STRATEGIES FOR TEACHING SPEAKING AND READING COMPREHENSION SKILLS

Erna Uli Simbolon

STRATEGIES FOR TEACHING SPEAKING AND READING COMPREHENSION SKILLS

BAB I : INTRODUCTION

Abstract

 The central  of this study was to analyze the English teachers’ strategies in

teaching speaking and reading comprehension skills in SMPN 1 P.Siantar . It was conducted

to get detailed information about the students’ responses toward their teachers’ strategies

in teaching speaking and reading comprehension skills. This study employed a qualitative

research design. Necessary data were gathered using open-ended question, classroom

observation, interview, and questionnaire. The result of this study revealed that the three

teachers applied teaching speaking and reading comprehension skills strategies in three

stages; Pre-stages, Whilst-stages and Post-Stages. From the three teachers observed,

they employed various stategies in each stage with different reasons. In general the

students’ responses toward their teachers’ strategies in teaching speaking and reading

comprehensions skills were good enough as their instructions were clear and

understandable. Based on those finding, it can be concluded that the English teachers

need to increase their knowledge and experience in order to understand the concept and

reasons in using the strategies for teaching speaking and reading comprehension. This

study recommended that English teachers should have awareness to the significance in

choosing the appropriate strategies for teaching speaking and reading comprehension

skills. So that the learning process can run effectively.

Keywords: Strategy, Speaking, Reading 

BAB II  BACKGROUND

The teaching of English as a foreign language has become increasingly important in Indonesia. It is the first foreign language in Indonesia. It is a compulsory subject to be taught for three years at Junior High Schools and for another three years in Senior High Schools (Lauder,2008).

English also has been taught in Elementary Schools as an elective subject since the implementation of the 1994 Curriculum. It seems the development of English language teaching in Indonesia touches the recent English curriculum objectives. Ironically, there are still very limited number of students who are able to  communicate in English, although they

have been studying English for about six years. In this context, M. Thalal (2010)

stated that there are many cases in which students’ expectations do not match with the reality of learning result showing that their English proficiency i s still very low or they do not have significant English ability after many years of study. Moreover, students of foreign language education programs are considered successful if they can communicate effectively in the language (Riggenbach & Lazaraton, 1991). The parameter used to revise the English

teaching program in well-design syllabus, lesson plan, and material design that the

students’ success or lack of success in EFL (English as Foreign Language) is  e-Journal Program Pascasarjana Universitas Pendidikan Ganesha Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris (Volume 1 Tahun 2013)  judged by the accuracy of the language they produced. In order to improve the accuracy of English communicative competence based on recent English curriculum objectives, the teaching of speaking skill has become increasingly important in the English as a foreign language context.   Unfortunately, the change in the

curriculum is not followed by appropriate socialization and teacher training and so, accordingly, the results thus far do not match the expectations. First, teachers are still teaching in the traditional way with the biggest emphasis on the grammar, and if some are already moving towards a new approach, the emphasis on fluency in the beginning is not directly followed by accuracy. Moreover, the change of approach is not followed by the application of suitable assessment. 

In Indonesia, schools are put into different types of categories: Regular schools, National Standard Schools, International Schools, International Standard School (SBI), and Prospective International Standard Schools (RSBI) Referring to bilingual education in Indonesia the types of schools are the last three: international schools, international standard school (SBI), and Prospective International Standard School (RSBI).  Law No 20/2003 gives a definition of an international school as ‘an institutional education which is run by the representative of foreign countries in Indonesia, which can use the education rules of the countries mentioned, and which is approved by the Indonesian government.’ Clegg (2007) mentions that the Government of Indonesia has taken a decision to establish English-medium education in a limited number of schools known as SBI schools.Having discussed the distinctive features of the International Standard School, it is of the researcher interest to analyze how English is taught in this type of school. As a matter of fact, English is not only taught as a subject matter but also is used as the language of instruction in the classroom. Besides, teacher and students  need to have a higher standard of teaching

