those cultures instead of their own cultures. These problems impact the decreasing value of character education in each individual and the extinction of Indonesian local wisdom. [1] Indonesia is a multicultural society which has various cultures worth learning, especially by the young generation. One of the cultures and local wisdoms is that of the Sundanese in West Java. Unfortunately, the Sundanese people has not optimally preserved their cultures, especially Sundanese language as their mother tongue. This concerning issue led to an awareness that people should be encouraged in using balanced language in West Java. [2] As using balanced language is deemed important, it will simultaneously raise the awareness of how important it is to preserve Sundanese language in West Java. This preservation should be done as early as possible. There are so many cultures and local wisdoms, especially literary works which contain character educational values. Teachers can use these works to cultivate moral values in their students and simultaneously sustaining Sundanese literary works. Thus, students can experience and understand these forgotten works and, at the same time, learn from them. Overlooking this situation, this study viewed it as essential to describe character educational values in Sundanese literary works (17 Sundanese pupuh) and to identify the relevance of these Sundanese pupuh as learning materials for elementary school students. This kind of research has been done many times around the world. In other countries, pupuh is usually called as folk songs or poetries. According to different researches around the world, many folk songs from various countries contained profound meanings and excellent character educational values [3][4]. Similar to the folk songs, Sundanese pupuh, poetries or folk songs also integrated a variety of character educational values that can educate the students. Therefore, the use of local wisdoms was expected to provide a more optimal character education process for the students [5][6].

CHARACTER EDUCATIONAL VALUES
Character education is a concept involving every aspect of life family, school community, and society which supports positive character development in each individual [7]. The process occurs throughout a notion explaining how family, school community, and society take part in character development of every individual; whether it is a kid or an adult. These characters are formulated by moral qualities and ethics existing in the society, including emotional characters and responds, cognition, and behavior. [8]. These characters can also mean virtues containing respect, responsibility, trustworthiness, justice, caring, and nationalism.
In educational scope, character education is defined as approaches used by educators to cultivate positive values and characters in their students [9][10][11]. The approaches frequently used are imitation, modeling, and instruction; among these, educators should choose any that they deem the most effective way to develop the characters [12]. Briefly, character education is an effort done in order to promote positive characters and positive attitudes that go along with them according to existing social ethics and moral norms. The cultivation and growth of the character education should be done in family, society, and school community. These three communities impact every individual's characters, so there should be cooperation and value integration between them. This way, the country can achieve national education's goal in shaping young generation's characters by making use of all aspects of life optimally.

Sundanese Pupuh
Character educational values are richly found in local literatures, and one of them is Sundanese pupuh which is applied as learning materials for a local subject in elementary schools. Pupuh is a poetry in Sundanese language which is performed as a song. Pupuh, also called macapat (Javanese folk song), has the lyrical patterns of tembang, imported from Java at the early 17 th century when Mataram Kingdom turned the land of Sunda as neighboring country. [13]. Pupuh can also be defined as Sundanese or Javanese song from poems which has the pattern of guru lagu and guru wilangan [14].
Shortly, pupuh can be defined as a song which has certain rules for its lyrics. Each of the rules is one with the pupuh itself [15][16][17]. Pupuh was a kind of literature combined with vocal (karawitan) which has rules for line numbers per stanza, syllable numbers per line, last syllable in every line, breath management (pedotan) in every line, and characteristics (watek) of every pupuh [18]. Thus, pupuh is a poetry in Sundanese language performed as a song (sekar) according to rules about certain sentence pattern. Besides, pupuh can also be defined as a song which has certain pattern for its lyrics. In simpler words, pupuh can be defined as a song which has certain rules for every line of its lyrics. The compilation book of Sundanese pupuh by Mang Koko and P. Nataprawira which is utilized as a learning material in elementary school contains 17 kinds of Sundanese pupuh with 17 different rules and standard. These kinds of Sundanese pupuh and their rules are shown in Table 1.

