This research sets to investigate: (1) The types and sub-types of communication strategies (CSs) employed by the students; (2) The similarities and differences of CSs employed by the students on the perspective of oral proficiency and; (3) The similarities and differences of CSs employed by the students on the perspective of gender differences.
The research was conducted at the English Education Department of UIN Walisongo, Semarang from December 2017 to February 2018. It was a qualitative research in the form of case study. There were 12 students involved as the subjects in this research. The data were obtained from observation, interview, and document analysis. Ary, Jacobs, Sorensen, Razavieh’s concept was utilized to analysis the data.
The findings revealed that: (1) The students employed five types and thirteen out of eighteen sub-types of CSs. The five types were avoidance or reduction strategies, achievement or compensatory strategies, stalling or time-gaining strategies, self-monitoring strategies, and interactional strategies. The sub-types were topic avoidance, message abandonment, all-purpose words, non-linguistic means, restructuring, literal translation, code switching, fillers/hesitation devices/gambits, self-repetition, self-initiated repair, self-rephrasing, appeal for help, and meaning negotiation strategies.; (2) The students with high proficiency level used five types and ten sub-types of CSs. Meanwhile, the students with low proficiency level used four types and nine sub-types of CSs. It means that the students with high proficiency level utilized more types and sub-types of CSs than the low proficient students did; (3) The female students used four types and ten sub-types of CSs. Meanwhile, the male students utilized five types and ten sub-types of CSs. On the other words, gender differences influence the use of CSs because male students employed more types of CS that the female students did.
Espousing to the findings of the research, it can be inferred that CSs aid the students to circumvent their linguistic difficulties. These strategies also promote students’ fluency in speaking because the students can communicate without any restrictions. From this point of view, it can be indicated that CSs have a direct influence on communication and plays a constitutive role in second language acquisition.