THE CORRELATION BETWEEN VOCABULARY ACHIEVEMENT AND READING COMPREHENSION ACHIEVEMENT OF THE GRADE 8 STUDENTS AT SMPN 1 PUGER JEMBER

Abstract

English is as a foreign language in Indonesia. This language has been taught from elementary school up to university level. In Junior High School, English education is one of compulsory subjects. One important aspect of learning a foreign language is reading. Being able to read in English is very important as it is known that success in reading is the most necessary because it is a basic tool of education. Almost all the English materials are taught in written form. The important aspect that influences the reading comprehension skill is vocabulary mastery. To comprehend a text, students should have known about the vocabularies that are used in the text. If the students find too many unfamiliar words, it will difficult for them to comprehend the information and the message from the text they read. Vocabulary is the key for the students in comprehending a text. This research was conducted to find the correlation between the vocabulary achievement and reading comprehension achievement of the grade 8 students at SMPN 1 Puger Jember. The respondents of this research were some students of the grade 8 at SMPN 1 Puger Jember who were taken by using proportional random sampling by lottery. The total number of respondents was 60 students. The primary data on this research were collected from the students’ score of vocabulary achievement test and reading comprehension achievement test, while the secondary data were gained through interview and documentation. The students’ vocabulary achievement score were collected by doing the multiple choice test which covered large vocabulary The result of analysis by using Product Moment Correlation showed that the r statistic was 0.753. It showed that the degree of the correlation between vocabulary achievement and reading comprehension achievement was high. The coefficient correlation was 0 ≤ 0.753 ≤ 1, it meant that there was a positive correlation. It showed that the two variables have positive correlation. It means that the increase of variable X is followed by the increase of variable Y. The students who got good score in vocabulary, they also got good score in reading. Whereas, the students who got low score in vocabulary, they also got low score in reading. Based on the computation, the value of sig column is 0.000. This value is lower than 0.05. It means that the alternative hypothesis