Language is one of urgent communication tools. People
need language to communicate and interact with others to undergo their daily
life. In relation to the function, English is one of the international
languages that most commonly used in the world. English tends to influence the
absorption and the development of economy, science, technology, politics,
culture and international relationship. Nevertheless, in our country English is
treated as a foreign language. Therefore, most of Indonesians cannot master
this language well. In studying English, there are some skills which have to be
mastered by learners. They are receptive skills and productive skills. The
receptive skills are listening and reading, while the productive skills are
speaking and writing. Among the basic skills above, reading plays an important
role in learning because most of learning activity cannot separate by reading.
According to Bettelheim and Zelan (1981) “Reading is a skill that opens up
whole new worlds of information and imagination”. By reading we can know and
asses a lot of information, even up to date events all over the world.
Definition of Reading
Reading is one of the important daily activities that
should be mastered by everyone. By reading, people find a knowledge and
entertainment almost at the same time. In the process of teaching and learning,
reading plays a crucial role as source to gain information. Students, there are
suggested to read many books and literary works in order to extend their
background knowledge. Goodman (1973, cited in Long and Richard 1987, p. 219)
says that reading is a process in which the reader picks and choose from the
available information only enough to select and predict a language structure
which is decidable. It means that in reading process reader try to understand
the grammatical role of a text, such as: letters, words, and phases, which
exist in the text. According to Haris and Sipay (1980, p. 8), reading
(comprehending) is a result of interaction between the perception of graphic
symbols that represent language and the readers language skill and knowledge of
the world.
Teaching of Reading Comprehension to Senior High
School
Senior high school student English ability ranges from
higher intermediate all the way to complete false beginner, depending on the
school. However, student levels within a school tend to be much more homogenous
than they are at junior high school. The role of an ELT at senior high school
therefore can range from planning interesting lessons to re-inspire jaded
students (who perhaps were left behind at junior high school) to designing and
marking tests to prepare students for their university entrance exams. Whatever they end up going, one goal
that all ELT should keep in mind is to provide students with meaningful
opportunities to practice using English, whether that is in a conversation, or
a diary. English at senior high school is still too focused on disconnected pattern
practice and learning grammar points: reminding students that English is a tool
for communication and giving them the chance to do some more practical
activities can provide a welcome break and even impart some useful skills. The objectives as an ELT in a senior
high school cover a lot of ground Number one, obviously I’m here to teach
English. But my physical presence does a lot more. One of my primary goals is
to make students more comfortable with foreigners and possibly open up their
minds to other countries, cultures, and the fact that I am a real person just
like them. Your objectives should become very personal to you and it should be
your priority to meet them.
Authentic
Materials Definition
Nunan
(1989): “any material which has not been specifically produced for the purpose
of language teaching.” (as cited in Macdonald, Badger &White, 2000). The
important thing to start with is to narrow down the meaning of 'authentic
materials'. Yes, it is obviously a worthwhile thing for the students to have
meaningful experiences in the classroom, to make language learning an
educational process of self development and discovery as well as the learning
of a language tool. But this has little or nothing to do with authentic
materials. For using authentic materials simply means using examples of
language produced by native speakers for some real purpose of their own rather
than using language produced and designed solely for the classroom. Anybody who
takes into the classroom a newspaper article, an advertisement, a pop song, a
strip cartoon, or even a bus ticket, is using authentic materials. Teachers
have always introduced such real into their classrooms, and always will. The
question really is whether it is helpful to their students.
Authentic
Activities for Authentic Materials.
What is needed is a set of pedagogical techniques that
will enable teachers to make effective, structured, purposeful use of authentic
materials, but that do not require elaborate preparations. Such techniques
should involve activities that blend naturally and seamlessly with the
authentic materials themselves, enhancing and highlighting the materials rather
than analysing and manipulating them. These techniques should be informed by
our knowledge of language acquisition processes and principles, and should be
based on pedagogical skills that teachers can develop and apply effectively
within the time and energy constraints of the actual classroom environment. As
a rule of thumb, we would suggest that "authentic activities" (that
is, activities that resemble the kinds of things people normally do with
authentic materials) may bring us closer to the kinds of pedagogical techniques
that we have in mind.
