READING STRATEGIES
OF NON-ENGLISH DEPARTMENT STUDENTS
A THESIS
Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements to Obtain Sarjana Pendidikan Degree
in English Language Education
By
S. MULAT ANDRIYANI 981214062
ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDUCATION STUDY PROGRAM
DEPARTMENT OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS EDUCATION
FACULTY OF TEACHERS TRAINING AND EDUCATION
SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY
YOGYAKARTA
2007
I dedicate this thesis to My Mother, Father, Sisters, Yayang, and Dedek Wibi
STATEMENT OF WORK’S ORIGINALITY
I honestly declare that this thesis which I wrote does not contain the works or part of the works of other people, except those cited in the quotations and bibliography, as a scientific paper should.
Yogyakarta, 16th January 2007
S. Mulat Andriyani
ABSTRACT
Andriyani, S. Mulat. 2007. Reading Strategies of non-English Department Students.
Yogyakarta: English Education Study Program, Sanata Dharma University.
Strategies are important tools to gain the success of reading comprehension. They help the readers read effectively and efficiently since strategies can reduce the difficulties which occur in their reading.
The aim of this research was to find out the patterns of strategies used in reading English texts. This research was carried out on the ground that to comprehend their compulsory books written in English, non-English department students use different strategies. There was a question asked in this research. The question was: what the participants’ patterns of strategies in reading English text are.
This research was qualitative with three participants to find out the patterns of strategies in English reading tests. This research used three instruments to get the data. They were observation, tests, and interview. The observation was done to identify the participants’ activities during doing the tests. The tests were done to identify their reading comprehension. The tests were written tests. There were six written tests given. Each written test consisted of a text and questions. The questions related to identify title, locate main idea, and draw conclusion. The interview was done to get information on the strategies. The interview was what the participants did to comprehend the texts contain. The interview was conducted after the participants did each test.
The analysis result presented the data resulted from interview, observation, tests, and other data that are considered important for the research. The result of the analysis shows that: The participants used certain patterns to comprehend the reading texts. The patterns were: first, they read the text between the lines. Second, they consulted dictionary. The last, they reread the text to make sure their comprehension. Other findings showed that: (1) the three participants had different comprehension level. It could be seen from the data that Participant 1 was the best among the participants, Participant 2 was better than Participant 3, (2) it was found out that the participants did not master the grammar well, (3) the participants’ did not also master vocabulary well, but they tried to answer the questions using their own words, and (4) the participants were not careful in writing the vocabulary. This research recommended the students to use various and suitable strategies, since they can facilitate their reading comprehension.
ABSTRAK
Andriyani, S. Mulat. 2007. Strategi-strategi membaca oleh mahasiswaprogram non-Bahasa Inggris. Yogyakarta: Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris, Universitas Sanata Dharma.
Strategi-strategi adalah alat yang penting untuk berhasil dalam pemahaman membaca. Mereka menolong pembaca untuk membaca secara efektif dan efisien karena strategi-strategi bisa mengurangi kesulitan-kesulitan yang timbul saat mereka membaca.
Tujuan penelitian ini adalah untuk mengetahui strategi-strategi dalam pemahaman membaca teks berbahasa Inggris. Penelitian ini dikembangkan atas dasar bahwa untuk memahami buku acuan yang ditulis dalam bahasa Inggris, siswa non-program bahasa Inggris menggunakan strategi-strategi. Ada sebuah pertanyaan yang ditanyakan dalam penelitian ini. Pertanyaan tersebut adalah: pola-pola strategi apa yang digunakan siswa dalam memahami teks berbahasa Inggris.
Penelitian ini adalah penelitian kwalitatif dengan tiga partisipan untuk mengetahui strategi-strategi dan pemahaman membaca bahasa Inggris. Penelitian ini menggunakan tiga alat dalam memperoleh data. Alat-alat tersebut adalah pengamatan, tes-tes, dan wawancara. Pengamatan dilakukan untuk mengetahui kegiatan kegiatan apa yang dilakukan oleh para partisipan selama mengerjakan tes. tes dilakukan untuk mengetahui pemahan membaca bahasa inggris mereka. Tes-tes tersebut berupa Tes-tes tertulis. Ada enam Tes-test tertulis yang diberikan. Tiap Tes-tes terdiri dari sebuah teks dan pertanyaan-pertanyaan. Wawancara dilakukan untuk memperoleh informasi tentang strategi. Wawancara tersebut adalah tentang apa yang para partisipan lakukan untuk memahami isi bacaan tersebut. Wawancara tersebut dilakukan setelah para participan selesai mengerjakan tiap tes.
Hasil analisa membicarakan tentang data yang diperoleh dari wawancara, observasi, tes-tes, dan data-data lain yang penting untuk penelitian ini. Hasil analisa menunjukkan bahwa: para partisipan menggunakan pola-pola tertentu untuk memahami teks berbahasa Inggris. Pola tersebut adalah: pertama, mereka membaca teks sekilas. Kedua, mereka membuka kamus. Terakhir, mereka membaca kembali teks untuk memastikan pemahaman. Penemuan lain menunjukkan bahwa: (1) ketiga partisipan mempunyai tingkat kemampuan pemahamn membaca yang berbeda. Hal ini dapat dilihat dari data bahwa kemampuan membaca Partisipan 1 yang terbaik dari ketiganya, Partisipan 2 lebih baik daripada Partisipan 3, (2) diketahui bahwa para partisipan tidak menguasai tata bahasa dengan baik, (3) para partisipan juga tidak menguasai kosakata dengan baik, tapi mereka berusaha untuk menjawab pertanyaan dengan menggunakan bahasa mereka sendiri, dan (4) para partisipan tidak teliti dalm menulis kosakata. Penelitian ini merekomendasikan agar siswa-siswa untuk penggunaan strategi secara bervariasi dan tepat, karena strategi-strategi tersebut dapat mambantu pemahaman bacaan mereka.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to express my sincere gratitude to those people who have assisted me in a variety of ways during my study and those who have contributed a lot to the accomplishment of this thesis.
