Skripsi Bahasa Inggris

The Effect of Discussion Class to The Students’ Achievement in Reading Comprehension at SMP Negeri 39 Medan

ABSTRACT

Simatupang, Fadilah : “The Effect of Discussion Class to The Students’ Achievement in Reading Comprehension at SMP Negeri 39 Medan“, Thesis : English Department of Teacher Training and Education, University of Muhammadiyah North Sumatera 2008.

This thesis deals with the effect of Discussion Class to the students’ achievement in reading comprehension. The objective of the study is to investigate the effect of discussion class for reading achievement in second year of junior high school. The data were obtained from school year of junior high school by giving multiple choice test. The population of the sample was taken from SMP Negeri 39 Medan,Jln. Young Panah Hijau Labuhan-Deli Medan Academic Year 2007/2008 which consists of 40 students. The research was conducted by using experimental research. The result of this research was teaching reading by using discussion class is more effective than teaching reading with the conventional.


CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION

A. Background of The Study
Basically, the language is very important in our life. Because, language is a tool of communication and it has a big influence in building the relationship with another people. Language is a medium to transfer message to another people. By language, one may express their idea, opinion, and another expression. Human may not build an interaction without using language. Beside that,language has the scientific study which is sometimes forgotten by language user. Most people regard that language is a simple study which does not need specific observation. For instance, pragmatics, semantics, syntax, morphology, phonology, and another. And, there are four skill in language term, namely reading, speaking, listening, and writing.
The importance of language is also supported Allah in His Glorious Qur’an surah Al-Hujarah : verse 13 which had meaning : “ O Mankind ! Lo ! We have created you from a make and female, and have made you nations and tribes that you may know one another. Lo ! The noblest o you, in the sight of Allah, is the best in conduct. Lo ! Allah is knower, Aware”. It is also supported by Rasulullah SAW in his hadits, as had meaning : “ Searching knowledge is an obligatory for all moslems “.

Both Al-Qur’an and hadits above prove that language is very important in our life. We can not omit that, because without that, we can not build up the social interaction to another people. As the researcher explain above, language has four skill. Each skill has special characteristic whether it is in teaching strategies or in the way to study them. From the four skill of language above, the researcher is eager to choose reading comprehension. Because the researher regard that reading is as the first skill which is taught to the students in school.
In supporting the explanation above, it is important to know what is reading. Reading is a receptive language process. It is a psycholinguistic process in that it starts with a linguistics surface representation encoded by a writer and ends with meaning which the reader constructs. Because reading is a psycholinguistic process, it may be an active and passive reading. However, reading process is an attempt to drill or explore the textual passage in reading text. An active reading condition depends on the way in teaching it to the students. The approaches which are used in teaching reading influence the students’ interest in doing that. The teacher should choose the appropriate approach in order to get the good students’ achievement in reading comprehension.
In solving reading problem, the linguists has attempt many methods, approach and learning groups such as discussion class. Students prefer to work in pairs such as a discussion class which consists of four to five students in comprehending the reading text. In the case of it, reading is not a passive, but rather an active, and in fact an interaction process has been recognized for some time in first or native language reading ( Goodman : 1967 ). That statement has invited researcher interest to observe the effectiveness of discussion class for students on reading achievement, then it becomes the title of this study.

B. Identification of The Problem
The problems are identified as having to the following aspects :
1. The description of discussion class in learning reading comprehension.
2. The effectiveness of discussion class on the students’ achievement in learning reading comprehension.

C. Scope and Limitation
The scope of this study is to search the effectiveness of discussion class to the students’ achievement in reading comprehension. The study is limited to the second year students on SMP Negeri 39 Medan

D. Formulation of the Problem
The problem of this study can be formulated as follows :
1. Is there any significance effect of discussion class to the students’ achievement in reading comprehension ?
2. What are the difficulties faced by the students in learning reading comprehension ?

E. Objective of the Research
The objective of this research is to answer the problem in formulating the problem point, namely to find out the effect of discussion class to the students’ achievement in reading comprehension.