Authentic Material Level of Student
Authentic materials can be used with intermediate and
advanced level students only. On the other hand, others believe that all levels
of students, even lower levels, are able to manage using authentic materials
(McNeil, 1994; Miller, 2005).
Authentic Materials in the Classroom
Authentic materials must be used in accordance with
students’ ability. (Baird, 2004). The
text should be used to serve its original purpose as if it is used outside the
classroom. For example, if students are working with health brochures, they
must look for information they need, rather than a list of new words chosen by
the teacher (Jacobson, Degener, & Purcell-Gates, 2003, p. 46). In this respect, Taylor (1994) states that
“authenticity is not a characteristic of a text in itself: it is a feature of a
text in a particular context. Therefore, a text can only be truly authentic in
the context for which it was originally written.”
Research Design.
The present study was conducted as an experimental
research involving two variables: the teaching technique as the independent
variable and the students’ achievement as the dependent variable. The study is
to evaluate the effect of independent on the dependent variable. Specifically,
it is to investigate the effectiveness of authentic material compared with non-authentic
material techniques. Since there is no random assignment applied to the subject
in this study, the research design adopted for this study is a quasi-experimental
design. The researcher made pre-test and post-test to know the qualities of
both groups. Pre-test was applied to know quality of experimental group and
control group that was led to the next statistical computation and the
post-test was applied to know the effect of treatment. In this design, only the
experimental group was given treatment. Later, in the end of treatment. Both
groups were given post-test. Their mean score were compared and tested at 0.05
level of significance to determine the effect of treatment. The researcher
chooses at the eleventh grade of SMA Maarif NU Pandaan Pasuruan.
Instrument
of the study.
In
this study, the instrument used questions-answer test, the test was given in the
pre-test. The students were asked to answer all questions, which consist of 8
items. To guarantee the content validity of the test, the researcher made the
appropriate with the book base on curriculum 2006 which has been used in the
school. The content validity according to sauvignon (1983:236) stated that the
tasks included are representative of the larger set of task, of which the test
is supposed to be a sample. For example, the test faithfully reflects the
syllabus or instructional program in which it is based. The title of the book
was “PR Bahasa Inggris SMA/MA” for class
XI, published by Intan Pariwara 2014. Then, the authentic material text were
prepared by researcher which was also taken from newspaper.
Validating the Text
Heaton (1988) and Bachman (1990) agree that validity
is the most important future of a good test. A test in considered valid when
the test measures what is supposed to measures. There are three types of
validity: construct validity, content validity, and criterion validity. For the
purpose of the present study only content validity was used as the test was an
achievement test. Gronlund (1982) in Susanto (2010) mentions that content
validity is of major concern in achievement testing, and is significant to have
in both criterion-referenced and norm-referenced tests. In this case, the test
was justified in term of (1) its appropriateness to the course objectives as
stated in the curriculum; and (2) its relevance to the objective of the study.
The test is related to the topic in the class. The topic is job vacancy kind of
analytical exposition text focus on advertisement.
Data
Collection.
The
researcher collected the data from the score of pre-test and post-test. In the
data collection the researcher was focused on three topics, namely, pre-test,
treatment and post-test. The following sections discuss of the topic in detail.
Pre-Test
Pre-test was the first which was gives to the students
before the researcher did the treatment. The aim of the pre-test was to know
the mastery of the students in English vocabulary between the experimental
group Class XI IPS 2 and the control group Class XI IPS 3 before the treatment.
The score of the test was obtained to know whether the means of both groups
were significantly different or not. The pre-test was conducted on May 2014 for
the control group and June 2014 for the experimental group.
Treatment
Treatment is way of treating a person or thing (Oxford
dictionary, 1991, p. 443). As mentioned in the pre-test, there were two groups
which were treated. The experimental group was treated by teaching them using
authentic material technique while the control group was treated by teaching
them using conventional technique. In the treatment will be discussed about
teaching procedure and the schedule of test and treatment.