and learning processes inside the classrooms. Therefore, it is interesting to examine how teacher conduct the teaching and learning of speaking and reading skills in EFL classes, which are the most important skills in an Internal needs to be analyzed and discussed. Furthermore Volya (2009) stated that , a professional teacher should consider suitable strategies in teaching speaking. As focus of teaching speaking is to improve the oral production of the students, it requires the teacher not only to create a warm and humanistic classroom atmosphere, but also to provide each student with a turn to speak or a role to play. Since learning and communication strategies form one of the components of communicative competence, the teacher should spend more time teaching speaking strategies, which are normally ignored by EFL teachers.  In reading itself, Patel (2008) said that, reading is most useful and important skill for people. This skill is more important than speaking and writing. Reading is a source of joys. Good reading is that which keeps students regular in which provide him both pleasure and profit. Reading habits not only help the students to get knowledge and wisdom from the cultural of heritage, but are also very helpful in passing for leisure period.  Based on the above descriptions,

the reasons of researcher taking only speaking and reading comprehension skills

in the present study are:

1. All skills in English are integrated or  related one another.

2. The researcher is limited by the time.  In line with the background of the study, the problems of this study are formulated as follows;

(1) What strategies are used by the English teachers in teaching speaking and reading

comprehension skills,

(2) What problems are encountered by the English teachers in teaching the speaking and reading comprehension skills, and

 (3) What are the students’ responses toward their English  e-Journal Program Pascasarjana Universitas Pendidikan Ganesha  Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris (Volume 1 Tahun 2013)

 teachers’ strategies in teaching speaking and reading comprehension skills.  Speaking English in The Indonesian Context

Considering the current status of English as a foreign language in Indonesia, not so many people use it in their day-today communication. However, in certain communities in this country English has been used for various reasons (Musyahda, 2002), leading to the fact that some people use it as the second language. For  example, in the academic level, some of the schoolars are quite familiar with English and occasionally use it as a means for communicating.   The Practice of Teaching EFL Speaking In The Indonesian Context  The teaching of EFL speaking in Indonesia has been closely connected to the concept of communicative competence which is emphasized within the Communicative Language Teaching (CLT)

approach. As this approach values interaction among students in the process of language learning, classroom activities have a central role in enabling the students interact and thus improve their speaking proficiency.   The Nature of Reading  This study focuses to define reading as a process. It is in line with Anderson’s (2003:68) idea which states reading as a fluent process of readers combining information from a text and their background knowledge which need reading strategies to build meaning.  Based on the above descriptions, Grabe in Melkamu (2002:11) viewed reading as a kind of dialogue between the reader and the text. This interactive process of reading reflects that a reader should toil hard to draw meaning out of a text employing different reading strategies such as skimming, scanning, predicting, etc. Hence, in this process of reading,

there is active interpretive interaction between the reader, the writer and the text.Reading Comprehension  Reading comprehension skills are important for English Language Learners. Reading comprehension has multiple definitions and explanations. One of the definitions of reading comprehension is stated as follows: Reading Comprehension is a process that involves the orchestration of the readers prior knowledge about the world and about the language. It involves such as predicting, questioning, summarizing, determining meaning of vocabulary in context, monitoring one’se-Journal Program Pascasarjana Universitas Pendidikan Ganesha  Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris (Volume 1 Tahun 2013)

 own comprehension and reflecting. The process also involves such is governed by a specific context, and it is independent on social interaction. It is the integration of all there processes that account for comprehension (Weaver, 1994:44).  Based on weaver’s idea above, this study focuses to define reading comprehension as a managing process of reader’s prior knowledge by creating the strategies in reading such as predicting, questioning, summazing, determining meaning of vocabulary in context, monitoring and reflecting.  The most detailed one, snow et al (2002) define reading comprehension as the process of simultaneously extracting and constructing meaning through interaction and involvement with written

language. They classify that comprehension entails three elements.

a. The readers who is doing  comprehension (considering) with capacities, abilities, knowledge and experiences that a person brings to the act of reading. 

