Sample of Backgroud

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

This chapter consists of  background, problem statement, objective of the research, significance of the research and scope of the research.

A.           Background.

Language is not only used for daily conversation, but also used in education, research  and science  both in spoken and written form. Considering       those    functions,    people    study    language     both    formal    and  informal. The use of language enables the members of a social   group to  cooperate   with   one   another   for   their   own   benefits.   Language   has   to   be learned and used in social community so without the existence of language,  it will cause mis interpretation about what other people say. 

 English has become an international language, many people  in   the   world   used   it as   a   means of   communication.   That   is   why  English  becomes the second language for many people around the world.

 As  a foreign  language  in  Indonesia,  English  is  seriously   learned   by   many people to  have a good prospect to be the community of  international   world. Depdikbud (1994: 1) states“ Bahasa Inggris adalah  bahasa  Internasional   yang perlu diajarkan untuk tujuan penyerapan dan pengembangan ilmu pengetahuan, teknologi, dan seni  budaya serta pengembangan hubungan  antar   bangsa.         

English is taught to give students simple skills in understanding written and oral statement in English. This language are required to master the four basic language development tasks, namely the development of vocabulary, stringing words, say words, and language skills including reading, writing, speaking, and listening.

Vocabulary is the most important material in foreign language teaching for young  learners. Therefore, the teaching of English vocabulary has a very essential role in enabling Indonesian students to master English as their foreign language. English vocabulary mastery, in fact, it has become a big problem for most Indonesian students. If one does not have sufficient number of vocabulary, he will not be able to communicate with his surroundings

Vocabulary is one of the important elements of languange proficiency that becomes the basis of how well learners speak, write, listen and read. In the past, vocabulary teaching and learning were often give little priority in second languange programs.(Richard, 2002). Whereas, withouth a good mastery of vocabulary, learners may be discourage in making use of languange learning change around them such as watching English program, listening to the radio, reading some kinds of English test, etc.  

In teaching and learning English, vocabulary as an element of languange is considered as the most important factor in improving the mastery of four languange skills. They are not able to be mastered if students are still lacking vocabulary. The students cannot express their communicative needs ( ideas, emotions, desires and though) to someone clearly because of their sufficient vocabulary. Without vocabulary, we can not express our idea or understand the message. The students cannot read, speak, listen, and write without understanding the meaning of words. Rivers in Nunan (1991: 117) argues that the acquisition of an adequate vocabulary is essential for successful second language use because without an extensive vocabulary, we will be unable to use the structures and functions that  we may have learned for comprehensible communication.

The teacher of English, as a second languange  should know very well how important vocabulary is. They know that students must learn thousand of words the speakers or writers use in their speech or writing. Fortunately, teachers and students agree that vocabulary is needed in learning and teaching, and it is not less important than grammar, as Wilkins in Syam(1972) stated that the fact is while languange withouth grammar very little can be conveyed, withouth vocabulary nothing can be conveyed. So the English teacher should be able to find out solution in vocabulary teaching by creating various efficient and effective technique. Beside that, they should establish condition that make learning vocabulary occur within a reasonable period of time.

The teacher’s role in applying interesting methods is one of the important factors in creating a good atmosphere in the classroom activities. They should know how to improve the students’interest and student’s achievement during the class and know how to design materials which are easy to be understand by the students. Teachers should be able to be develope any kind of material so that learning vocabulary will not become such boring and monotonous thing. The teacher can enrich the students’ vocabulary through short story

To solve this problem, literature can be alternative medium to improve student’s vocabulary. Collie and Slater (1987) stated that there are many good reasons for using literature in the classroom. Here are a few : (1). Literature in the classroom because their skills  they acquire in dealing with difficult or unknown languange can be used outside the class; (2) literature encourages interaction. Literatury text can be helpful in the languange learning process because of the personal involvement, involves discussion and sharing feelings or opinion; (3) literature expands languange awareness. Asking learners to examine sophisticated or non standard examples of languange (which can occur in literary texts), makes them more aware of the norms of  languange  use; (4) literature educates the whole person. By examining values in literary in literary texts, teacher encourage learners to develope attitudes towards them. These values and atttudes relate to the world outside the classroom; (5) literature is motivating. Literature holds high status in many cultures and countries. For this reason, students can fell a real sense of achievement at understanding a piece of highly respected literature. Also, literature is often more interesting than the text found in course books.

Short story is one of the modern prose forms. As literary work, story become an interesting thing for people to read and talk. The function of story is to entertain and to enrich mental experience. Story is talking about author expression to anything about life experience concerning with human imagination. And the short stories encourage the students to think about moral, social and philosophical.

Based on the data of curriculum  of SMP Negeri 6 Pangsid,  the problem of the students in learning English is because of the lack of vocabulary. They still have low score in learning vocabulary. They’ve just got score 65,  it is law of the minimal achievement criteria. According to some English teachers there, the students are lack of words meaning, they are not able to understand the meaning of the words, the usage of the words,  the word formation  and the word formation in English.

In this thesis, the researcher would like to apply a short story  in the class when teaching English . The research will thread the students’ vocabulary through the word meaning, the word usage, the word formation and the word grammar.   Furthermore, these activities is  as one of the language teaching , It is considered to be able to give students great motivation from which they can enhance their  vocabulary  in  English., And also it can give contribution for the teachers to become a good motivator for their students. This motivation fully plays a very important role to the willingness of the students in studying English

Based on the problems above, the teacher should develop a good teaching vocabulary  to enrich the students’ vocabulary. The researcher  chooses the title “Using Short Story to improve students’ vocabulary achievement  for Grade  IX Student of SMP Negeri  6 Pangsid.

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