Sundanese Pupuh as Learning Materials for Elementary School Students
Sundanese Pupuh is included as learning materials written in a compilation book of pupuh, from which the students learn and use it as a learning material. In other words, the compilation book of Sundanese pupuh can be included as a printed learning material [19]. Selecting source book for elementary students should be based on their needs as well as certain criteria in order to be compatible with the level of elementary school. Some of the criteria to assess learning materials are: 1) having relevance to the syllabus; 2) the content of the text containing proper examples to be imitated; 3) being able to establish the applicable values and norms according to their ages, interests, environment, and needs; 4) no signs of discrimination; and 5) exceptional passage structure [20].
Some other criteria in choosing learning materials for students consist of four points: 1) value, which means every book read by students should accommodate righteous values to encourage them in reading; 2) purpose, which means every book read by students should make the students set certain goals to be achieved; 3) audience, which means the process of book selection should consider the characteristics of the students who will probably read the books; 4) balance, which means the variety of genres should be balanced in terms of themes and contents to avoid boredom [21].
Based on the theories presented above, it can be concluded that basically, relevant learning materials should cover three main criteria: 1) teaching positive virtues of life; 2} having correct and appropriate sentences and texts; and 3) not containing discriminative contents. Thus, as this study aimed to describe various character educational values in Sundanese pupuh as learning materials for elementary school students, this study expected that Sundanese pupuh can be applied optimally as learning materials, especially for elementary school students in West Java.

RESEARCH METHOD
The method used to collect the data was structural analysis of the meaning of Sundanese pupuh's lyrics. The first step of data collection was reading the lyrics thoroughly and repeatedly until the values of character education from the meaning were found (intrarater). In order to confirm the accuracy of the meaning, discussion with a partner who was a Sundanese language expert was done (interater). Lastly, the data were documented as pupuh's lyric meaning containing values of character education.
Once the data were obtained, data analysis was conducted qualitatively according to these steps: (1) data comparison, which was a step to analyze the data in order to make the classifying process easier; (2) data categorization, when similar data were put into certain categories; (3) data presentation, when the classified data were displayed in a table according to their character educational values; and (4) inferencing, which was done based on the obtained data to make the conclusion [22].

RESULTS AND ANALYSIS
The result shows that generally, all of Sundanese pupuh integrate character education values as mentioned in Presidential Regulation Number 87 of 2017 on Strengthening Character Education. However, it should be understood that each value was not always found in every pupuh. The values of teamwork (gotong royong) was the most contained value found in Sundanese pupuh, and it was not surprising since Indonesians, in general, highly respect teamwork (gotong royong) as one of their tradition [23].
Looking at the values of character education integrated in Sundanese pupuh, the education of character values through local subject should be implemented more optimally using the Sundanese pupuh or other literary works [24][25][26]. It is actually obvious that fundamentally, literature played an impactful role in cultivating the character educational values [27]. According to the data, there are some pupuh which contain almost all of the values. The following subheadings will discuss each of the character educational values discovered in Sundanese pupuh. The summary of the findings about character educational values in Sundanese pupuh is displayed in Table 2.

Religious Values
Religiosity is a character related to God in behaving, showing attitude and carrying out action in relation to the teachings of one's religious belief and how he/she expresses tolerance towards other religious beliefs' teachings. This value includes devotion to God, fear of God, purity, tolerance, and natural awareness. These values can be noticed in a part of Sundanese pupuh's lyrics below. The example shows religious values of devotion to God and fear of God since the lyrics describe repentance and asking for forgiveness from God Almighty because of the wrong he/she has committed towards his/her parents. As these values are related to God, someone religious will demonstrate the mind, words, and actions based on godly values or the teachings of the religion he/she believes in. [28]. Previous studies also revealed the existence of religious values in literary works like guguritan which was identical to those of Sundanese pupuh [29]. These religious values are what the excerpt has displayed. These values are contained in 4 kinds of Sundanese pupuh which are pupuh Mijil, Pangkur, Wirangrong and Jurudemung.

Nationalistic Values
The character of a nationalist can be described as showing passion and appreciation towards one's country in behaving, showing attitude and carrying out action including in this character are the values of The lyrics portray how people must love their country which naturally suggests that nationalistic values exist. These values can be extracted from three kinds of pupuh which are Dandanggula, Durma, and Wirangrong. Specifically, Wirangrong incorporates the values more clearly compared to the other two. All these three describe how Indonesians fought in the past and how the young generation can respond to this and show love affectionally to this country. Some of the ways are through learning the history of their nation and being a diligent person in order to contribute good things for the country. This pupuh also illustrates the spirit of the nation which is integrated in each of its stanza [30]. Supporting this, previous studies have identified the existence of nationalistic values in novels as learning materials for the students [31].

