IMPROVING THE STUDENTS’ VOCABULARY ACHIEVEMENT
BY APPLYING PICTURES
A THESIS
Submitted to English Department, Faculty of Languages and Arts, State University of Medan, in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements
for the Degree of Sarjana Pendidikan
By:
NURMAULIDA RAHMI
Registration Number: 209121032
ENGLISH DEPARTMENT
FACULTY OF LANGUAGES AND ARTS
STATE UNIVERSITY OF MEDAN
DECLARATION
I have familiarized myself with the university’s policy on academic integrity. Except where appropriately acknowledged, this thesis is my own work, has been expressed in my own words and has not been previously submitted for assessment.
I understand that this paper may be screened electronically or otherwise for plagiarism.
Medan, November 2013
LEMBAR PENGESAHAN PANITIA UJIAN
Skripsi ini diajukan oleh : Nurmaulida Rahmi, NIM 209121032 Jurusan Bahasa dan Sastra Inggris
Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris Strata Satu Fakultas Bahasa dan Seni
Universitas Negeri Medan
Dinyatakan telah memenuhi persyaratan untuk memperoleh Gelar Sarjana Pendidikan
Panitia Ujian
Medan, Desember 2013 Ketua,
Dr. Isda Pramuniati, M.Hum NIP. 19641207 199103 2 002
Sekretaris,
i
ABSTRACT
Rahmi, Nurmaulida. Improving the Students’ Vocabulary Achievement by Applying Pictures. A Thesis. Faculty of Languages and Arts. State University of Medan, 2013.
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A. THE BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY……… 1
B. THE PROBLEM OF THE STUDY………. 3
C. THE OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY……….. 3
D. THE SCOPE OF THE STUDY………... 4
E. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY………... 4
CHAPTER II: REVIEW OF LITERATURE ………... 5
A. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK……….. 5
1. Vocabulary………... 5
a. Kinds of Vocabulary……… 6
2. Teaching Vocabulary………... 7
a. Principles of Teaching and Learning Vocabulary………... 9
3. Testing of Vocabulary………. 12
4. Media ……….. 13
5. Picture………. 14
a. The Advantages of using Pictures……….. 16
b. The Disadvantages of Using Pictures……….... 18
B. CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK………... 18
CHAPTER III: RESEARCH METHOD………... 19
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B. SUBJECT OF THE RESEARCH………... 20
C. THE INSTRUMENTS OF COLLECTING DATA………... 20
D. THE PROCEDURE IN COLLECTING DATA………..…. 21
1. Cycle I……… 21
F. THE TECHNIQUE OF DATA ANALYSIS……… 32
CHAPTER IV: THE DATA AND DATA ANALYSIS………... 34
A. THE DATA………. 34
1. Quantitative Data……..………... 34
2. Qualitative Data……… 36
B. THE DATA ANALYSIS………. 36
1. Analysis of Quantitative Data...………... 36
2. Analysis of Qualitative Data……… 43
a. Diary Notes………..……… 43
b. Observation Sheets……….. 44
C. RESEARCH FINDINGS……… 44
D. DISCUSSION………. 45
CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION……… 47
A. CONCLUSION……… 47
B. SUGGESTION………. 47
REFERENCES………. 49
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LIST OF TABLES
Table Page
3.1 Design of Research……….. 24
3.2 Steps of Action Research in Cycle I………... 25
3.3 Steps of Action Research in Cycle II……… 29
3.4 The Criterion Referring to PAP……… 31
4.1 The Score of the Students………... 35
4.2 Range of Score Improvement……… 37
4.3 Comparative Score of Students’ Vocabulary Test…... 40 4.4
4.5
The Improvement of Mean Score of Students’ Vocabulary………. The Percentage of Students’ Vocabulary
Achievement………... 41
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LIST OF APPENDICES
Appendix Title Page
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CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
A. THE BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
English as a language has a very important position because it is used internationally. Realizing that, the government in Indonesia has decreed English as a foreign language taught from the primary school up to the tertiary level in both private and state schools. There are four language skills in English, they are listening, speaking, reading and writing. Educational Level – Oriented Curriculum (KTSP – 2006) states that students must be able to master the four language skills. It is impossible that the students master each skill without mastering vocabulary since it plays the important function in order to be understood in the context of communication.