Research Finding
This research was designed to find out whether there
was significant effect of using authentic material in teaching English on
students’ achievement of reading comprehension at the eleventh grade of SMA
Maarif NU Paandaan Pasuruan. Therefore, the researcher used experimental and
control groups in this research. Experimental group was taught by using
authentic material whereas control group was taught without authentic material.
This section discussed the result of the data analysis
and hypothesis testing.
Result
There
are two result of the data analysis. The firs result is the data analysis based
on the students’ scores in the pre-test and the second is the data analysis
based on the student’s scores in the post-test.
a.
The
Result of the Data Analysis Based on the Students’ Scores in the Pre-test
In this study, the
experimental group and control were given pre-test. Pre-test was in order to
determine there is a significance or not of the students’ abilities in mastering
English
After analysing the
students’ scores in the pre-test. Based on data, it is
obvious that the difference between two means is not significance because the
t-value is smaller than t-value in the table. The t-value is 0.30 and t-value
in the table is 1.676. It means that the difference of mastering English in
both groups is not significance or they have same capability in mastering
English.
b.
The
Result of the Data Analysis Based on the Students’ Scores in the Post-test
The
result of the data analysis on the students’ scores in post-test was made to
see the significance of difference of both groups. Based on data, we know that the difference between two
means is significance because t-value is greater that the t-value in the table.
The t-value is 2.125 and t-value in the table is 1.676. It means that the
difference of mastering English on both groups is significance or they have
difference achievement in mastering English after they got the treatment.
Hypothesis Testing
The result of the data analysis on the students’ score
in the post-test was used in the testing of hypothesis. From the result of the
data analysis on the students’ score in the post-test, it was found that the
mean score at the experimental group was 7.35, the mean score of the control
group was 4.46, and t-ratio was 2.125 and t-critical was 1.676.
The
result above shows that the t-ratio is greater than the t-critical. Therefore,
the hypothesis is accepted and the null hypothesis is rejected.
The Interpretation of
the Result in the Data Analysis in the Pre-test and Post-test
This
section interprets the result of the data analysis on the students’ score in
the pre-test in research finding.
Interpretation of the
Result of the Data Analysis on the Students’ Score in the Pre-test
From the result of data analysis on the students’
score in pre-test was found that the mean score of experimental group was 5 ,
the mean score of control group was 4.5, and the t-ratio was 0.30 and the
critical was 1.676. From the result of data analysis on the students’ score in
the post-test, it was found that the mean score at the experimental group was
7.35, the mean score of the control group was 4.46, and t-value was 2.125 and
t-value in the table was 1.676. From the result above, it is found that there
is significance difference between two means because the t-value is greater
than t-value in the table. Therefore, it can be concluded that the students who
are taught by using authentic material have better vocabulary achievement than
those who are taught without using authentic material.
Discussion
With the support of all the data about using of
newspaper as the authentic materials and the effectiveness teaching and
learning of English at SMA Maarif NU Pandaan Pasuruan, the researcher have
found out that the result were positively correlated the principles presented.
The researcher believe that study das helped to develop the learning
effectiveness of English of students reference to the following rationales.
Authentic
Materials & Authenticity: Sources and Choices
Authentic
texts have been defined as “…real-life texts, not written for pedagogic
purposes” (Wallace 1992, p. 145)
they are therefore written for native speakers and contain “real” language.
They are “…materials that have been produced to fulfill some social purpose in
the language community.” (Peacock (1997),in contrast to non-authentic texts
that are especially designed for language learning purposes. The language in
non-authentic texts is artificial and unvaried, concentrating on something that
has to be taught and often containing a series of “false-text indicators” that
include:
- perfectly formed sentences (all the time);
- a question using a grammatical structure,
gets a full answer;
- repetition of structures;
- very often does not “read” well.
