Background of the Study

Students‟ factor is not the only factor that trigger the difficulty in students‟ reading. Teachers‟ factor play equal role in influencing students‟ reading comprehension. Teachers who do not give their supports to students to help them in their reading nor do teachers who give students opportunity to support one another in their reading learning will likely to demotivate students in reading. 5 Teachers who seems to be a kind of teacher-centered person in the class will hardly conduct a teaching reading strategy that involve students‟ awareness to participate in reading. A teacher-centered teacher also makes less feedback to students in the class whereas giving feedback to students in the class toward their reading is important as students will know their weakness in their reading and also by giving feedback, teacher can give their students an advice of reading strategy that seems fit to their students to overcome their reading difficulty. Due to the researchers‟ statements on Indonesian students‟ reading difficulty in the previous paragraphs, selecting appropriate teaching technique that is able to make students to be a skillful reader that are able to use their prior knowledge toward the text, predict as well grasp explicit meaning of a text and able to call an active cognitive process and enable teacher to make students more engage students in class and enable possibilities to give them feedback is also crucial to do. Didi Sukyadi and Eneng Uswatun Hasanah state in their article that teaching teaching that is able to cover those stated needs is Think-aloud. It is basically applied in two ways: as an informal assessment of students‟ reading strategies or comprehension and as a teaching strategy aimed at assisting readers of all ages in developing the essential comprehension self-monitoring skills necessary for effective learning. Didi Sukyadi and Eneng Uswatun Hasanah state some reasons why think-aloud strategy is good and appropriate to be applied in the class to increase students‟ reading comprehension. 6 First, by using Think-aloud students are able to learn to 5 Ariffudin Hamra and Eny Syatriana, “A Model of Reading for University EFL Students: Need Analysis and Model Decision .” English Language Teaching.Vol.5 No.10. 16 August 2012. Page 3 6 Didi Sukyadi and Eneng Uswatun Hasanah, op.cit., Page 5 control or monitor their own comprehension. Next, by using think aloud students can learn to use reading strategies. Third, it increases the level of students ‟ interest and participation. The last, Think-Aloud is considered as a valuable tool to assess students‟ comprehension in the classroom and enable teacher to give them feedbacks. Next, Leslie Oster Maarten W. van Someren in different articles also argue why Think-Aloud is suitable to be applied in the class whose reading problems are like what have been stated above. Oster mentioned that Think-Aloud technique is a technique that enables students to verbalize their thoughts as they read and thus students are able to make their own strategy so that in the further reading activity, they can choose by themselves the best technique in reading 7 . Think-Aloud also provide the data that can be interrogated and investigated by teachers in the class 8 . Thus, teachers can analyze the difficulty experienced by students reading. Then, teachers are also able to help students to overcome their students by giving advices in their reading. Then, according to the problems encountered in students reading and the strength of Think-Aloud to overcome them, the writer put his interest on conducting a research focusing on the use of Think-Aloud. Also, as the experience the writer had while the writer conducted a teaching practice in a senior high school shows that many students still have difficulty to answer a question focusing on interpreting a meaning from a text, the writer is eager to know the influence of Think-Aloud toward senior high school students‟ reading comprehension. The research that is going to be conducted is entitled as “Applying Think-Loud Technique in Improving Students Reading Comprehension of Narrative Text. 7 Leslie Oster, “Using Think-Aloud for Reading Instruction”, The Reading Teacher, Vol.55, No.1, 1 st September 2001, p.64 8 Maarten W. van Someren, et.al, “The Think Aloud Method : A Practical Guide To Modelling Cognitive Processes”London, Academic Press, 1994 Pg. 31

B. Identification of Problems

Problem related to reading and teaching are found from the explanation above and the following statements are the identification of the problem. 1. Students are incapable to reconnect their prior knowledge towards texts they are reading 2. Students cannot predict or grasp implicit meaning from a text 3. Students are merely able to read a text without understanding it 4. Students are not capable of interpreting implicit meaning from a text 5. Students find it is hard to predict a meaning from unfamiliar word or phrase of a test

C. Limitation of the Study

This study is focused and limited on the developing of students‟ reading comprehension of narrative texts of tenth grade students of Sekolah Menengah Kejuruan SMK 57 Jagakarsa. This study will examine and analyze how effective the use of Think-Aloud technique in teaching narrative texts in class to enhance students‟ performance in comprehending a text and also their awareness toward their reading strategies.

D. Formulation of the Problem

In the research, the writer plans to analyze the use of Think-Aloud technique in teaching reading of narrative text of students in the level of senior high school. Thus, the writers would like to formulate the problem as follows: 1. Is Think-Aloud technique able to enhance the students‟ reading comprehension toward a reading text? 2. Does Think-Aloud enhance the awareness of students toward their reading strategy

E. Aim of the Study

The aim of study is to find out whether Think-Aloud technique can be effectively conducted in senior high school and to know how effective it is to use Think-Aloud to enhance students‟ comprehension towards a reading text and in this case is a narrative text. In addition, the aim of the study is also to seek the answer whether Think-Aloud is able to enhance students‟ awareness towards their reading strategies.

F. Significance of the Study

The result of the study is expected to be able to provide a needed and useful information of a teaching technique. So according to the writer expectation, this study‟s results, ipso facto, are aimed to first, English teacher who develop a strategy and a technique in teaching reading. The result will give them information about technique in teaching reading, which can be an alternative solution they can use in the class. Second, students who want to solve their difficulty in comprehending text. Along with teachers, the students can practice this technique in their reading activity in the class and it also give them a possible opportunity to develop their reading skill through a different technique and also to gain their awareness towards reading strategies.. The last, for school institution where the writer conduct the research. This research‟s result is able to provide them useful information of teaching English reading that can be used to develop the quality of the institution especially in teaching English Reading.

CHAPTER II LITERATURE REVIEW

A. READING

1. Definition of Reading

Reading as one of four language skills plays an important role in our lives. Since most languages, even though not all in this world, are divided in two forms, which are oral and written language, thence a good ability of reading is needed to comprehend languages, particularly those that are written. While we are reading we are not merely doing a passive process. Deane Spears tells us that when we take a book and we begin to read the words, the reading process starts at the same time. The reading process is called decoding words 9 . Furthermore, Deane Spears defines that decoding words is decrypting the letters that make up individual word and processing the letters and sounds. Moreover, Spears fences that in getting the message of a text from a reading process, we are not simply processing the letters and sound but we also need to understand the relationship that the words have with other words in text. By understanding the text, we will be able to put the meaning of words together. While we are talking about reading, we will also talk about the fluency in reading. In speaking, fluency is important because it can influence the process of communication, so is in reading. Fluency in language skills, especially in speaking and reading, is frequently used as an indicator of a person that has been successfully learning the target language. In speaking, the term of fluency is related to how well a person is able to speak in target language mindlessly. Being fluent in reading is no more than we can read a text fluently without spelling the letter one by one. The concept of fluency in reading is 9 Deanne Spears, Developing Critical Reading Skills New York: McGraw-Hill, 2006, Pg.2 7