First of all, I am grateful to my Lord Jesus Christ for His everlasting blessing, love, and talents so that I was able to finish this thesis.
This completion of this thesis has required hard efforts and taken a lot of energy, and it would not have been possible without the assistances of others. Therefore, I would like to acknowledge my greatest gratitude to Ag. Hardy Prasetyo, S.Pd., M.A., my sponsor for spending his time to correct my thesis.
My greatest gratitude is expressed also to Dr. J. Bismoko who has kindly spent his precious time guiding, advising, correcting me to finish this thesis, and who has provided me with valuable and helpful comments to improve my thesis.
I would also like to express my greatest gratitude to Th. Astanti Rorik W., S.Pd., M.Ed. for her patience and willingness to read and correct this thesis and for her help in giving ideas and comments.
My appreciation goes to all the members of the lecturing staff of the English Education Study Program of Sanata Dharma University who had guided and taught me, and to all secretariat and library staff for their warm and kind help.
I would like to thank to my friends, PBI ’98: Dewi, Sari, Cathy, Nana, Inang and Lis for the fun time being together.
My deepest gratitude is dedicated to my beloved parents, Bapak, Ibuk, for their love, encouragement, and being patient, to my sisters: Mbak Nining, Mbak Lus, Mbak Kanti for their love and support.
My deepest gratitude also goes to Albertus Iwan Setiyanto, my dearly beloved husband, for being patient and giving support, help, care, and greatest love to me, and also to Christophorus Indriawan Wibisono, my dearest cute little son, for bringing cheerfulness to my life. He is my amazing grace that God gives to me. Both of them complete my happiness and are my biggest spirit. I love them both so much.
S. Mulat Andriyani
TABLE OF CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE ... i
PAGE OF APPROVAL ... ii
PAGE OF ACCEPTANCE ... iii
PAGE OF DEDICATION ... iv
STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY ... v
ABSTRACT ... vi
ABSTRAK ... vii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ... viii
TABLE OF CONTENTS ... ix
LIST OF TABLES ... xii
CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION ... 1
A. Background ... 1
B. Problem Identification ... 3
C. Limitation of the Research ... 4
D. Research Questions ... 4
E. Research Objectives ... 4
F. Research Benefits ... 5
G. Definition of Terms ... 5
CHAPTER V CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMENDATIONS... 46
A. Conclusions ... 46
B. Other Findings ... 47
C. Recommendations ... 48
BIBLIOGRAPHY ... 49
APPENDICES ... 51
APPENDIX 1: Test Materials ... 52
APPENDIX 2: Interview of Participant 1... 61
APPENDIX 3: Interview Interpretation of Participant 1 ... 65
APPENDIX 4: Observation on Participant 1 ... 69
APPENDIX 5: Interview of Participant 2 ... 71
APPENDIX 6: Interview Interpretation of Participant 2 ... 75
APPENDIX 7: Observation on Participant 2 ... 78
APPENDIX 8: Interview of Participant 3 ... 80
APPENDIX 9: Interview Interpretation of Participant 3 ... 84
APPENDIX 10: Observation on Participant 3 ... 87
LIST OF TABLES
1. Table 4.1 The results of reading tests ……… 37
1
This chapter purposes to clarify the research questions. Therefore, it discusses
the background of the research, problem identification, limitation of the research,
research questions, research objectives, benefits, and definition of the terms.
A. Background
When one reads a text, he or she tries to get the ideas of the text. Reading
does not merely know each word in the text, but it needs one’s text comprehension.
Comprehension is the product of reading. One needs strategies to facilitate successful
comprehension. Reading strategy is a mental process that a reader consciously
chooses to use in accomplishing reading tasks (Cohen, 1990: 83). Strategies help the
reader to meet successful reading and to reduce the difficulties that occur in the
reading activities.
Reading in a second language is not only done by students of the English
program. Students of non-English Programs also require reading their textbooks
written in English. It is not easy since English is a foreign language or second
language. We are quite sure that reading in a native language is much easier than in a
second language since we have mastered its vocabulary and structure of our own
language. On the other hand, reading in a second language is difficult. It demands
enough knowledge of the target language which has a different system from the
native language. The lack of vocabulary, structure, and other knowledge cannot
influenced by one’s mother tongue. Sometimes, reader uses his mother tongue
structure in reading English. Sartinah (1988: 34) states that “to express oneself in a
foreign language is an impossible thing if it is combined with the way of thinking in
one’s mother tongue”. Reading ability is individual because each person has different
reading ability. Reading ability refers to what extent the process is well developed
and the result is achieved. According to Davis as cited in Smith and Johnson (1980:
13), one can have good reading comprehension when she or he has the ability to find
the main thought of passage and to draw inferences from the passage that determine
the writer’s attitude purpose. Those two abilities then will be mentioned as
comprehension in this research if the participants master them. There are three
abilities, those are the elements of comprehension, will be discussed in this research.
Besides the two abilities above that are ability to find the main thought of passage or
then will be mentioned as the ability to locate main idea and ability to draw
inferences from the passage or then will mentioned as the ability to draw conclusion,
there is also ability to identify title.
Reading comprehension is the ability to make sense of printed symbols by
coordinating emotional, cognitive and psychomotor abilities to understand the
meaning of the text that is being read, and reading strategy is a mental process that
the reader consciously chooses to use in accomplishing reading task. Reading cannot
be separated from strategies in that they facilitate the reader to read more effective
and efficient. To gain successful reading comprehension one needs reading
strategies. One can have different strategies in his reading process. Different reading
tasks require different strategies. So, it needs research to find out the strategies in
B. Problem Identification
Comprehension cannot be separated from strategies. Strategies play an
important role in reading comprehension because they facilitate the readers to read
efficiently to meet successful reading comprehension. Strategies can be
metacognitive, cognitive, social, and affective. Metacognitive strategies control the
reader’s cognition by coordinating the planning, organizing, and evaluation of the
learning process. Cognitive strategies encompass the language learning strategies of
identification, grouping, retention, and storage of language material, as well as the
language use strategies of retrieval, rehearsal, and comprehension. Social strategies
include the actions which the learners choose to take in order to interact with other
learners and with native speakers. Affective strategies serve to regulate emotions,
motivation, and attitudes.