The
artificial nature of the language and structures used, make them very unlike
anything that the learner will encounter in the real world and very often they
do not reflect how the language is really used. They are useful for teaching
structures but are not very good for improving reading skills (for the simple
fact that they read unnaturally). They can be useful for preparing the learner
for the eventual reading of “real” texts. The
sources of authentic materials that can be used in the classroom are infinite,
but the most common are newspapers, magazines, TV programs, movies, songs and
literature. One of the most useful is the Internet. Whereas newspapers and any
other printed material date very quickly, the Internet is continuously updated,
more visually stimulating as well as being interactive, therefore promoting a
more active approach to reading rather than a passive one. From a more
practical point of view, the Internet is a modern day reality, most students
use it and for teachers, there is easier access to endless amounts of many
different types of material. From a even more practical/economical point of
view, trying to obtain authentic materials abroad can be very expensive, an
English paper/magazine can cost up to 3-4 times the price that it usually is
and sometimes is not very good. Often by having unlimited access in the work
place, looking for materials costs nothing, only time. Authentic materials
should be the kind of material that students will need and want to be able to
read when travelling, studying abroad, or using the language in other contexts
outside the classroom. Authentic materials enable learners to interact with the
real language and content rather than the form. Learners feel that they are
learning a target language as it is used outside the classroom. When choosing
materials from the various sources, it is therefore worth taking into
consideration that the aim should be to understand meaning and not form,
especially when using literary texts with the emphasis being on what is being
said and not necessarily on the literary form or stylistics. Nuttall (2000, p. 34)
gives three main criteria when choosing texts to be used in the classroom
suitability of content, exploitability and readability. Suitability of content
can be considered to be the most important of the three, in that the reading
material should interest the students as well as be relevant to their needs.
The texts should motivate as well as. Exploitability refers to how the text can
be used to develop the students’ competence as readers. A text that cannot be
exploited for teaching purposes has no
use in the classroom. Just because it is in English does not mean that it can
be useful. Readability is used to describe the combination of structural and
lexical difficulty of a text, as well as referring to the amount of new
vocabulary and any new grammatical forms present. It is important to assess the
right level for the right students.
Concept
of Authenticity
The
concept of authenticity is central to CLT,with the learner being exposed to the
same language as a native speaker. Four types of authenticity within the
classroom have been identified and in particular to the use of authentic texts:
1. Authenticity of the texts which we may use as
input data for our students;
2. Authenticity of the learners’ own
interpretations of such texts;
3. Authenticity of tasks conducive to language
learning;
4. Authenticity of the actual social situation
of the classroom language. (Breen 1985,
p. 61)
Widdowson
has a process-orientated view of authenticity, making a distinction between
“authentic” and “genuine”. Genuine is an example of native speaker language,
while authentic is a native speaker response (it can also include the response
the writer intended upon when writing the text.): “The language presented to
them may be a genuine record of native speaker behavior, genuine, that is to
say, as textual data, but to the extent that it does not engage native speaker
response it cannot be realized as authentic discourse.” (Widdowson 1990, p. 45) Authenticity can
therefore be considered to be the interaction between the reader and the text
and not just the text in itself. Reading is considered to be an ongoing
interaction, going beyond the physical context of the text, looking for meaning
as well as processing information. Goodman takes this even further claiming
that reading is “…an essential interaction between language and thought…” (1988, p. 12)Where the writer
encodes his thoughts as language and the reader decodes the language into thought.
