English language is essential in our daily life. It serves many purposes. For instances, to communicate with people, to promote products and so on. Nowadays, the fast growth of communication technologies and information has assisted a revolution on how we use English language. Due to the increase usage of English Language as the first global language, the proficiency of English language is an advantage for the user. Eka Kurniasih (2011) stated that in international context, English serves as a tool to get a finer job, mainly in multinational companies. As a student teacher, having a strong foundation of English language can help me to be balanced when trying to learn and acquire new knowledge in language learning. By acquiring these four language skills which are, listening, speaking reading and writing, an individual can be balanced in English language and can casually use it all over the place. Listening and reading are utilised as a medium for receiving information. Thus, they are are called as receptive skills. As for the remaining two skills, speaking and writing, they are used as medium for sending information; subsequently these two skills are labelled as productive skills. The four skills are related to each other and important in language learning.
The first skill of language is listening. According to Helgesen (as cited in U.C.S Maong, 2014), listening is an active, persistent processing of making sense of what we hear. Listening is the first skill to understand at in order to master or become proficient in a language. This is because we listen twice as much as we speak, four times as much as we read and five time as much as we write (Wilga rivers as cited in N. Chitravelu, S. Sithamparam & T.S. Choon, 2005). So, in order to engage in other language skills, we must capable of listening well in order to gain knowledge. In addition, listening also can improve speaking skills as Nida (as cited in N. Chitravelu, S. Sithamparam & T.S. Choon, 2005) concluded that listening is a task when trying to learn a language. In listening, spoken text or audio text is received by ears and sent to the brain to interpret and search for the meaning. As both reading and listening are receptive skills, they have common associate skills to be accomplished such as identifying main facts and details, relating cause and effect, identifying sequence of events, predicting outcomes and inferring meaning from contextual clues. Acquiring listening skills give us a huge advantage mainly in language learning. For example, when we listen to lectures, we can improve our vocabulary and learn new words from it. Listening skills such as informative listening can be used to obtain information from a conversation. Hence, listening is crucial in shaping balanced individual.
Next, speaking is one of the four language skills needed to shape a balanced individual. Speaking is an interactive process of forming meaning that involves processing and receiving and producing information (Brown, Burns & Joyce, as cited in U.C.S. Maong, 2014). Hornby (2005) describe speaking as the act of having a conversation with someone. This shows the need of interaction among people, which is giving response to each other when communicating. In a speech situation, listening, thinking and speaking go on at the same time. Part of learning to speak are involving systematic expressions that go with different situation so well that the speaker produces them automatically at the right time and proper situations (N. Chitravelu, S. Sithamparam & T.S. Choon, 2005). There are two types of communication which are verbal and non-verbal communication. Verbal communication is the use of auditory language to exchange information or communicate with other people. For examples, sounds, words, or speaking. Projecting one's voice in a suitable way can contribute to effective verbal communication. Non-verbal communication is the communication between people through non-verbal or visual cues which includes movements, touch, facial expressions, body gestures, timing and anything else that communicates without speaking. Hence, right speaking skills (verbal and non-verbal) are the key elements in shaping a balanced individual. Appropriate speaking skills help to increase productivity in learning processes because they are necessary for one to share ideas and manage discussions. After that, appropriate speaking skills also capable us to respond rationally and cherish a responsive culture. This can avoid conflicts which can affect one emotion and allow room for feedbacks as people would not waver to approach someone with good speaking skills.
Next, the third skill of language is reading. Hornby (2005) states that a person reads when he/she looks at and understands “the meaning of written or printed words or symbols”. Reading is the process of creating meaning through the dynamic interaction among the readers‟ existing knowledge, the information suggested by the written language, and the context of the reading situation (Anthony, Pearson & Raphael, as cited in U.C.S Maong, 2014). Reading skills enables learners to access information from many written texts. Same as listening, reading skill is called receptive skill. In a most obvious sense reading involves thinking. It is the attempt of the reader to understand as nearly as possible the thinking of the writer. In a less obvious but perhaps more crucial way, reading involves thinking of our own. There are multiple types of reading such as scanning, skimming, intensive reading, extensive reading and interactive reading aloud. In acquiring the ability to read using multiple skills, one must be a critical reader. Reading skills help an individual to not accept everything in a written form blindly. Apart from that, when reading we often question so that we are not easily manipulated by false claims. Having various multiple reading skills help us in time management as we can identify the main points and put important points as a priority. Thus, reading is vital in shaping balanced individual.
The last skill of language is writing. Writing is a system for interpersonal communication using symbols or signs on a flat surface such as paper, cloth or even stone tablets (N. Chitravelu, S. Sithamparam & T.S. Choon, 2005). According to Hornby (2005), writing can be signifies as making letters or numbers on surface using pen and pencil. Writing can be use in our daily life to get things done, to inform, to persuade, to maintain relationships, to document events and to record feelings experiences, observations. Writing is the most difficult skill for language learners since must think and generate new ideas, organize them properly, translate these ideas into readable text which can be quite difficult for students. Writing is the final product of separate acts that are hugely challenging to learn simultaneously (U.C.S. Maong, 2014). Among these distinguishable acts are editing, note taking, identifying a central idea, drafting and outlining. It is difficult to start writing of any kind without a central idea and the notes to support it. When the brain has an idea, it encodes the idea and send it to the hand. Then the hand writes down or types in words. So, writing skill can be regarded as productive skills. By having the ability to apply writing skills will surely help one to become a balanced individual. Good writers try their best in producing a high-quality and organised/systematic writing in normal essays or academical essays. Besides that, having writing skills will also help an individual to think critically. Critical thinking in writing aid one to be smart when writing and elaborating essay so that the product that one produce is authentic and attracts readers’ interest. Hence, producing a critical thinker by writing lead to a balanced individual.
In conclusion, the four language does help in shaping a balanced individual. Nevertheless, it is not only a matter of integrate the four skills of the English language, but how to use it in our real life, in order to make ourselves involved in a real communicative situation. To achieve the goal of being a balanced individual, it is important to practice the four skills casually based on our weaknesses in order to improve our language skills levels.