41
an instrument to measure the students‟ achievement and it was also as a
data collecting.
b. Action and Observation
The action and observation was conducted at class VII.3 SMPN 66 Jakarta on June 2
th
and 4
th
2010. Here, the writer observed the teacher that was implementing minimal pair drills to improve the
students‟ pronunciation. Then
, the writer also noticed the students‟ activities during teaching learning process.
1. Action
In her action to apply the minimal pair technique in regarding the impro
vement of students‟ pronunciation, the teacher does some steps. Firstly, she distributed the handouts to the students; those
included the materials, the practice, and the exercises. I n the students‟
handout, there was a cloze dialogue and the students filled the blank of the dialogue with the words or phrases in the box appropriately.
While the students worked it, the teacher gave her attention to the students; she walked around the class and
checked the students‟ behavior in doing their work. The students who
didn‟t understand about the exercises, they asked the teacher.
After the students finished their work, the teacher asked the students to write down their answers on the whiteboard while the
other students corrected their classmate ‟s answer and matched their
answers with the correct one. Furthermore, the students read aloud the dialog together by teachers‟ guidance. Then, the students read the
dialog in pair. After they finished it, the teacher introduced them the phonemic chart at a glance. This activity was involved to introduce the
students about the English sounds and to differentiate the contrastive sound between English and their native language.
42
Then, the teacher took out some words. Those words were presented in pairs. She imitated the students how to pronounce those
words correctly and accurately. The practice was done by reading it together and continued by reading per seat-line, and then, they were
instructed to pronounce it one by one. Moreover, the students were given the minimal pair exercise-
practice. They did it in pair. This exercise was assumed to check the students‟ comprehension in English sounds. Then they completed and
practiced their task. After that, the teacher concluded the topic.
2. Observation
In this observation, the observer tried to record all activities during teaching learning activity. The recorded categories were the
teachers‟ performance, students‟ feedbackresponses, and the class situation. Relate
d to the teachers‟ performance, she had done the tasks appropriate with the teaching scenario or lesson plan which had been
made. She also gave the instruction clearly, so it could be understood by the students. Besides, the students seemed active when they were
introduced minimal pair activities. Unfortunately, they still confuse when the teacher asked them to analyze the word in pair. The students
were still afraid of making mistake, it could be seen when the teacher asked them to say the word one by one. The actively students were
still dominant. Only a few students who existed for practicing and answering the teacher‟s question orally.
Nevertheless, the students sometimes denied the minimal pair practices because they faced difficulty in pronouncing some new
English vowel or consonant they found. They should work hard to practice it, so that they can‟t correct their pronunciation.
Furthermore, in the second action of cycle one the students seemed more active than before. They seemed confident to practice
the pronunciation activities. After teaching learning process finished
Kategori