b. The text that is to be comprehended (including printer text or electronic text)

c. The activity in which comprehension is a part of considering the purposes, process and consquences associated with the act of reading.  Then, Grabe and Staller (2002) also deliver that reading for general comprehension refers to the ability to understand information in a text and interpret it appropriately and correctly. However, reading comprehension abilities are quite complex and different in numereus ways depending on tasks, motivation, goals and language ability. In line with this idea, Barnet (1988) states that level of reader comprehension is determined well from the interactions between the reader variables and the text variables.  Logsdon (2007) confirms Reflect as an activity to reproduce something after

reading. In this, it is about the information fit into things that we have already learned

and the new information that we learn. He also defines Recite as a strategy to think  about the material that can be done by taking brief notes, discussing, explaining to

other students, and using graphic organizer to increase understanding of how

concepts in the reading relate to each other.   In conclusion, reading comprehension strategy is the reader’s effort or way to elicit the information or selection text in reading. Teachers canencourage students to use effective strategies which are mentioned in the discussion above when reading English text. They also can make a major difference in student’s success of failure to read text effectively by modeling, coaching, facilitating, promoting, and teaching reading comprehension strategies in their Classroom.

Questionnaire for Students

Questionnaire for students was made to ask close ended questions .In this study, the researcher used Likert Scale Questionnaire since this method is simple, versatile and reliable (Dornyei, 2003:36).

Then, Dornyei (2003) also explained that Likert Scale consists of a series of statements which are related to a particular target with the respondents are asked to indicate the items of agree or disagree by marking one of the responses ranging from ‘strongly agree’ to ‘strongly disagree’. The questionnaire was developed based on the fourth research question. The data gathered from questionnaire were used to support the main data that got from observation. They were considered to find out the students’ responses toward their teachers’ strategies in teaching speaking and reading comprehension.

RESEARCH FINDINGS AND

DISCUSSIONS

The Teachers Strategies in Teaching Speaking and Reading Comprehension Skills.

As shown in data below, teachers’ strategies in teaching speaking and

reading comprehension skills were presented into three teaching stages or

activities; Pre, Whilst, and Post activities. It can be seen in the following framework:

A General Framework of Teachers Strategies in Teaching Speaking Skill

Classroom

Observation

Strategies in Teaching Speaking

Pre Activity

Whilst

Activity

Post activity

e-Journal Program Pascasarjana Universitas Pendidikan Ganesha  Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris (Volume 1 Tahun 2013)  

Observation 1 Brainstorming Strategy Reviewing Strategy  

Observation 2

Brainstorming  Strategy Retelling Strategy

Observation 3 Direct Instruction Strategy

From the three observation (the above table) it can be seen that Most of the teachers (T1 and T2) prefer to use  brainstorming strategy in the stage of Pre Activity with different reasons, in which T1 stated that he used brainstorming strategy to motivate the students speaking or community in English. Whereas the other one (T2) thought that using Brainstorming strategy in the stage of the Pre-activity could make the students have prior understanding about the learning material that would be learned. While the T3 prefer to use direct instruction strategy in the stage of Pre-Activity because the material he taught at that time was remedial

material.  In Whilst Activity, each teacher used different strategy with different reasons. T1 used Role-Play strategy solely as the juncture of a conversation between the previous and the next pairs. T2 used Retelling Strategy because the material taught was recount with related to past event. T3 used Direct Speaking strategy because the students had known the material and they prepared the materials of speech to be presented.  In Post Activity, most of the teachers (T1 and T2) prefer to use Reviewing

Classroom

Observation

Direct

Speaking

Strategy

Reviewing

Strategy

Reviewing

Strategy

No Strategy

strategy with different reasons. T1 used Reviewing strategy as the stabilization of

comprehension to the materials that had been learned by the students, whereas T2 used Reviewing strategy to analyze whether the students really understood or not the material that had been talked about, while T3 did not apply any strategies in this stage (Post Activity) with the reason that he was limited by the time, besides he had plan to continue at the next meeting.  Based on the above descriptions the researcher would like to present their concepts on Teaching Speaking Strategy.

T1: Teaching Speaking Strategy is a model  of learning speaking which consists of Building  Knowledge of Field (BKOF),Modelling of Text (MOT), Joint Constructions of Text (JCOT), Independent Construction of Text

(ICOT).

T2: Teaching Speaking Strategy is a strategy used in the learning process to take the students are really capable to speak English.

