THE EFFECT OF USING NUMBERED HEADS TOGETHER TECHNIQUE ON READING COMPREHENSION ACHIEVEMENT OF THE EIGHT GRADE STUDENTS AT SMP ISLAM GUMUKMAS JEMBER

Abstract

The purpose of this research was to know whether or not there was a significant effect of using Numbered Heads Together Technique on Reading Comprehension Achievement of the Eighth Grade Students at SMP Islam Gumukmas Jember. Reading is one of the four basic skills that must be taught to the junior high school students. This skill is as important as the other language skills, but it is assumed that through reading skill students will be able to learn the other skills more conveniently because all of the skills involved reading activities. Reading relates to reading comprehension. It means that when students are reading, they are doing thinking process by comprehending all the words, phrases, sentences, and paragraphs in order to get the meaning of the text as a whole. Through reading activities, students are expected to understand the meaning of the text and get the information needed of the whole text. One of the techniques that can be used and applied by an English teacher is using Numbered Heads Together technique in a reading class. Numbered Heads Together technique is a cooperative learning technique that promotes discussion and both individual and group accountability. Based on the interview with the English teacher of the eighth grade at SMP Islam Gumukmas, Jember, it was known that the English teacher as the center of teaching reading of English and the English teacher taught the students by using Lecturing technique, question and answer, and sometimes gives some games and using song in teaching learning process. In other words, the English teacher has never used NHT Technique in teaching reading. She also explained that lecturing technique actually was not very effective for students because the students have a lack of activities. The students did not always understand well the meaning of the reading text, and they spent a long time to read the text which mostly done word by word. Consequently, they could not answer all the comprehension questions correctly in a given time. For that reason, the teacher should choose the appropriate teaching strategy to make the students master in reading skill. One of them is Numbered Heads Together Technique. The respondent of the research was the eighth grade students of SMP Islam Gumukmas Jember, which consisted of four classes (VIII A, VIII B, VIII C, VIII D). The sample of the research was class VIII A (the experimental) consisted of 44 students and class VIII C (control class) consisted of 44 students. The data in this research was gathered by administering a reading comprehension test. In this research, quasi-experimental with posttest-only control group design was applied. First, the researcher administered the homogeneity test to the eighth grade students at SMP Islam Gumukmas. The homogeneity test’s result was heterogonous. So, the researcher choosing the experimental and the control group should be taken from two classes that had the same or the closest mean difference. It was found that grade VIII A and grade VIII C had the closest mean difference. Then, After that, the researcher gave the treatment, the experimental group (VIII A) was taught by using NHT Treatment and the control group (VIII C) was taught by using Lecturing technique. After two meetings, both classes got posttest. The last, the result of the posttest was analyzed by using independent sample t-test formula to know whether or not the mean difference between the experimental group and the control group was significant. . Based on the calculation, the mean score of the experimental group was higher than the mean score of the control group (72,65>60,95) .The result of the data analysis showed that the statistical value of students’ posttest was 5,37 while the value of t-table at significant level 5 % with degree of freedom (Df) 85 was 1,98. It indicates that the value of t-test was higher than that of t-table (5,37 > 1,98). It meant that the null hypothesis (Ho) formulated: “NHT technique does not have any significant effect on the eighth grade students’ reading comprehension achievement at SMP Islam Gumukmas in the 2014/2015 academic year” was rejected. In contrast, the formulated alternative hypothesis (Ha): NHT technique has any significant effect on the eighth grade students’ reading comprehension achievement at SMP Islam Gumukmas in the 2014/2015 academic year” was accepted. It indicated that the result of t-test analysis was significant Based on the result of this research, it was concluded that there is a significant effect of using Numbered Heads Together Technique on reading comprehension achievement of the eighth grade students at SMP Islam G umukmas Jember in the 2014/2015 academic year. So, it is suggested to the English teachers to use Numbered Heads Together technique to teach English to the students, especially to teach reading comprehension and it also suggested for the other researchers to conduct a similar research with the same or different language skill or components, such as classroom action research to improve the students’ reading achievement by using Numbered Heads Together technique.