Successful reading also involves emotion, cognitive, and psychomotor
abilities (Taschow, 1985: 24). Emotion is connected with interest. When one is
interested in reading a text, he or she tries hard to comprehend the text, and the goal
of reading that is comprehension, hopefully achieved. Cognition relates to
understanding in reading. Understanding involves interpretation, assimilation,
accommodation, adaptation, and equilibrium. Cognition depends on perceiving,
recognizing, conceiving, judging, and reasoning, all of which lead to understanding.
Psychomotor abilities connect to reading fluency that fluency in silent reading can be
expressed in agility or mental action and nimbleness of thought, comprehension, and
resourcefulness in completing and composing stories, solving problems, and
Based on the identification above, therefore, this research was done to find
out their strategies in reading English text. The research was on three participants of
non-English department. The research uses qualitative research that makes use
observation, tests, and interview to collect the data.
C. Limitation of the Research
From the problem identification above and to make this research feasible, it is
necessary to limit the study into several areas. The purpose of it is to make the writer
easy to develop the research so that she can present deep discussion.
The environment of the research is the non-English Department and requires
three non-English department students of different universities as the participants.
The research focuses on the strategies used by the participants in their reading
English texts. The comprehension can show the effectiveness of the strategies they
choose. The criteria of comprehension are the participants’ abilities in identifying
title, locating main idea, and drawing accurate conclusion in each test.
D. Research Questions
The problems of this research can be formulated as: What are the students’
strategies in reading English texts?
E. Research Objectives
Because the research was on strategies used by three non-English department
students, therefore, the objective of the study is to find out their strategies in reading
F. Research Benefits
Strategies in reading are mental processes that the reader chooses to use in
accomplishing reading task (Cohen, 1990: 83). Reading strategies have important
roles in comprehension English texts. Strategies here mean techniques of reading to
get the idea of the reading texts. There were various strategies used to meet
successful reading comprehension. The result of this research could be useful not
only for the students but also for the teachers.
The students will get information about the strategies they should use for
certain texts. They can apply different strategies to solve their problem in
comprehending English texts. Therefore, by knowing various kinds of strategies they
can comprehend English text better and can apply them appropriately. Finally, those
might make the reading texts easier to comprehend. Using different strategies to read
English text is useful since a problem in reading comprehension cannot only be
solved by a strategy but sometimes need more than one strategy.
The teachers will also get information about reading comprehension. He or
she can inform his or her students about the strategies they should apply when they
read difficult text. Comprehension can be gain if the readers apply various strategies.
G. Definition of Terms
It is necessary to clarify up some terms used in the research that are
considered important. Those terms are:
1. Reading Strategies
Reading strategies are mental processes that readers consciously choose to use in
strategies, paraphrasing strategies, strategies for establishing coherence in text,
or strategies for supervising strategies use (Sarig in Cohen, 1990: 91).
2. Reading Comprehension
Reading comprehension in this research is the ability to identify title, locating
main idea, and draw conclusion in the reading tests.
3. Non- English Department Students
The three students who learn English to support their academic and professional
success in non-English related studies, such as Health, Economic, and
7
This chapter discusses the theory of reading and it is divided into two big areas.
Those are theoretical description and theoretical framework. The theory description
presents some theories that support this research. The theory framework discusses the
theory to clarify related concepts to answer the research questions theoretically and to
show their complexities.
A. Theoretical Discussion.
This section presents some theories that support this research. This section is
divided into four subsections. They are Strategies, Reading, Non-English Students, and
Strategies and Reading Comprehension in EAP.
1. Strategies.
Specifically, Cohen (1990: 83) proposes strategies in reading as mental processes
that reader consciously chooses to use in accomplishing reading tasks. According to this
definition, all levels of strategies, such as guessing new words from context to more
specific ones, like performing interparagraph analysis to guess words, are all considered
“strategies”, as opposed to referring to the more specific ones by some other term, such
as “techniques” or tactic”. Such strategies facilitate successful comprehension of text.
Strategies refer to both general approaches and specific actions or techniques to learn a
second language, in this case, reading English text. A reader deploys strategies to
overcome particular reading problems. Generally, reader is aware of the strategies he uses
Strategies contribute indirectly to learning by providing the reader with the data about
second language which he then processes. However, some strategies may also contribute
directly, for example, memorization strategies directed at specific lexical items or
grammatical rules. Strategies use varies considerably as a result of both kinds of task the
reader is engaged in and individual learner preferences.
The following are possible differences that distinguish a skill from strategy that
presented by Urguhant (1998: 91).
Strategies are reader-oriented; while skills are text oriented. It is true that skill
taxonomies tend to focus on text.
Strategies represent conscious decisions taken by the reader; skills are deployed
unconsciously. Another way of phrasing this is that skills have reached the level
of automatically.
Strategies, unlike skills, represent a response to a problem, e.g. failure to
understand a word or significance of preposition, failure to find the information
one was looking for.
On the whole, William and Moran in Urguhant (1998: 91) draw the distinction between
skill and strategy. A skill is an ability which has been automated and operated largerly
subconsciously, whereas a strategy is a conscious procedure carried out in order to solve
a problem.
Sometimes, strategies are referred to as good, effective, successful, and converse.
It needs to be pointed out that with some expectations, strategies themselves are not
reader from one instance within one task to another instance within that same task, from
one task to another, or by different readers dealing with different task (Cohen, 1990: 8).
There is an opinion that readers who use more strategies indicate that they are
better than they who use fewer strategies. The total number or variety of strategies
employed and the frequency with which any given strategy is used are not necessarily
indicators of how successful they will be on a language task. Whereas the successful
completion of some tasks may require the use of various strategies used repeatedly, the
successful completion of others may depend on the use of just a few strategies, each
strategy is only used once but successfully.
a. Types of Strategies
There are actually many possible reading strategies to choose from. Sarig in
Cohen (1990: 91) classifies strategies into four basic types. They include:
1. Support strategies
Types of reading acts that are undertaken to facilitate high level strategies. For
example, skimming, scanning, skipping, marking the text, and using glossary.