Values of Integrity
A person who keeps integrity in him/herself will hold firmly onto his/her principles and show an attitude of honesty and promise keeping. The values of integrity are honesty, excellence, politeness, and righteousness. A part of lyrics from Pucung below is an example of how values of integrity exist in Sundanese pupuh below. What the teacher has advised Do it immediately Do not act clumsily Since others will observe your behavior Looking at these lyrics, it can be understood that someone can show their integrity by firmly holding onto his/her life principles which are constructed by virtues like honesty [32]- [34]. People with integrity will always remember these values and act them out in their lives as reflected in their honesty, excellence, politeness, and righteousness. There are four kinds of pupuh containing these values: pupuh Pucung, Mijil, Gambuh, and Wirangrong. Pupuh Pucung accommodates the values more evidently than the other two. In the excerpt above, pupuh Pucung depicts the advice for a child to be excellent, honest, and always listening and enacting teacher's valuable advice. As to review the previous studies, the values of integrity as mentioned in Serat Madu Tata Krami are viewed as paramount in the relevance to character education [35].

Values of Teamwork (Gotong Royong)
Teamwork is an attitude of participation and getting involved in giving positive assists towards others which induces solidarity and loyalty in a sense of unity. Included in the values are cooperation, solidarity, helping, and affinity. The values of teamwork can be found in a part of lyrics from pupuh below. According to the lyrics, the stork wants to help the poor turtle by asking it to bite the twig so that the stork can fly and bring the turtle to another place which has water. The stork acts out the character of helping, which is one of the values of teamwork. Teamwork (gotong royong) is a person's attitude which is willing to aid someone in positive causes [36], [37]. This attitude is shown by the stork that wantsto help the turtle to cross the river. The values of teamwork were also found in other pupuh, which are pupuh Asmarandana, Sinom, Balakbak, Ladrang, Pucung, Lambang, Gambuh, Gurisa, and Magatru. The values of teamwork is the most frequent values contained in almost all 17 kinds of pupuh, which implies that the values of teamwork (gotong royong) is fundamentally very substantial to preserve [11]. Other studies also identified the values of teamwork in tembang macapat which can be used to reinforce character education [25].

Values of Independence
Independence is an attitude of doing everything by one's self without needing other's help and without being dependent on others, so he/she has a sense of responsibility in accomplishing his/her duty. The values of independence are devotion, creativity, discipline, bravery, and passion in learning. These traits can be found in lyrics part of pupuh below. It can be deduced that this pupuh gives an advice to keep working hard for what we do now will affect what we will experience in the future. That is why this pupuh integrated the value of devotion as it is included in the values of independence. The values of independence are one's attitudes showing his/her willingness to do things on his/her own independently and without any help from anyone [28], [38]. These values, as portrayed in the excerpt above, are the attitudes which need to be habituated in children as early as possible, so that they can learn independently. The values of independence are found in four pupuh: pupuh Kinanti, Pucung, Mijil, and Pangkur. The values of independence are not integrated widely since there were found only the characters of bravery, passion in learning, and devotion as included in these values. The previous studies also revealed the integration of the values of independence in a drama to develop character education for children [39].

The Relevance of Sundanese Pupuh as Learning Materials for Elementary Students
The results on the relevance of Sundanese pupuh as learning materials for elementary school students based on three selected criteria are presented in Table 3 below. Kinanti Generally, a learning material should have correct sentence or text structure, should not contain discrimination, and should contain positive virtues of life to be learned [20][21]. The results showed that all 17 kinds of Sundanese pupuh were included in appropriate learning materials for both reading and listening which elementary school students can learn and listen to. All 17 kinds of Sundanese pupuh also possess character educational values, appropriate sentence or text structure, and do not contain discriminative content. Therefore, these 17 kinds of Sundanese pupuh can be concluded as relevant as learning materials for elementary school students.
In conclusion, this study identified that through local wisdom in the form of Sundanese poetry or Sundanese pupuh, students can learn character educational values which are integrated in these literary works used as learning materials in teaching and learning process at school [39][40][41][42][43][44][45]. The literature is sufficient to be a learning material used by the teachers to educate the students about character educational values, moreover since it uses Sundanese language which is the mother tongue of the students in West Java.

CONCLUSION
According to the findings and discussions, it can be concluded that all 17 kinds of Sundanese pupuh studied in this research contained character educational values. The most frequent values found in pupuh were the values of teamwork (gotong royong) in variants of cooperation, solidarity, helping, and affinity which were integrated in pupuh Asmarandana, Sinom, Balakbak, Ladrang, Pucung, Lambang, Gambuh, Gurisa, and Magatru. The relevance of Sundanese pupuh as learning materials for elementary school students was viewed as sufficient since there was discovered positive virtues of life expressed through appropriate sentence or text structure, and no discriminative content. Thus it can be concluded that 17 types of Sundanese pupuh basically have the value of character education as appropriate teaching materials for elementary school students.