IMPROVING CLASS VIII A STUDENTS’ SPEAKING ACHIEVEMENT BY GIVING VERBAL AND NON-VERBAL REINFORCEMENT AT SMPN 1 SUKOWONO JEMBER IN THE 2011/2012 ACADEMIC YEAR

Abstract

SUMMARY

Improving Class VIII A Students’ Speaking Achievement by Giving Verbal And Non-Verbal Reinforcement At SMPN 1 Sukowono Jember in the 2011/2012 Academic Year; Hamim Ma’ruf, 060210401376; 2013; 79 pages; English Education Study Program, Language and Arts Department, Faculty of Teacher Training and Education, Jember University.

This classroom action research was intended to improve the grade eight students’ speaking achievement by giving verbal and non-verbal reinforcement. The subjects of this research were class VIII A students of SMPN 1 Sukowono that were determined purposively. Based on the result of classroom observation in the preliminary study, it was found that many students of class VIII A experienced difficulties in doing English speaking. Besides, they did not participate actively during the teaching learning process. This finding was supported by the English teacher’s admission and the result of speaking diagnostic test. The result of diagnostic test showed that only 13 students achieved the standard requirement score of English which was 65, while 25 students have score below 65. It could be said that only 35.13% students had achieved the standard requirement score of English. This classroom action research was conducted collaboratively with class VIII A English teacher of SMPN 1 Sukowono. There were four stages of activities in this research, namely: planning of the action, implementation of the action, observation and evaluation, and data analysis and reflection. The data collection methods that were used in this research were interview, documentation, diagnostic test, classroom observation, and achievement test. This classroom action research was carried out in two cycles and each cycle was conducted in three meetings. The first and the second meeting were used to do the actions and the third meeting was used to conduct the speaking achievement test. vii

In the cycle I, there were 70.27% of the students who were active during the teaching of speaking in the first meeting of cycle I and there were 75.67% of the students who were active during the teaching of speaking in the second meeting of cycle I. It can be said that the percentage of student’ active part icipat ion has achieved higher than 70% of the target minimum of students’ act ive involvement. However, the percentage of the students who achieved ≥65 in speaking test was only 67.5% whereas the target of this research was 70%. Dealing with the results, it was necessary to continue the action to the second cycle by revising some necessary aspects in the first cycle. In the second cycle, there were 81% of the students who were active during the teaching of speaking in the first meeting of cycle II and there were 83.78% of the students who were active during the teaching of speaking in the second meeting of cycle II. It can be said that the percentage of student’ active part icipat ion has achieved higher than 70% of the target. Meanwhile, the percentage of the students who got ≥65 in speaking test was 78.37%. It means that the minimum requirement percentage of the students who got ≥65 had been achieved in cycle II. Since all of research targets had been successfully achieved in the second cycle, the action was stopped. Based on the research results from cycle I to cycle II, it could be concluded that teaching speaking by giving verbal and non-verbal reinforcement could improve the students’ participation and speaking achievement. Thus, the English teacher was suggested to give verbal and non-verbal reinforcement to the students to improve their academic performance like English speaking since it could improve the students’ speaking achievement.