2. Paraphrasing strategies
Decoding strategies to clarify meaning by simplifying syntax, finding
synonyms for words and phrases, looking for prepositions or basic ideas, and
identifying the function of potions of the text.
3. Strategies for establishing coherence in text
The use of world knowledge or clues in the text to make the text intelligible as
context, and distinguishing the discourse functions in the text (such as
introduction, definition, exemplification, and conclusion).
4. Strategies for supervising strategies use
Conscious strategies for checking ongoing self-evaluation, changing the
planning and executing of task, identifying misunderstandings, and
remediating when reading problems are found.
O’Malley and Chamot (Ellis, 2003: 536) distinguish strategies in accordance with
the information-processing model, based on their research. Strategies can be cognitive,
metacognitive, social, and affective strategies. Cognitive strategies refer to the steps or
operations used in problem solving that require direct analysis, transformation or
synthesis of learning material. They have an operative or cognitive-processing function,
e.g. translation, deduction, elaboration, transfer, and inferencing. Translation is making
use the first of language as a base for understanding and/or producing the second
language. Deduction is consciously applying rules to produce or understand the second
language. Elaboration means relating new information to other concepts in memory.
Transfer is using previous acquired linguistic and/or conceptual knowledge to facilitate a
new language learning task. And inferencing means using available information to guess
meanings of new items, predict outcomes, or fill in missing information. Metacognitive
strategies make use of knowledge about cognitive processes and constitute an attempt to
regulate language learning by means of planning, monitoring, and evaluating. Such
strategies allow learners to control their own cognition by coordinating the planning,
organizing, and evaluating. Social strategies concern the ways in which learners select to
interact with other learners and native speakers, e.g. asking questions to clarify social
strategies serve to regulate emotions, motivation, and attitudes, e.g. strategies for
reduction of anxiety and for self-encouragement.
b. The Importance of Reading Strategies
Reading strategies are very important in reading comprehension. They facilitate
readers who want to read efficiently. A reader who has determined what he expects to
gain from his reading should select reading strategies which best suit his particular
purpose (Kustaryo, 1988: 4). If he is reading a novel or a magazine for pleasure, he
would obviously not use the same kind of reading strategies that he would use in reading
a book of science, linguistics, mathematics, biology, and other subjects.
Reading is very complex and progresses from very poor reading habits to better
ones. It requires a high level of effort and concentration. It is more than just a visual task.
A reader must not only see and identify the symbols in front of him but also must be able
to interpret what he needs, associate with his past experience, and project beyond this in
term of ideas, judgments, applications, and conclusions. These reading necessities should
be trained to improve the reader’s reading abilities. Readers should know some reading
strategies that they need for their college work. They should be sure that suitable
strategies are used to facilitate their rapid understanding of the reading materials.
Different types of reading materials call for different reading strategies. In any reading
task, a reader should be flexible in using these strategies, meaning that the strategies
should be appropriately chosen. They should fit with the aim of reading. This
appropriateness will help his reading and give positive effects, that are, the objective he
wants to obtain, to get some information, to get the main idea, to understand the whole
Research has shown that the strategies one uses in reading in a target language
may be similar to the ones one uses for reading in his native language. This may be good
or bad depending on the kind of reader he is in his native language. For learners who are
poor readers in their native language, the reading of language target language material
may produce similar problems. According to Levine and Reves (Cohen, 1990: 74), if the
target language trains such learner in the use of the reading strategies, the learning of the
target language may provide an opportunity for them to strengthen their reading skills
altogether, which has been found to have positive backwash effect on native language
reading.
It has been thought that readers decrease their use of strategies in target language
reading once the level of language is beyond their language proficiency. It now appears
that readers may read on, drawing on their reading strategies, but possibly with little or
no comprehension because of the excessive linguistic (Sarig in Cohen, 1990: 74). In other
words, rather than give up on a reading passage if it makes demands beyond their level of
language, non-native readers may well continue reading, drawing on their reading
strategies to compensate for a lack of proficiency.
2. Reading a. Nature
Reading is the ability to make sense of written or printed symbols. The reader
uses the symbols to guide the recovery of information from his or her memory and
subsequently uses this information to construct a plausible interpretation of the writer’s
reading to learn, he or she engages the whole organism, not only the mind, in complex,
purposeful processes by coordinating emotional, cognitive, psychomotor abilities.
Biglmaier, as quoted by Horst G. Taschow (1985: 24), calls emotion, cognition,
and psychomotor abilities as the dimensions of reading and describes each dimension in
terms of its major criterion. Thus, emotion is connected with interest, cognition with
understanding, and psychomotor abilities with certainty, fluency, and speed. Emotion is
characterized by reading interest. Interest is one of the affective factors that develop and
maintain the desire for reading. Understanding involves interpretation, assimilation,
accommodation, adaptation, and equilibrium. Cognition or the act of knowing depends on
perceiving, recognizing, conceiving, judging, and reasoning, all of which lead to
understanding. Reading understanding means grasping the ideas represented in print and
apprehending clearly the nature and subtleties of the reading content and becoming
thoroughly familiar with them.
Psychomotor abilities are characterized by reading certainty, reading fluency, and
reading speed which defines the reader’s state of being almost free of doubt in processing
graphphophonic, syntactic, and semantic information and being able to process them
fluently and expeditiously. Reading certainty can be expressed through handling new,
unknown, and difficult words in isolation and in context and through using them in oral
and written responses and communications. Reading fluency: in writing can be described
as being able to form letter without interrupting the stroke of the pen from the beginning
to the end of a word. Quality in written word fluency is expressed in agility or mental
action and nimbleness of thought, comprehension, and resourcefulness in completing and
composing stories, solving problems, and initiating and working out new ideas. Speed is
we determine whether the reader’s mind attaches meaning with the same speed as the
eye’s race along and down the printed lines. Reading certainty, fluency, and speed, which
constitute the psychomotor reading abilities, support and strengthen the reader’s progress
from a dependent, outside-regulated reader to an independent, self disciplined reader.