T3: Teaching Speaking Strategy is teaching strategy to improve the students abilityto speak.

A General Framework of Teachers Strategies  in Teaching Reading Comprehension Skill

Strategies in Teaching Reading Pre Activity Whilst Activity Post activity

Observation 1 Brainstorming Strategy

Observation 2 1. BrainstormingStrategy

2. Word

1. Reading Aloud Strategy

2. ComprehensionStrategy

1. Reading RaceStrategy

2. Comprehension Reinforcement Strategy Reinforcement Strategy

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Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris (Volume 1 Tahun 2013)

 Guessing Strategy

Observation 3 Introducing Strategy

From the three teachers observed, each of them applied different strategies whether in Pre and Whilst Activity with different reasons as well. Only in post activity T1 and T2 used the same strategy namely reinforcement strategy, but also they had different reasons. While T3 applied reviewing strategy with his own reason.  In Pre activity T1 used brainstorming strategy as an introduction or warming up before starting the learning

material. T2 used brainstorming and word Guessing strategy to analyze the students’ prior knowledge due to their vocabulary and readiness in joining the learning process. Different with T3 who used introducing strategy to give the students’ basic understanding about the learning material that would be taught. In whilst activity, T1 used reading aloud and comprehension strategy to describe the balance of students’ reading related to pronunciation and intonation. T2 used reading race and comprehension strategies in order the students’ did not feel suppressed in the process of learning and they could learn through game. While T3 used direct learning strategy as the pre activity had been done before, namely exploration and collaboration.  In post reading, two of the teachers observed (T1 and T2) used reinforcement strategy, but they had different reasons,while T3 used reviewing strategy. T1 used reinforcement strategy to improve thestudents experience and ability in reading English texts. T2 used reinforcement strategy to clarify whether the students had understood the material that had been learned or not. T3 used reviewing strategy to confirm whether the learning objectives had been achieved.  Both pre-ativity and post-activity involve limited range of strategies. Strategy Direct Learning Strategy Reviewing Strategy However, obvious differences in strategies used are seen in the whilst activities. In speaking, every lesson used different strategies (reviewing, retelling, and direct speaking). In reading, the strategies used are reading aloud, comprehension check, reading race, and direct strategies. These indicate that teachers used their creativity in strategy use during the main activity, which means that teachers might have an interpretation that main activities are the most important segment in the teaching and learning process  The post activities are similar to the pre-activities in the way of the limited strategy used. As a matter of fact all the three segments are equally important and  teachers should use a variety of stratges to make learning to be enjoyable and

effective.  

BAB III CONCLUSIONS

For the first  problem, it can be concluded that the teachers applied three kinds of stages in teaching speaking those are stages of teaching activities. In pre-speaking stage they gave sthe students some questions as a brainstorming, even one of them used word cards to elicit the students vocabulary mastery. This activities were done to know the students’ prior knowledge. Then, in Whilst-speaking stage, they applied direct speaking and conducted speaking through making dialog in front of the class. The last, in post-speaking stage they did

reinforcement and gave the conclusions to know whether the students understand or not the material had been given. For the second research problem, it can be seen that the teachers applied three kinds of stages in teaching reading those are pre- reading, Whilst reading, and post-reading stages. In pre-reading stage they gave the students some questions e-Journal Program Pascasarjana Universitas Pendidikan Ganesha Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris (Volume 1 Tahun 2013) as a worming up to know and enrich the students vocabulary mastery. This is also done to help the students to enter to the topic being discussed. Next, in Whilstreading stage, they distributed the texts and gave some questions related to thetext provided. This is done to know the students’ comprehension on the text given.Even, this is done through a play. Then, in post-reading stage they did reinforcementand gave the conclusions to know whether or not the students understand to thematerial had been given by their teachers. Then as found in the results ofquestionnaire data, it can be concluded that basically almost of the studentsbelieved that all of the teachers had created some extent strategies in teachingspeaking and reading comprehension skills. They perceived all their teachersprepared the lesson and activated their background knowledge before speaking and reading activity. They also perceived that all their teachers had created clear instruction that could help them to speak and understand the text in reading.

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