F. The Significance of the Research
The result of this study are hoped to give contribution to :
1. Teachers of Junior High School to understand about discussion class.
2. Teachers of Junior High School can get advantages and feedback from the effectiveness of discussion class.
3. The writer in order to apply discussion class in teaching English reading.


G. Objective of the Study
1. To find out the significance effect of discussion class to the students’ achievement in reading comprehension.
2. To find out the students’ difficulties in learning reading comprehension

H. The Significance of the Study
The result of this study are hoped to give contribution to :
1. Teachers of Junior High School to understand about discussion class.
2.. Teachers of Junior High School can get advantages and feedback from the effectiveness of discussion class.
3.. The writer in order to apply discussion class in teaching English reading.


CHAPTER II
REVIEW OF LITERATURE

A. Theoretical Framework
1. The Effect
An important aspect of being an effective teacher is being able to keep the class a whole working together and oriented toward classrooms task. Effective teachers establish and maintain an environment in which learning occur. According to Westhoff taken from Increasing the Effectiveness of Foreign Language Reading Instruction (1997:97) effect is the goal result that the students want and using good communication skills. Weinstein (1997:173) said that to create the optimal learning environment, teachers need repertoire of strategies for establishing rules and procedures, organizing groups, monitoring and facing classroom activities and handling misbehavior.
Effective teachers know that students are motivated when they can make choices that are inclined with their personal interest. Generally, motivation is one of the factors that support individual to learn. According to Hasibuan (2002:8) stated that motivation is the power to move or the power to push someone in order to do something. The more someone is motivated, the more he wants to learn. Vaughan (1981:67-84) supposed that effective teachers have good strategies to help students become self motivated to learn. Teachers must have a variety of perspectives and strategies, and be flexible in their applications. There are three key ingredients by teachers which are professional knowledge and skill, commitment, and professional growth.

2. Description of Reading Comprehension
Reading is the process of getting meaning from text. As Richard Platt,and Platt (1992:306-307) state that reading is perceiving a written text in order to understand its contents. The understanding that results is called reading comprehension. Different types of reading comprehension are often distinguished according to the reader’s purposes in reading and the type of reading used. The following are commonly referred to as Rivers ( 1968 : 207 ) states :
a. Literal comprehension : reading in order to understand, remember, or recall the information explicitly contained in a passage.
b. Inferential comprehension : reading in order to find information, which is not explicitly stated in a passage, using the readers’ experience and intuition, and by inferring.
c. Critical or evaluative comprehension : reading in order to compare information in a passage with the readers’ own knowledge and values.
d. Appreciative comprehension : reading in order to gain an emotional or other kind of valued response from a passage.

Therefore, most foreign language reading specialists view reading as interactive. The reader interacts with the text to create meaning as the reader’s mental processes work together at different levels. The level of reader comprehension of a text according to Rumelhart 1980 : 304) is determined by how well the reader variables ( interest level in the text, purpose for reading the text, knowledge of the topic, foreign language abilities, awareness of the reading process, and level of willingness to take risks ) interact with the text variables ( text type, structure, syntax and vocabulary ).
One important part of interactive structure process theory emphasizes according to Carrel (1984 : 77) is schemata, that is the reader’s pre-existing concepts about the world and about the text to be read.
Into this framework, the reader fits what he or she finds in any passage. If new textual information does not fit into a reader’s schemata, the reader misunderstands the new material, ignores the new material, or revises the schemata to match the facts within the passage. Many teachers now accept the new that reading is the result of a two-way communication between the reader and the text, achieved through the simultaneous interaction of bottom-up information processing (which involves word recognition, sound / spelling correspondence, etc).
In reading process, various kinds of readers will have different activity; the different is based on their prior knowledge of the text. Goodman (1967:156) states that a skilled reader is constructive before reading process. The notion of constructing knowledge refocuses the locus of control in the reading process on the reader. Their own world knowledge and world view. It demands that the teachers activate their students’ schema– that is, help students recognize the knowledge that they are already have about the topic of a text. This would be akin to the building of a foundation in the process of construction.

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