Use
of Authentic Reading Materials in the Classroom
One
of the main ideas of using authentic materials in the classroom is to “expose”
the learner to as much real language as possible. Even if the classroom is not
a “real-life” situation, authentic materials do have a very important place
within it. It has been argued that by taking a text out of its original
context, it loses it authenticity.“As soon as texts, whatever their original
purpose, are brought into classrooms for pedagogic purposes they have,
arguably, lost authenticity.” (Wallace 1992,
p. 79) Even if true, the learner is still exposed to
real discourse and not the artificial language of course textbooks, which tend
not to contain any incidental or improper examples. They also tend to reflect
the current teaching trend. Authentic materials also give the reader the
opportunity to gain real information and know what is going on in the world
around them. More times than not, they have something to say, be it giving
information, a review. They also produce a sense of achievement. Extracting
real information from a real text in a new/different language can be extremely
motivating, therefore increasing students' motivation for learning by exposing
them to 'real'language (Guariento & Morley 2001). They also reflect the
changes in language use, (again something that does not occur in textbooks,
which become very dated, very quickly) as well as giving the learner the proof
that the language is real and not only studied in the classroom. “Authentic texts
can be motivating because they are proof that the language is used for
real-life purposes by real people.” (Nuttall 1996, p. 172) The wide variety of different types of text
means that it is easier to find something that will interest the learner and
may even encourage further reading or reading for pleasure. An advantage of
taking a complete newspaper or magazine into classroom, rather than photocopies
of an article, is that students can actually choose what they want to read. The
more the learner reads, the better a reader he will become, not only improving
his language level but also confidence. If the text interests the learner it
can also be related to his own experiences. One of the aims of authentic
materials is to help the student react in the same way L1 speakers react in
their first language (L1). Learners who live in the target language
environment, once outside of the classroom will encounter a variety of
situations in which different reading purposes/skills are required. We can
claim that learners are being exposed to real language and they feel that they
are learning the 'real' language. The main advantages of using authentic
materials in the classroom therefore include:
1. having
a positive effect on student motivation;
2. giving
authentic cultural information;
3. exposing
students to real language;
4. relating
more closely to students’ needs;
5.
supporting
a more creative approach to teaching (Sacha 2006:60).
The
negative aspects of authentic materials
These
are what make us excited and willing to use authentic materials in our
classrooms, but while using them, it is inevitable that we face some problems. The negative aspects of authentic materials are that
they can be too culturally biased, often a good knowledge of cultural
background is required when reading, as well as too many structures being
mixed, causing lower levels problems when decoding the texts (Martinez 2002).
Students often bring copies of newspaper articles (in particular the tabloids)
or song lyrics to the classroom, asking to translate them after having looked
up each word in the dictionary and not understood a single word. Richards
(2001) notes that authentic materials often contain difficult language,
unneeded vocabulary items and complex language structures, which can often
create problems for the teacher too. They can also become very dated, very
quickly but unlike textbooks can be updated or replaced much easier and more
cost effectively. The biggest problem with authentic materials is that if the
wrong type of text is chosen, the vocabulary may not be relevant to the
learner’s needs and too many structures can create difficulty. This can have
the opposite effect, rather than motivate the learner, it can de-motivate and
in Krashenite terms “put up the effective filter”.
Discussion
of Research Findings
It has been mentioned above that the use of t-test
formula to check the difference in score achieved by the experimental group and
the control group showed that the students who were taught by using authentic
material achieve better scores than these who were not taught by using
authentic material. The mean score of the post-test in the experimental group
was 7.35 while in the control group was 4.46. However, based on the collected
data it was found that there is evidence to support the research hypothesis and
to reject the null hypothesis. It can be shown that the result of analysis
t-value is 2.125 and t-test in the table is 1.676 it means that t-test is
higher than t-value in table, furthermore, the research hypothesis is accepted
and the null hypothesis is rejected. In other words, the test statistical in
the analysis of the research data prove that the students’ score who were
taught by using authentic material. It can be referred, that the authentic
material technique is more successful as instructional media in teaching
reading comprehension and learning English. Authentic material is one of
teaching material in teaching reading. It can make the students much more
interested in the teaching and learning process. Another teaching material used
for teaching reading is textbook. Using authentic materials in teaching reading
is more effective than using textbook for the eleventh grade students. Richards
(2003, p. 252) states that authentic materials are preferred over created
materials, because they contain authentic language and reflect real-world uses
of language compared with the contrived content of much created materials. When
the teacher uses authentic materials in teaching reading, the class atmosphere
changes into a better one and the students are much more interested in the
teaching and learning process. The students get a real example of language use
from authentic materials which are taken from the real world. They feel
whatever they study in the class is very useful for their daily life. They can
find teaching materials from their surroundings by themselves. Bringing
authentic materials into the classroom activities can fulfil the students' need
in their daily communication. The reading comprehension score of the students
with high achievement is better than the one of those with low achievement.