Without this abilities, reader find it burdensome if not self-defeating to process print. But
when reading certainty, reading fluency, and reading speed work together with the
reader’s emotion and cognition, the reader’s whole organism engages in reading to
extract meaning from text effectively, efficiently, and economically, meaningful and
experiential learning.
Reading is an active set of skills. According to Eskey in Cohen (1990: 75),
reading has been viewed as a continual interaction of identification skills and interpretive
skills. Identification skill is the recognition of words and phrases and the grammatical
signal required for the simple decoding of the text. Interpretive skill is the higher-level
skill that allows for meaningful reconstruction of a text as unified, coherent structure of
meaning. In this interactive model, readers are seen to use their previous knowledge of
form (the alphabet, words in context, rhetorical form to identify the visual cues and their
expectations about the conceptual structure of the text (cultural, subject matter,
pragmatics) in order to perform a personal reconstruction of the meaning of the text.
Reading is a receptive language process. It is a psycholinguistic process in that it
starts with a linguistic surface representation encoded by a writer and ends with meaning
which the reader constructs (Goodman, 1988: 11). During the reading process, readers
construct a meaningful representation of text through an interaction of their conceptual
and linguistic knowledge with the cues that are in the text. The reader uses minimal
syntactic, and semantic cues) assist readers in sampling, confirming, correcting, and
rejecting the predictions they make about the message (Barnitz, 1985: 4).
According to the research reported in Spiro, Bruce, and Brewer as quoted by
Barnitz in Reading Development of Nonnative Speaker of English (1985: 4), there are at least three essential elements of an adequate model of reading. First, reading is
multileveled in that native readers use various levels of a language simultaneously to
access meaning. Readers use their knowledge of the world and their pragmatic, discourse,
syntactic, morphological, and phonological knowledge in constructing and reconstructing
meaning. Secondly, reading is interactive in that the reader’s comprehension is “driven”
by the knowledge structure or “schemata” of the reader and the specific content and
linguistic in the text. All the levels of background knowledge (social, linguistic,
conceptual, etc) interact simultaneously as readers construct a meaning of a text. Thirdly,
reading involves the generation of hypotheses as readers make predictions about the
meaning of a text. These predictions will be confirmed or rejected as reading proceeds.
Quoted by Barnitz (1985: 6), Goodman and Burke wrote that psycholinguistic
research on reading implies that reading instruction should provide opportunities for
students to discover the process of the total orchestration of language and conceptual
skills with an emphasis not only on the meaning intended by the author and reader, but
also on the strategies for constructing meaning or a text. A language must be studied in
process.
There are two kinds of information used in respective language. First, the
language structure which is the grammar, or set of syntactic relationships that make it
possible to express highly complex messages using a very small set of symbols. The
concepts and conceptual sentences. Meaning is the end product of receptive language..
Readers bring meaning to any communication and conduct themselves as seekers of
meaning.
According to Carrell, Devine, and Eskey (1988: 16), readers employ five
processes in reading. The brain is the organ of information processing. It decides what
tasks it must handle, what information is available, what strategies it must employ, which
input channels to use, where to seek information. The brain seeks to maximize
If the brain predicts, it must also seek to verify its prediction. So it monitors to
confirm or disconfirm with subsequent input what it expected.
meaning is being constructed, or the meaning is already known, or the story is
uninteresting or the reader finds it inappropriate for the particular purpose. At
any rate, termination in reading is usually an open option at any point.
These processes have an intrinsic sequence. Prediction precedes confirmation
which precedes correction. Yet the same information may be used to confirm a prior
prediction and to make a new one.
b. Comprehension
Comprehension is frequently mentioned in cognitive and educational psychology,
as well as, of course, the pedagogical literature. There is often an assumption in the
literature that it is the goal of reading process (Urquhant, 1998: 84). Strategies appear to
have come into reading research via psychology, where they were used to describe how
an organism sought to attain its goals. In both reading research and practice a focus on
strategy has had the effect of making the whole operation more learner-centered.
According to Davis as cited in Smith and Johnson (1980: 13), one can have good
reading comprehension if she or he has: (1) knowledge of word meaning, (2) ability to
select the appropriate meaning of a word or phrase in the light of its contextual setting,
(3) ability to follow the organization of a passage and to identify antecedents and
references in it, (4) ability to find the main thought of a passage, (5) ability to answer
questions that specifically answered in the passage, (6) ability to answer questions that
are solved in the passage, but not in the word in which the questions are asked, (7) ability
to draw inferences from the passage that determine its tone and mood, (8) ability to
recognize the literary devices used in the passage, (9) ability to determine the writer’s
passage or point 4 and draw inferences from the passage or point 7 are used to identify
the participants’ comprehension, and also give appropriate title.
Before 1970s, the focus of attention among people concerned with reading in
education was “decoding”, whereas, it moves to “comprehension” in 1970s. A focus on
comprehension is in line with our feeling that it is what reading is about, i.e. getting
information from written text. Rayner and Pollatsek, as cited by Urquhant (1998: 85),
give definition and description of comprehension that it equals “the meaning of the text”
that is being read. They would mention here the notion that the ideal comprehension
consists of the recovery of author’s meaning. They do not think that it can be doubted
that readers often strive to do this. When one can understand the meaning of texts, she or
he can purpose the main idea and draw conclusion, moreover, give appropriate title.
The component of comprehension is composed of a large number of skill
segments at the literal, interpretive, critical, and creative levels. Many readers find the
communication process between writer and reader to be complex because of the number
of factors. Some readers at all learning levels find that they cannot comprehend what has
been written because they lack experience for the words and concept presented. In the
reading process, the readers are required to determine what the text says accurately.
Therefore, the ability to recognize words helps the reader in the identification process.
