The Background of Study

1 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

A. The Background of Study

In Indonesia, English becomes the subject that students should master and that is examined in national examination in Junior High School 1 . English is specified as a compulsory subject, part of the basic curriculum. In learning English, the students must capable or master not only the four skills, those are speaking, listening, reading, and writing, but also language components, such as grammar, pronunciation and vocabulary. Structure is important part of language components. The structure of a language sometimes refers to as grammar. Learning English grammatically enable students‟ language to use linguistic form accurately, meaningfully, and appropriately. Grammar consists of many parts that should be learned by the students. One of the important one is tense. Tense has fundamental role in the English language, so the inappropriate uses of tenses may obscure the meaning. By tense, the students know when the action occurs, and understand or know the correspondence between the form of the verb and their concept of time. The students of Junior High School are extended to learn some tenses including simple past tense. The simple past indicates that an activity or situation began and ended at a particular time in the past. The simple past tense is related to narrative and recount text. The students must study simple past tense because mastering simple past tense would help the foreign language learners to better understanding in using English. However, after the writer observed teaching and learning grammar at MTs Al-Ikhwan on 25 February 2014, the writer found that in learning and teaching process, the students have low score in grammar, teacher ‟s method in learning simple past tense makes the students less of motivation or interest, 1 Prof. Dr. Khairil Anwar, Kurikulum 2013 untuk Tingkat Sekolah Menengah PertamaMadrasah Tsanawiyah, Jakarta: PT. Binatama Raya, 2013, p. 7. some students think that grammar a boring subject, and the students got difficulty in memorizing form of regular and irregular verbs. Teaching method in explaining the materials could cause students difficulties in using the correct structure of simple past tense. In other words, the Indonesian students may find difficulties in memorizing irregular verbs. This might be because the students are influenced by teaching method. Based on the situation of learning simple past tense in that school, the writer thinks that it is important to create suitable techniques related to students‟ condition. The teachers have to make the correct way for students to make them not only get the material, but also can appropriate method. The students need to be delivered a technique that makes them intended to learn actively in learning simple past tense. In this research, the writer will use cooperative learning by using jigsaw technique as an alternative way in teaching simple past tense. Cooperative Learning is not a new idea in education. There are a few teachers use this method. In cooperative learning, students make a small group and work together to meet common goals. The students can interact with each other to acquire and practice a subject. Cooperative learning principles and techniques are tools which teachers use to encourage mutual helpfulness in the groups and the active participation of all members. There are many techniques in Cooperative Learning but the writer chooses jigsaw technique in teaching simple past tense. In jigsaw technique, students are assigned to five or six member study teams. Materials are presented to the students in text form, and each student is responsible for learning the material. Then, when the students finish learning material in expert team, they have to return to their home teams and teach other members what they have learned. The writer assumes that jigsaw technique is one of the techniques which can improve the students‟ achievement and will enable students to comprehend the material more easily, because the students in jigsaw technique classroom work collaboratively. Hopefully, by using jigsaw technique, the students will enjoy their learning activities. Based on the explanation above, the writer do a research in MTs Al- Ikhwan. The writer use jigsaw technique to teach simple past tense. The title of this research is “The Effectiveness of Jigsaw Technique in Teaching Simple Past Tense ” An Experimental Research at Grade VIII of MTs Al- Ikhwan.

B. Identification of Problems