THE STUDENTS` READING COMPREHENSION DIFFICULTIES AND STRATEGIES AT ENGLISH EDUCATION DEPARTMENT OF UNIVERSITAS MUHAMMADIYAH YOGYAKARTA
The Students` Reading Comprehension Difficulties and Strategies at English
Education Department of Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta
A Skripsi
Submitted to the Faculty of Language Education as a Partial Fulfillment of
the Requirements for the Degree of Sarjana Pendidikan
Author:
Didit Nur Yulianto
20120540052
English Education Department
Faculty of Language Education
Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta
December 2016
i
Table of Contents
Cover ……………………………………………………………………………………
i
Approval Sheet…………………………………………………………………………
ii
Statement of Authenticity……………………………………………………………..
iii
Motto …………………………………………………………………………………..
iv
Acknowledgment ………………………………………………………………………
v
Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………
vi
Table of Contents …………..………………………………………………………….
vii
Chapter one Introduction …………………………………………………………….
1
Background of the Research ……………………………………………………
1
Statement and Limitation of the Problem ………………………………………
2
Research Questions …………………………………………………………….
3
Objectives of the Study …………………………………………………………
3
Significances of the Study ………………………………………………………
3
Chapter Two Literature Review ………………………………………………………
4
Reading Comprehension …………………………………………………………
4
Process of Reading Comprehension ……………………………………………..
5
Difficulties of Reading Comprehension …………………………………………
5
Metacognitive strategies in reading ……………………………………………...
7
Advantages of reading comprehension ………………………………………….
9
Review of Related Studies ………………………………………………………
10
vii
Conceptual Framework …………………………………………………………. 12
Chapter Three Research Methodology………………………………………………
14
Research Design ……………………………………………………………….
14
Setting of Research …………………………………………………………….
14
Population and Sample …………………………………………………………
14
…………………………………………………..
15
Data Analysis Method ………………………………………………….............
19
Chapter Four Results and Discussion .….………,…………………………………..
20
Result …………………………………………………………………………..
20
Discussion ……………………………………………………………………..
29
Chapter Five Conclusion and suggestion …………………………………………..
32
Conclusion …………………………………………………………………….
32
Suggestion …………………………………………………………………….
33
References ……………………………………………………………………………
34
Appendix ……………………………………………………………………………..
37
Data Gathering Techniques
viii
Abstract
The lecturers of English Education Department of Universitas Muhammadiyah
Yogyakarta (EED of UMY) require the students to read English journals or textbooks. In
fulfilling this requirement the students face difficulties in reading comprehension. The students
also use strategies in reading. This research aimed to find out the students’ difficulties and
strategies in reading. The research used quantitative method using questioner as the instrument
distributed to 64 participants. The participants were EED of UMY students batch 2014. They
were chosen based on their availability and willingness. The data gathered were analyzed using
SPSS. Related to the difficulties the students faced in reading, the result showed that the mean
average of the category of phonological processing was 2.80 followed by complex sentences
2.75, meaning of word / vocabulary 2.61, lack of concentration during reading 2.51, language
processing 2.41, inability to connect ideas in a passage 2.36, and meaning of sentences 2.11. This
means the students only ‘sometimes’ faced these category of difficulties. From seven categories,
the highest difficulty the students of EED of UMY batch 2014 faced when reading was related to
phonological processing, while the lowest difficulty was related to meaning of sentences. In
addition, the result related to the strategies used by the students showed that the mean average of
the category of predicting was 3.06 followed by monitoring / clarifying / and fix up 3.04,
visualizing 2.91, summarizing / retelling 2.88, drawing inferences 2.67, and questioning 2.47.
This means the students only ‘sometimes’ used these strategies. From the six categories of
strategies, the most strategy used by the students was predicting and the least strategy used by
the students was questioning.
Keywords: reading comprehension, difficulties in reading, reading strategies
vi
1
Chapter One
Introduction
In this chapter, the researcher discusses the background of the research, the
statement of problem, limitation of problem, research question, objective of the
research, and significances of this research.