Good readers are better than poor readers at recognizing words automatically. It is
because the identification process may occur automatically after much practice. The more
skillful a reader, the more automatic the identification process is. When word recognition
is automatic, a reader can focus his or her attention on the higher-level sentence
integration and the semantic processing. Thus, we can differentiate word recognition as
There are many factors that influence reading comprehension ability. They can be
intelligence, lack of vocabularies, motivation, and interest. Intelligence, as usually
reflected in IQ (Intelligence Quotation) rate, is proved to have influence upon one’s level
of reading ability. Moyle (1968: 50) who called intelligence as general ability, stated that
who seem to be poorly endowed with general ability have for more difficulties in
mastering the process of learning to read than to do those who are well-endowed. There is
a strong relationship between intelligent and word recognition and comprehension. One
who has below average level of intelligence will probably find difficult in dealing with
comprehension activities.
The second factor is lack of vocabulary mastery. Lie Kim San (1985: 67) in his
research finds that lack of vocabulary is one factor causing readers have poor English
reading comprehension. When they attempt to comprehend a text containing a number of
unfamiliar words, they cannot understand it. Those unfamiliar words block them to
understand the context of the text. They cannot begin to read with full of understanding
until they have been thought to overcome the unknown words. In reading comprehension,
a reader must be able to attach some kind of meaning or understanding to the words.
Those who have little experience with vocabularies will face difficulties in
comprehending them (Cushenberry: 1985: 61-63). The success of reading activity is
partly determined by the knowledge of vocabulary that will be used in the reading
process.
According to Wieners and Bazerman (1985: 3), reading has a close connection
with vocabulary as they state “To read well, you need strong vocabulary. To build strong
vocabulary, you need to read well”. And since the authentic English text often uses
because they do not know the meaning of some words. In fact, there are ways to help
readers keep reading when they face new words. In order to find out the meaning of new
words, one does not really need a dictionary. He or she can do it by using sentences
around the unfamiliar word.
The third factor is motivation. It is not surprising that motivation, that is a positive
attitude about learning, should be considered an important part of the reading content. It
is a key to any learning. Positive motivation is essential since it provides greater effort,
encouraged concentration, and increased cooperation with those involved in the
instruction process (Alexander, 1983: 375). It also gives the reason why that a student
reads the whole reading assignment or just read a few lines, that he is he is full attention
or just with half of his heart and also that he reads actively or just reads without thinking
much about it.
The last factor that influences comprehension is interest. Reader’s interest will
determine the level of motivation and involvement in accomplishing an English reading
task. A great interest of English or other topics can influence to what extent the reader
will succeed in reading the text. The reader comprehends better when he read passages
discussing topics of high interest to them. There are two possible reasons for this,
namely: (1) he knows more about the topics, and (2) he is personally motivated to read.
Lado (1987: 5), writes another factor of comprehension that can be seen as a
hindrance. It is a person who learns a foreign language will tend to use his mother tongue.
Beside, he also says that whether it is easy or not to learn a foreign language depends on
the structure of his mother tongue too: are the patterns a like, the same, or very different
in type, from the foreign language he learns? The differences in structure may cause
There are two approaches in reading processing purposed by Mitchell (1983: 106)
that may be taken by readers. They are Bottom-up Processing and Top-down Processing.
Bottom up analyses begin with the stimulus, for example, the text or bits of the text. The
reader begins with word by word to semantic and syntactic rules to assign a meaning of a
sentence. We can say in other words that with the first kind of interaction, the processing
starts with raw input and passes through increasing refined analysis until the meaning of
the text is eventually determined. Top-down processing is produced when decisions made
at the higher levels in processing system are used to guide choices at lower levels. In
order to analyze the text in this way, the reader has to draw upon his knowledge of the
world and his knowledge of structure of the sentences.
A further limitation arises when we consider the interaction between readers and
texts that makes up the reading process. There has been for some time a consensus in the
field of reading theory about the general outlines of the relationship between reader, text,
and comprehension, though, of course, details vary. Readings may differ in the case of
readers from different culture, either ethnic or professional, or in the case of the same
reader at different times, with different knowledge or different preoccupations.
Interpretations are such differing readings, which are generally not under control of the
readers.
The reading product may also vary according to a dimension controlled by
reader’s purposes. The reader may decide to glimpse at the text, extracting gist, or work
conscientiously through it satisfying himself that he has made sense of all of it. Such
variations are labeled comprehension.
Interpretations, on the other hand, are variations brought about in the reading
testing. Interpretation and knowledge of the world has a relationship in that one can have
good interpretation if she or she involves his or her knowledge of the world in
interpreting a language. Therefore, connecting knowledge of the world is one of the
strategies that can be used in the reading tests.
There are three types of reading comprehension purposed by Harris (1947: 134).
The first type is literal comprehension. This level of comprehension represents the
minimum of involvement on the part of the reader. It is simple understanding of the
words and ideas of the author’s message is received but not examined, evaluated, or
utilized in anyway. The second type is interpretive comprehension. At this type of
comprehension, the reader not only knows what the author said about goes beyond that
simple knowledge, it involves an effort to grasp relationship, compare facts with personal
experiences, understand sequences, see cause and effect relationships, and generally
interpret the message. It requires a more active participant on the part of the reader. The
last type of comprehension is applies comprehension. This type of comprehension
requires the reader does more than merely receiving and interpreting the message. The
reader evaluates the author’s ideas, either accepting or rejecting them or applying them to
some new situation. In some cases, the author’s message is designed to produce some
application. For example, the author’s message is received, understood, and utilized in
some way, mentally and physically.
3. Non English Students
Non-English students learn English for academic purposes. This involves English
for academic study needs. EAP accounts for a large amount of ESP activity. A further
field of study and those who are already expert, perhaps via the medium of their own
language. The general consensus is that the concerns of EAP are not specific to English,
but that many students are aiming at a higher level of academic achievement through
English than in their first language. Thus they are learning academic strategies for the
first time through English and they may subsequently try to apply what they have learnt
to operations in their first language. For example, reading in an academic context.
