| dc.description.abstract | One of the requirements of having the ability to communicate in English is
by having adequate vocabulary. Vocabulary, according to Prasarntong and Dennis
(2015: 1), is a central of a language and is important to the learners. Without
having vocabulary, the process of language learning cannot be achieved. Thus,
vocabulary is considered valuable to learn as it gives contribution to the students
to perform or practice their language skills well. The researcher believes that
teaching vocabulary should not be meaning-free, but be facilitated by an
interesting technique to provide the students opportunities to enrich their
vocabulary effectively. Therefore, it is teacher’s responsibility to seek an
interesting technique to motivate students in learning vocabulary. One of the
techniques that the researcher implemented was by using a language game named
crossword puzzle.
In addition, students who succeed in completing crossword puzzle are able
to use the vocabularies they have learnt (Allen, 1983: 52). Therefore, choosing
crossword puzzle as a game is expected to attract their attention. Besides, it can
also be used to enrich their stocks of vocabulary through an interesting and
motivating game, because interested and motivated students will have a better
chance of learning vocabulary successfully.
This experimental research was conducted to investigate the effect of
using crossword puzzle on the eighth grade students’ vocabulary achievement.
The population of this research was the whole eighth grade students. The research
respondents were determined based on the results of homogeneity test by using
ANOVA formula in SPSS program. Since the population was homogeneous,
sampling was done by lottery to choose both experimental and control groups. As
the result, 30 students of VIII C were selected as experimental group whereas 29 students of VIII G were chosen as the control one. The experimental group was
exposed to the use of crossword puzzle whereas the control group received no
treatment as they were only taught by question and answer technique.
After presenting the materials to both experimental and control groups, the
researcher measured the students’ vocabulary mastery by administering the posttest.
The researcher analyzed the results of post test by using Independent sample
t-test in SPSS program to reveal the mean difference between the groups. Based
on the calculation of the data analysis, the significance value was 0.036. As it was
lower than 0.05, it could be proved that null hypothesis was rejected while the
alternative hypothesis was accepted. In other words, there was a significant effect
of using crossword puzzle on the eighth grade students’ vocabulary achievement. | en_US |