Background of the Research
Reading is a process determined by what the reader’s brain, emotions and
beliefs have brought to the reading such as the knowledge/information, strategies for
processing text, moods, fears and joys (Weaver, 2009). Because the result of reading
is comprehension or reading comprehension, people can improve their knowledge
and get inspiration from reading. For students, reading activity can make them
understand the materials that they want to learn better. They can improve their
information and knowledge through reading.
In reading, usually students have many problems. They have difficulties to
understand the main point of the text. They do not only need time to understand the
main idea in the text, but they also have to know the purpose of reading and the
benefit of reading. Students may have reading difficulties in understanding the main
idea, vocabulary, structure, and grammar in the texts. The problems on reading will
give influence to the students’ reading comprehension in the learning process.
To overcome the difficulties when reading, students usually have their own
strategies to help them understand the main idea or purpose in the text. Students need
the strategies in reading because they have problems such as vocabulary, and
2
phonological problems. The strategies are solution for students to improve their skills
in reading. The skills of reading will improve the strategies in reading.
As a student of English Education Department of Universitas Muhammadiyah
Yogyakarta (EED of UMY), the researcher believes that many activities in English
Education Department of UMY given by the lecturers will improve students’ reading
ability. However, reading activity is not easy for the students. The students, including
the researcher, have difficulties in reading. Based on the researcher’s experience, the
difficulties in reading comprehension often deal with vocabulary and getting the main
ideas. The structure and grammar in the text books also sometimes make the students
confused.
Considering the problems in reading comprehension faced by EED of UMY
students and the strategies used by the students, the researcher would like to
investigate students difficulties in reading comprehension and strategies of students at
EED of UMY.
Statement and Limitation of the Problem
The EED of UMY lecturers require the students to read English journals or
textbooks. The students also have to get more information from other sources. When
the students read the reading materials, vocabulary, structure, and grammar often
become their problems in comprehending the reading materials. Moreover, they also
often have difficulties in getting main ideas of the text. To overcome the difficulties
some strategies are usually used by the students.
3
In this research, the researcher wanted to focus the study on the students’
difficulties in reading comprehension. In addition, the researcher wanted to know
about the students’ strategies in reading as the next concern of this research. This
current research was limited to students of English Education Department of
Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta students, Batch 2014.
Research Questions
To administer this research, based on the background, the researcher
formulates the research questions. The formulated research questions are:
1. What are the students’ difficulties in reading comprehension at EED of UMY?
2. What are the students’ strategies in reading at EED of UMY?
Objectives of the Study
Based on the formulated research question, this research has two purposes.
They are:
1. To find out the students’ difficulties in reading comprehension at EED of
UMY.
2. To find out the students’ strategies in reading at EED of UMY.
Significances of the Study
There are some significances that can be achieved from this research. The
significances are addressed to the teachers, students, and other researcher.
This research is significant for the teachers, especially for the lecturers at EED
of UMY. They will get information about the difficulties of reading comprehension
faced by the students, so they can encourage the students to use more strategies in
4
reading. More strategies can help them comprehend reading better. Moreover, this
research is significant to the students. They will know the difficulties of reading
comprehension. Therefore, it is hoped that they will have intention to improve ability
on reading comprehension. The students might find other strategies to face their
difficulties in reading through this research. In addition, other researchers can use this
research as a reference of the information about reading comprehension difficulties
and reading strategies.
5
Chapter Two
Literature Review
This chapter presents several points related to the topic of this study. Several
theories are needed to support the study. The points will explain a review on reading
comprehension, the difficulties of reading comprehension, and the strategies in
reading. The researcher also presents conceptual framework of this study in this
chapter.
Reading Comprehension
Reading comprehension is a complex process that involves many different
variables and factors (McKee, 2012). “We define reading comprehension as the
process of simultaneously extracting and constructing meaning through interaction
and involvement with written language” (Snow, 2002, p. 11). The definition shows
that many aspects have relations with reading comprehension. The students might
have significant difficulties comprehending written text (Zein, Solis, Vaughn,
McCulley, 2012). The lack of vocabulary can be the source of the problem.
