A Study of Teacher's Strategies for Handling Primary School Students' Behavioral Problems in "X" Primary School.

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ABSTRAK

Skripsi yang berjudul “A Study of Teachers’ Strategies for Handling Primary School Students’ Behavioral Problems in X Primary School in Bandung”

ini menganalisis tiga hal: pertama, behavioral problems yang paling sering dilakukan oleh murid-murid kelas 4 di X Primary School; kedua, strategi yang paling sering digunakan pengajar di X Primary School untuk mengatasi behavioral problems murid-murid kelas 4; dan ketiga, respon murid-murid terhadap strategi

yang digunakan pengajar. Analisis data di dalam penelitian ini ditunjang oleh beberapa teori, seperti teori dari Felder dan Brent, Yuan, Long, dan Johnson, sementara pengambilan data itu sendiri dilakukan dengan dua cara, yakni observasi kelas dan wawancara pengajar.

Hasil observasi dan wawancara kemudian memperlihatkan bahwa ada lima jenis behavioral problems yang paling sering dilakukan murid-murid kelas 4: being out of their students’ seats, cheating, inattentiveness, attention seeking, dan verbal

and physical threats. Sementara itu, ada empat strategi yang digunakan pengajar

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CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1. Background of the Study

To be a teacher may be easy; people only need to be educated and then teach

students out of mere obligation, which usually results in their ignoring the students’

understanding or never communicating with students after class. However, to be a great teacher is different. GreatSchools Staff (2016), the leading national nonprofit organization empowering parents to unlock educational opportunities for their

child, states, “Great teachers form strong relationships with their students and show

that they care about them as people. Great teachers are warm, accessible,

enthusiastic and caring” (para. 6). Therefore, a great teacher will communicate with

students, even outside the class, as it builds a strong relationship between the teacher and the students.

To be a great teacher is not as easy as we think; a teacher should know

his/her students’ characteristics, and most importantly, a teacher has to be patient.

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be able to do something to prevent or handle it right away before it becomes a habit.

Therefore, the teacher needs to know various strategies to handle students’

misbehavior.

The topic of my study is “A Study of Teachers’ Strategies for Handling

Primary School Students’ Behavioral Problems in X Primary School in Bandung.”

Strategy is defined as “the process of planning something or putting a plan into

operation in a skillful way” (Hornby, 2010, p. 1475). Behavioral is the adjective of

behavior and the word behavior itself means “the way that somebody behaves,

especially towards other people” (p. 120). Meanwhile, problem is defined as “a

thing that is difficult to deal with or to understand” (p. 1167). Thus, from the

definition of these three words, it can be concluded that the topic I would like to

discuss is the process that the teacher uses in handling the primary school students’

behavior that is difficult to deal with.

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1.2. Statement of the Problem

After analyzing the problems, I come up with particular questions:

1. What are the most common behavioral problems that X Primary School students often do?

2. What kinds of strategies do the teachers use to handle the students’ most common behavioral problems in X Primary School?

3. How do the students in X Primary School respond to the use of the teachers’ strategies?

1.3. Purpose of the Study

Based on the aforementioned statement of the problems, the purposes of the study are:

1. To discover the most common behavioral problems that X Primary School students often do during the class.

2. To find the suitable strategies that teachers in X Primary School use to handle the students who misbehave.

3. To know the responses of the students in X Primary School towards the teachers’ strategies to handle the students’ behavioral problems.

1.4. Significance of the Problem

This research is expected to be one of the references for teachers in primary schools whose students misbehave, especially for those teachers who are teaching for the first time will not be shocked when their students are misbehaving and there

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In addition, this study provides an insight for any students who are going to take Applied Linguistics concentration.

1.5. Limitation of the Study

This study is a small scale study as it is limited to the teachers’ strategies

for handling X Primary School students’ behavioral problems. Therefore, the result

cannot be generalized.

1.6. Organization of the Study

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CHAPTER FIVE

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION

This chapter contains conclusion and recommendation which are based on the findings and discussion of the study.

5.1. Conclusion

As has been stated in Chapter One, the purposes of this study are to discover the most common behavioral problems that X Primary School students often do during the class, to find the suitable strategies that teachers in X Primary School use to handle the students who misbehave, and to know the responses of the students in X Primary School towards the teachers’ strategies to handle the students’

behavioral problems.

Based on the results of the analysis, the most common behavioral problems that the students often did in X Primary School were walking around the class (included in being out of their students’ seat), followed by cheating during quizzes

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being out of their students’ seat), playing with their own stuff (included in

inattentiveness), doing verbal threats, looking outside the class during the lesson (included in inattentiveness), and doing physical threats.

The teachers in X Primary School have their own strategies for handling the students’ behavioral problems. The most common strategies that the teachers in that

school used are praise, rules, punishment, and reward. Based on the results of the analysis, the most suitable strategy to handle the fourth grade students in X Primary School is reward because this strategy has decreased the number of students who misbehaved in class and has also triggered positive responses from the students. Many students became obedient after the teachers applied this strategy. As can be seen in the Appendices II, total of students who misbehaved is the fewest among the others. The second suitable strategy is punishment. Punishment is quite effective to handle the fourth grade students because it makes the students feel reluctant to misbehave again. As can be seen in the Appendices II, total of students who misbehaved is more than rewards and fewer than praise. Praise is the third suitable strategy that the teachers use to handle the students’ behavioral problems,

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In conclusion, choosing the suitable strategies for handling the students’ behavioral problems is very important because applying the suitable strategies can help the students reduce their misbehavior and prevent it from becoming a habit. In addition, choosing the suitable strategies can prevent the students from imitating or applying the teachers’ inappropriate strategies, such as shouting at their students or

other people in the future.

5.2. Recommendation

Based on the findings of this study, there are several recommendations that I would like to address to the teachers in X Primary School, the headmistress of X Primary School, and the future researchers who will collect data in X Primary School.

There are three recommendations for the teachers in X Primary School. First, the teachers in X Primary School might try to contact the students’ parents to discuss the students’ attitude and performance in school because this can motivate

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A STUDY OF TEACHERS’ STRATEGIES FOR

HANDLING PRIMARY SCHOOL STUDENTS’

BEHAVIORAL PROBLEMS IN X PRIMARY SCHOOL

IN BANDUNG

a thesis

submitted to the English Department of the Faculty of Letters

in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the ‘Sarjana’ degree

EKA SUSANTI 1241033

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

FACULTY OF LETTERS

MARANATHA CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY

B A N D U N G

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First of all, I thank Jesus Christ for his guidance and for giving me strength in completing this thesis entitled “A Study of Teachers’ Strategies For Handlng

Primary School Students’ Behavioral Problems in X Primary School in Bandung”,

which is submitted to the English Department of the Faculty of Letters in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the ‘Sarjana’ degree. Despite some difficulties,

I have been able to finish it. A lot of thanks are due to both my supervisors, Maryani and Joanna Deborah who have helped me in finishing my thesis.

I would also like to thank both of my parents, Tanto and Lu Kiau, for their support, prayers, and blessing not just when I was writing my thesis, but also during my whole study in the Faculty of Letters.

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