Harmer (1998, p. 8) states that one of the main tasks for teachers is to
provoke achievement and involvement in the subject even when students are not
initially interested in it. Students' achievement toward learning English is
very important. Their achievement influences their score in reading learning
English. The students with high achievement are always active, creative,
curious, having good participation in the teaching and learning process. They
have their own spirit to study for getting their best competency and skill.
Because of their curiosity, they like to have a challenging activity in
learning reading. Gardner and Lambert in Harmer (1998, p. 8) states that
students who felt more warm about a language and who wanted to integrate into
the culture of its speakers learnt more successfully than those who were only
learning language as a means to an end (e.g. getting a better job). From the,
this study indicated that using authentic material could increase the students’
mastery of vocabulary. Authentic material can also help the students to
understand the lesson easily because authentic material represents real objects,
newspaper and internet. Besides, authentic material can be used to stimulate
the students in learning English. To sum up, the implementation of authentic
material has given positive effect on the students because it can be increased
students’ score and can motivate students in learning English.
Conclusion
The researcher conclusions are presented in accordance
with the data that have been analysed in the previous chapter. From the data
analysis about the effectiveness of teaching reading comprehension by using
authentic materials eleventh grade students at SMA Maarif NU Pandaan, it can be
concluded that. Post-test scores in experimental group
was 7.35 and control group was 4.46, the t-value was 2.125 and t-value in the
table was 1.676 , it means that after being taught by using authentic material
the students had better reading comprehension achievement than before being
taught by using authentic material.
There
is a significance effect of using authentic material as treatment in teaching
English on the students’ achievement of reading comprehension at SMA Maarif Nu
Pandaan.
Suggestion
The suggestions are given to the teacher for the
implementation of effectiveness authentic material and to the other researchers
for further studies.
Suggestion for teacher
To improve the atmosphere of the teaching and learning
process, the teacher can apply authentic materials in teaching reading so that
the students will be much more interested in learning English and they will
enjoy learning English. The more the students enjoy learning English, the more
they easily understand the teaching materials.
When
the authentic materials are brought into the class as teaching materials, the
class atmosphere will look like the atmosphere of the real world because
whatever is studied in the classroom is the same as the one in the real life.
In such kind of class atmosphere, the teachers can easily conduct teaching and
learning activities. Therefore, it is better for teachers to apply authentic
materials in the teaching and learning process.
Suggestion for Further
Researcher
Below are some suggestions for researches
1. This
study use quasi-experimental design with two groups of students in different
school. For better result, the researcher used one school and used true
experimental design.
2. The
present study was conducted in two weeks. The researcher suggests that other
researcher use longer treatment for greater effectiveness of the experiment.
3. Before
giving a pre-test and post-test to the students, the researcher must consider
the validity of to make the data valid. The validity of the test is important
criteria in experimental research, because the experimental research includes
score which mention the effect of treatment.
References
Bachman, L. F. (1990). Fundamental consideration in language
testing. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Baird, K., & Redmond, M. (Eds.).
(2004). The use of authentic materials in
the K-12 French program. Winston-Salem, NC: Wake Forest University,
Department of Education.
Breen, M. (1985). Authenticity in
the language classroom. Applied
Linguistics 6, 60-70.
Guariento, W. & Morley. (2001).
Text and task authenticity in the EFL classroom. ELT Journal, 55 (4), 347 - 353.
Jacobson, E., Degener, S., &
Purcell-Gates, V. (2003). Creating
authentic materials and activities for the adult literacy classroom: a handbook
for practitioners. NCSALL.
Oxford Learner’s Pocket Dictionary.
(1991) .New Edition. Hongkong.
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