Reading is probably the most generally needed skill in EAP worldwide. An
important question is how far success in reading is helped by practice in the other
language skills. Activation of knowledge of the language through writing to speaking can
feed back into reading. However, very often there is too little time on a course to do more
than focus on (silent reading and little motivation to do so (Robinson, 1991: 102). For
many disciplines, much if not all of the basic material is available in the students’ first
language, which is also the medium of instruction. The need of English is limited to the
skill of reading and the content of the texts is likely to be discussed in the first language.
A second issue in EAP reading is how far knowledge of the topic can compensate
in linguistic difficulties in reading a text. Particular structure and types of vocabulary
appears to be the cause of most difficulties in reading. Related to the issue, it is important
to teach grammar to aid reading. In order for the teachers and students not to spend too
much of a reading class in studying grammar, it is important to identify the purpose for
which a text needs to be read. In an influential article, Johns and Davies (Robinson, 1991:
103) suggest that in EAP, texts are vehicles for information not linguistic objects. They
suggest a methodology for studying written texts, such that the focus is on the
information in them and not primarily on the linguistic forms used to realize that
think, not just manipulate language. It is most appropriate for the students to read is not
ready-prepared textbooks but extracts from the textbooks and articles supplied by their
specialist departments or faculties (Armanet and Obese-jecty in Robinson, 1991: 103).
Robin and Thompson in Urguhant (1990: 87) define the characteristics of good language
learners. Good language learners should be creative developing a feel for the language by
experimenting with its grammar and words. They use their memories and other memory
strategies to recall what have been learned. They use their linguistic knowledge,
including knowledge of the first language in learning the second language, but they have
to be aware that knowledge of the first language can always be applied in the foreign
language, e.g. structure. In reading, they use contextual cues to help them in
comprehension. They may learn to make intelligent guesses by relating any information
in the text and their knowledge of the world. Good learners may learn production
strategies to fill in gaps in their own competence. Learners should be careful in choosing
strategies. The strategies should suit to the problem of the reading ability.
4. Strategies and Reading Comprehension in EAP
Reading in a second language or foreign language is similar to the understanding
of reading in general, in the sense that it requires active participation of the reader.
However, reading in second or foreign language becomes more difficult for the learners
because of the lack of vocabulary and structure of the language. Specific terms that relate
to their study which cannot be found in the dictionary can also mean lack of vocabulary.
Since reading in EAP do not pay attention and provide much grammar teaching activities,
Strategies have important role in reading EAP. They facilitate the readers to read
efficiently. Strategies are specific methods of approaching a problem or tasks, modes of
operation for achievement a particular end, planned designs for controlling manipulating
certain information. A reader who has determined what he expects to gain from his
reading should select a reading strategies which best suits his particular purpose. It is
important because reading comprehension is not reading the whole text without
understanding any idea inside the text. It is more than just a visual task. Comprehending a
text is an active thinking process which depends not only on the comprehension skill but
also on one’s experiences and knowledge. Relating background knowledge either
knowledge of the structure or knowledge of the world can be mentioned as strategy. In
reading comprehension, a reader must be able to attach some meaning or understanding
to the words in the text. Lack of vocabulary can make the learner cannot read with full
understanding. To overcome their problems, readers need to provide themselves with
strategies to facilitate them to comprehend the text.
Different types of reading materials call for different reading strategies. In any
reading tasks, a reader should be flexible in using strategies, meaning that the strategies
should be appropriately chose, they should fit the aim of this reading. This
appropriateness will help his reading and give positive effects, such as, the objective he
wants to obtain, to get some information, to get the main idea, to understand the whole
material, and other purposes, can be achieved (Kustaryo, 1988: 4).
B. Theoretical Framework
When talking about reading, the reader must be able to understand meanings.
expected the result. Comprehending a text is an active thinking process which depends
not only on the comprehension skill, but also on one’s experiences and knowledge. As a
code analysis, reading ability is a communication process between the reader and the
writer.
Reading involves emotion, cognitive, and psychomotor abilities. The reader
involves the three of them to extract meaning from text efficiently, effectively, and
meaningfully. Therefore, success in reading requires various skills and strategies so that
the reader can catch both the explicit and implicit message of the text. It is not easy to
read English texts. The readers need to apply strategies to catch up the idea of the texts
content. The strategies are used to facilitate the reading comprehension toward the texts.
There are four types of strategies, in accordance whether they are metacognitie,
cognitive, social, or affective (Ellis, 2003: 536). Metacognitive strategies deal with
pre-assesment, pre-planning, evaluation of language learning activities. These strategies
allow readers to control their own cognition by coordinating the planning, organizing,
and evaluating of the learning process. Cognition strategies have an operative-processing
function. Social strategies serve to regulate emotion, motivation, and attitude. Affective
strategies include the actions which the readers choose to take in order to interact with
other learners and with native speakers.
Sarig (Cohen, 1990: 91) categorizes strategies into four basic types. The types are
support strategies, paraphrasing strategies, strategies for establishing coherence in text,
and strategies for supervising the strategies used. Support strategies are types of reading
act that are undertaken to facilitate high level strategies. Paraphrasing strategies decode
strategies to clarify meaning by simplifying syntax, finding synonyms for words and
Strategies for establishing coherence in text refer to the use of world knowledge or clues
in the text to make the text intelligible as a piece of connected course. And Strategies for
supervising strategies use are conscious strategies for checking ongoing self-evaluation,
changing the planning and executing of task, identifying misunderstandings, and
remediating when reading problems are found.
Comprehension is a product of reading. It involves not only the reader’s skills but
also the reader’s background experience and knowledge. There are three criteria of
comprehension presented in this research. Davis (Smith and Johnson: (1990: 13)
mentioned nine comprehension criteria. Two of them are ability to find the main thought
of the passage and ability to draw inferences from the passage. The two abilities then are
included in the criteria of comprehension in this research. There are three criteria in this
research. The criteria are ability to identify title, ability to locate main idea and ability to
28
This chapter presents the methodology and the steps to do the research to answer
the research questions empirically. It covers five sections. The first section is method. In
the method, the writer writes the methodology that she uses in doing this research. The
second section is research participants. The research participants presents who the
participants are. The next section is research instrument. Here, the writer discusses what
the instrument she uses to get the data. Section number four is data recording that
presents how the data are gained. And the last section is research procedures that present
the step in doing the research.
