text, heshe can look away from the text and answer the two questions: What is it about? and What did the author say about? Further, it is said that one way to
accomplish this goal is to recognize and understand the parts first, the smallest units of meaning, and then to combine them to understand the whole. Finally, if the
students can comprehend all paragraphs they will get the idea of the whole text and they also get the needed information from the text correctly.
For example: There were so many places to see in Bali that my friend decided to
join the tours to see as much as possible. My friend stayed in Kuta on arrival. He spent the first three days swimming and surfing on Kuta beach. He visited
some tour agents and selected two tours. The first one was to Singaraja, the second was to Ubud.
On the day of the tour, he was ready. My friend and his group drove on through mountains. Singaraja is a city of about 90 thousands people. It is a
busy but quiet town. The street are lined with trees and there are many old Dutch houses. Then they returned very late in the evening to Kuta.
The second tour to Ubud was a very different tour. It was not to see the scenery but to see the art and the craft of the island. The first stop was at
Batubulan, a center of stone sculpture. There, my friend watched young boys were carving away at big blocks of stone. The next stop was Celuk, a center
for silversmiths and goldensmiths. After that he stopped a little while for lunch at Sukawati and on to mass. Mass is a tourist center.
My friend ten-day-stay ended very quickly. Besides his two tours, all his day was spent on the beach. He went sailing or surfboarding every day. He
was quite satisfied. Taken from http:www.englishdirection.com200803visiting-bali-recount-
text.html
What did the writer’s friend feel when he was in Bali? The answer : He was quite satisfied.
2.3 Recount Text
English syllabus for Junior High School Depdiknas, 2006:278 suggests that there are five written text types that the students should learn in junior high school:
procedure, descriptive, recount, narrative, and report. Yet, this research focused on recount text for the students’ achievement in learning reading because recount text is
taught to the eighth grade of Junior High School in this semester when the research was conducted.
Recount is used to retell events for the purpose of informing or entertaining. According to Goatly 2000:30, recount involves sequences of events to construct
past experiences by retelling events in an order in which they occurred. In other words, a recount text is a text which tells us about experiences which include the
sequences of events. The social function of this text is to share a story of what happened in the past. The text structure of a recount starts with an orientation. This
part tells the readers about the main idea of the story being discussed in the text. The next part is the series of events. In this part, the story starts from the early stage up to
the final stage. Finally, after all events are presented, the writer will wrap the story up with a re-orientation. In this part, the writer summarizes the story and tells hisher
impression of the experience that what has been elaborated Derewianka, 1990:15. Here is the example of a recount text.
Going to the Beach Last month my family and 1 went to the beach. We wanted to refresh our
mind and enjoyed the fresh air. We went there early in the morning by car. After parking our car, we walked along the beach barefooted. We felt the
smoothness of the sand. The cold sea water touched our feet. Then, we looked for a place to take a rest. We rolled out the mat on the
ground and had meals together. While eating, we saw many things. Many children built sand castles. Some of them played with their balls. We also saw
some people were swimming.
After having meals, I was interested in doing the same thing. I made sand castles with my sister. Meanwhile, my brother collected some sea shells.
I was so happy and really enjoyed that day. Taken from BIMA : Bimbingan Menuju Anak Cerdas, Bahasa Inggris SMP
Kelas VIII, 2006:35
Parts of the recount text above: Orientation
: Last month my family and 1 went to the beach. We wanted to refresh our mind and enjoyed the fresh air. We went there early in the morning by car.
Event 1 : After parking our car, we walked along the beach barefooted. We felt the
smoothness of the sand. The cold sea water touched our feet.
Event 2 : Then, we looked for a place to take a rest. We rolled out the mat on the
ground and had meals together. While eating, we saw many things. Many children built sand castles. Some of them played with their balls. We also saw some people
were swimming.
Event 3 : After having meals, I was interested in doing the same thing. I made sand
castles with my sister. Meanwhile, my brother collected some sea shells.
Reorientation : I was so happy and really enjoyed that day.
2.4 SQ3R Strategy Survey, question, read, recite, and review