Based on the observation done by the researcher at SD DARMA Medan, exactly in the fourth grade, it was found that the score of the test in semester 1 before getting remedial test are quite different. In class 4-A, 60% of the students get remedial test. In 4-B, it is found that 25% students also get remedial test. They have to get remedial test since their score are under Kriteria Ketuntasan Minimum (70). It means that students’ achievement of 4-A is still low. Therefore, this class will be the focus of the researcher to improve their achievement.
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usually teacher taught vocabulary by asking the students to open the dictionary, to find the meaning, to memorize the words in front of the class and after that, they forgot it. Another problem was the teachers’ technique used in teaching vocabulary was not interesting. They only give the students a non-stop drilling and memorization practice. Besides, the students were given the tasks that stated in their “Grow with English” textbook. It made the students lazy in learning vocabulary and most of the students got low score in vocabulary.
Hatch and Brown (1995:1) define vocabulary as a list or set of words for a particular language or a list or set of word that individual speaker of language might use. Vocabulary learning is a very important part of learning a language. Students intend to be able to listen, to speak, to read, and to write in English in order to enable to communicate. To achieve this aims, students must master a number of vocabularies as a condition in language mastery. With the rich vocabulary students will be able to communicate effectively and vice versa.
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Picture can be tools or media to stimulate students in describing an object or a person in the pictures. Students can acquire the meaning by seeing the things in the pictures without teacher’s explanation. Latuheru (1988) states that Pictures can translate abstract ideas into more realistic form, can be easily obtained, can be used in different academic levels, and can attract students’ interests. Besides, the use of pictures in the classroom provides a stimulating focus for the students’ interest because everybody likes to look at pictures (Lutfiyah, 2009). It can be concluded that pictures can help the students to describe an object or a person easily because they can enjoy the learning process.
The writer hopes that this study will be able to trigger students’ interest and motivation in learning many words related to image that they see through pictures. So, the writer wants to conduct a study to find out whether pictures can speed up the process of learning vocabulary and to prove whether the application of pictures significantly improve the students’ vocabulary achievement.
B. THE PROBLEM OF THE STUDY
In relation to the background of the study, a research problem is formulated in the form question as “Is the students’ vocabulary achievement significantly improved by applying pictures in the learning?”
C. THE OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY
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D. THE SCOPE OF THE STUDY
There are many alternative media which can be used in teaching; they are audio media, visual media and audio visual media. The media which considered as an appropriate one in this study is pictures as classified into visual media. Then, the vocabulary that will be taught is the context of the house and the school as the places of students’ daily life. This study is specified with a focus on the effectiveness of applying pictures of the house and the school in the learning to improve the vocabulary achievement of the grade IV students at SD Darma Medan.
E. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
Findings of this research are expected to be useful theoretically and practically.
Theoretically, the findings offer further horizons in language learning theories.
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CHAPTER V
CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION
A. CONCLUSION
The conclusion in this research taken from the data analysis presented in previous chapter. The result was taken from the students’ mean score in doing vocabulary tests as the quantitative data. The mean score in test II (61.67) is higher than test I (52.57) and the mean score in test III (72.42) is higher than test II. It means that, in each meeting the action gave them improvement. It showed that the students’ mean score increased from the first cycle to the second cycle.
It was also supported by qualitative data gathered from diary notes and observation sheets which showed that students continuously enthusiastic with the pictures and concern to the learning process. Therefore, it can be concluded that the students’ vocabulary achievement was significantly improved by applying pictures in the learning process in class IV-A SD DARMA Medan.
B. SUGGESTION
Related to the conclusion above, the writer points out some suggestions as follows:
(1) It is really good for the English teachers to apply pictures for teaching vocabulary because this media is good to motivate students in learning a foreign language, can help teacher manage the class and finally can help to improve the students’ vocabulary achievement.
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easily because pictures are the interesting media to use in learning vocabulary, and
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