A. Method
It was qualitative research by making observation of the phenomena, and
classifying data. The research was on three non-English department students. The
phenomena that the writer was going to search were on the reading strategies that were
used by them in reading English texts. The research started with purposes to find out the
reading strategies used by the students. To achieve these purposes, personal observation,
tests, and interview were done. Then, all instrument used were expected could answer the
questions what strategies were used by them.
B. Procedures of Data Acquisition and Analysis
1. Identifying the setting and participants
2. Determining the texts which were appropriate for the participants’ problem
3. Constructing tests to see the participants’ comprehension
4. Administering the tests
5. Observing and interviewing
6. Analyzing the data
a. Highligting categories
b. Coding
c. Summarizing categories
d. Integrating data (observation and interview)
e. Interpreting
7. Drawing conclusion.
C. Research Participants
The participants of the research were the non-English students from Gadjah Mada
, Atmajaya, and Sanata Dharma University. The number of the participant was three
students. They are considered enough to represent other students. The first participant
studied at the Medical Faculty of Gadjah Mada University, the second participant studied
at Atmajaya University and took Management Program, and the third participant studied
at the PGSD program of Sanata Dharma University.
C. Research Instruments
There were three kinds of instruments used in this research. Those were tests,
1. Tests
The tests were written tests. There were six different written tests for six meetings.
The number of the tests was considered enough to identify the students’ reading
strategies and comprehension. Each test consisted of a text followed by questions.
The questions were identifying title, locating main idea, and drawing conclusion. The
tests were used to identify the participants’ comprehension in reading English text.
The tests were administered to the students six times. The students got a text in each
meeting and they only had 30 minutes to do the test. The tests were not scored since
they were only for identifying the participant’s comprehension. The tests were
analyzed whether their answers on identifying title, locating main idea, and drawing
conclusion were correct or not. Correct answers mean comprehension. In this
research, the reading activities used are intensive reading and comprehensive
reading. It is intensive reading because the texts given are short texts that require
detail understanding. And it is comprehensive reading because in the process of their
reading comprehension, the participants need their background knowledge.
2. Observation
The observation was done at the same time as the students did the tests. This was to
identify the participants’ behavior during doing the tests. The result of the
observation was used to support the result of interview.
3. Interview
The interview was done to get information about the participants’ strategies. In this
interview, the writer asked the participants about anything related to how they
been used by them. The interview was done after the participants finished doing the
tests. The interview was not limited by time.
D. Data Recording
The data recording using interview was done after the writer administered the
tests. The interview was whether the participants used the strategies or not. Then, they
explain the functions. The data recording using tests was done in six different times. The
three participants did not do the tests` in the same place and time since they had different
activities. The time allocation was 30 minutes for each test. The writer analyzes it after
32
This chapter presents the implementation of what have been described in chapter
III and adjusted with emergent issues. This chapter discusses the presentation of research
finding and discussion of the result of data analysis. It consists of four main sections. The
first section concerns with the data from interview, the second section deals with data
from observation, the third section discusses the data getting from the tests and the last
section concerns with other data related to the topic discussed.
A. Data from Interview
In this section, the data are taken from the interview of the participants in six
meetings. The interview was on what they did to comprehend the texts. This section is
divided into two subsections. The first subsection presents the data presentation of the
strategies and the second subsection presents the data interpretation of the strategies.
1. Data Presentation
This part discusses patterns of strategies that were used by the participants in the
six meeting. The strategies that were used by the participants are as follow:
a. Participant 1
P1 used ten strategies. The tenth strategies were reading between the line,
rereading, consulting dictionary, guessing, connecting sentences, connecting
knowledge of the world, translating, reading in detail, taking note, and marking.
In the tests, P2 used eight strategies. The eighth strategies were reading
between the line, consulting dictionary, taking note, guessing meaning, connecting to
knowledge of the world, rereading, reading in detail and connecting sentences.
c. Participant 3
After considering the data from interview on strategies above, the writer found
eight strategies that had been applied by P3 in her reading tests. The strategies were
reading between the lines, consulting dictionary, taking note, guessing meaning,
rereading, connecting sentences, reading in detail and connecting her knowledge of
the world.
2. Data Interpretation
The data presentation of strategies that were used by the participants can be
interpreted as follow:
a. Reading between the lines
Reading between the lines is support strategies. The three participants used this
strategy, though it was not in all tests. They used it to find the topic or theme of the texts
and to find the key words.
b. Detailed Reading
The participants often used this strategy. They used it to find the main idea and to
answer the questions. They also used it after they read the texts and were failed to
comprehend the texts.
Consulting dictionary is paraphrase strategy. It is cognitive strategy, called
translation. The participants used Indonesian as a base for understanding a second
language, in this case English. All participants consulted dictionary frequently. This
strategy was the most used frequently by the participants. It meant that consulting
dictionary was very important for them in reading English texts.
d. Translation
Translation is also paraphrase strategy. It is cognitive strategy. Participant 1 used
this strategy she understand Indonesian well rather than English, so that she used
Indonesian to facilitate her in understanding English.
e. Marking
Only P1 that applied marking. It is support strategy. She marked sentences,
because she thought that the sentences were important.
f. Taking note
The participants applied taking note, especially they took note the meaning of
words that had been consulted in the dictionary. It is also support strategy.
g. Connecting to the knowledge of the world
It is strategy for establishing coherence in text. The participants applied
connecting to knowledge of the world in reading text six. The participants admitted that
they had ever read the same topic as text six. Therefore, they applied their background
knowledge to help them comprehend the text. Connecting to knowledge of the world is
cognitive strategy. It is called transfer. It means that the participants used their previous
acquired linguistic and or conceptual knowledge to facilitate a new language learning
task. It is also called elaboration. It required the participants to relate new information in
