THE EFFECT OF USING DIRECTED READING THINKING ACTIVITY (DRTA) STRATEGY ON READING COMPREHENSION ACHIEVEMENT OF GRADE EIGHT STUDENTS OF SMP NEGERI 5 TANGGUL

Abstract

Reading is the essential part in teaching learning activities especially in Indonesian English classroom. The students start, almost all the activities, in English teaching learning activities by reading. In other words, reading almost dominates all the students’ activities before having other skills. The students, generally, have difficulty in learning English, especially in reading English texts. Their problems are usually caused by their incapability in understanding the meaning of the difficult words and their incapability in comprehending ideas or messages from one paragraph to the next paragraph. Therefore, the English teacher is expected to be able to cover the students’ problems in reading. One of the strategies that can be used and applied by the English teacher is applying DRTA strategy in teaching reading. DRTA strategy is a strategy where the students can understand or comprehend the material deeply because the steps in this strategy can help the students to be away from confusion in comprehending the text. In this strategy, the students are asked to make predictions about the material in each paragraph by using the available clues. The students, in group, discuss the predictions, do guided silent reading and proving. The students are motivated to make predictions for the next paragraph based on the proof of the previous paragraph because they do not only use their prior knowledge but also their imagination. This research was conducted to know whether or not there was a significant effect of using Directed Reading Thinking Activity (DRTA) strategy on reading comprehension achievement of grade eight students of SMP Negeri 5 Tanggul. Thus, the respondents of this research were grade eight students of SMP Negeri 5 Tanggul that were determined by using cluster random sampling by lottery. The total number of the respondents was 78 students. The experimental group consisted of 39 students who were taught reading by using DRTA strategy. The control group consisted of 39 students who were taught reading by using Question and Answer technique. The primary data of this research were gained from the students’ reading comprehension achievement in the form of post test scores. The supporting data were gained from the interview with the English teacher and documentation. The primary data that had been collected were analyzed statistically by using t-test formula. The result showed that the statistical value of t-test was 2.67 while the value of t-table at significant level 5% with df (76) was 2.00. It indicated that the value of t-statistic was higher than that of the t-table (2.67>2.00). It means that the null hypothesis (h0) that was formulated:” there is no significant effect of using Directed Reading Thinking Activity (DRTA) strategy on reading comprehension achievement of grade eight students of SMP Negeri 5 Tanggul” was rejected and the alternative hypothesis (ha) that was formulated: “there is a significant effect of using directed reading thinking activity (DRTA) strategy on reading comprehension achievement of grade eight students of SMP Negeri 5 Tanggul” was accepted. Indeed, it can be stated that DRTA strategy significantly affected grade eight students’ reading comprehension achievement at SMP Negeri 5 Tanggul. Based on the result of this research, the teacher is recommended to use and apply DRTA strategy in teaching reading to make the students more active in developing their thinking about the story through predictions, and make the situation of the class becomes more alive. It was proved that DRTA strategy can make the students easy in understanding and comprehending the material; and can activate the students’ critical thinking when they make predictions and judge other predictions in proving step. Further, the students are suggested to apply DRTA strategy in reading other English texts or stories, to comprehend the content of the text better. Moreover, the future researchers are suggested to conduct a further research dealing with similar topic in different aspects of investigation, such as: using DRTA strategy in teaching nonfiction reading materials with the specification of asking the students to work in pair for the control group when the experimental group is asked to work in group; or using different research area; and research design, such as: the descriptive study of using DRTA strategy in students’ reading comprehension achievement.