According to Nosratinia, Gaurabsari, and Sarabchian (2014), vocabulary learning
strategies and autonomy significantly predict reading comprehension.
Reading, and specifically comprehension, is a complex endeavor that requires
a variety of skills (Nayton, 2013). Further, Nayton asserts that comprehension is
fundamentally the goal of both reading and listening. He mentioned that numerous
theorists have sought to explain the specific skills that are most essential to reading
comprehension.
6
Process of Reading Comprehension
According to Griffiths, Sohlberg, and Biancarosa, (2011) comprehension
proses is the result from three levels in representation of the text`s meaning. The first
level is the sentence level representation. This level is sometimes called surface level.
In this level words are literally written to make a text being read. The second level is
the proposition level of representation. In this level, the reader takes the main ideas
from the literal text. The third is the level of situation model. This is the highest
level. In this level, the readers construct their understanding of the text and integrate
and update what they already know about the topic into more complex and holistic
conceptualization of the text.
Meanwhile, according to Perfetti and Stafura (2014), the components of
comprehension involve the role of memory, the use of inferences, and the updating of
mental models. Related to the comprehension process, Kulesz (2014) asserted that
creating a coherent mental representation of the text and employment of
comprehension processes depend on limited attentional as well as working memory
resources.
Difficulties of Reading Comprehension
Reading comprehension difficulties can be identified early in students’ school
careers, and that this may be the best time to intervene (Beach & O`Connor, 2014).
Many factors that may have a role in problems related to reading comprehension,
adopting an appropriate strategy of reading practice may have some effects in
7
improving the reading activities of the students and making the practices more
appealing to the students (Erfanpour, 2013).
Nathan, Laurent, Sarah, Lee, Adam, and Nathasa, (February, 2016) said that
“Comprehension relies on mastery of decoding; children who struggle to decode find
it difficult to understand and remember what has been read. Because their efforts to
grasp individual words are so exhausting, they have no resources left for
understanding”. The following are the signs of difficulties in reading comprehension.
Confusion about the meaning of words and sentences. Some aspects can be
the sources of confusion. They are as follow:
Word. The readers might have difficulties with words that have similar
lexical forms, and they might mix between the meanings of pairs of words because
they seem to be the same (Mehjadi, 2015).
Sentences. “Many students have comprehension problems because they have
difficulty interpreting the meaning in sentences” (Boroughs, 2012, p.3
). “Sentence complexity can create comprehension problems for struggling readers”
(Scott, 2009, p.185). Many children spell to read with silent process, but after read
they do not understand the meaning of the new sentence in the reading (Supriasmoro,
2013).
Inability to connect ideas in a passage, “Personal need for structure and
reading comprehension skill may be connected to schema theory” (Munková,
Stranovská, Schuller, & Müglová, 2014, p.201).
8
Lack of concentration during reading, Students have weaknesses to pay
attention to many controls, when they approach a reading task very passively
(Boroughs, 2012).
The other difficulties that the readers have when reading text is they do not
understand new sentences when reading the text. According to Boroughs (2012, p.6),
“One reason they might have difficulty is because they are unfamiliar with the
complex sentence structures that occur in written language that do not occur in oral
language”. According to Sanahan, Mejer, Salvadore (2015) said that “Some students
might have difficulties in reading comprehension such as phonological, and/or
language processing”.
Phonological processing. Many poor readers have a specific weakness in
phonological processing even through their other processing skills (auditory and
language processing) are strong.
Language processing. Language processing includes a variety of language
abilities including reading and writing. It is a broader term than phonological
processing.
Metacognitive Strategies in Reading
Reading strategies improve reading (Karami, 2008). According to Texas
Reading Agency (2004, p.9), “A strategy is a general set of steps used to solve
problems”. In beginning reading and literacy, problems can include learning how to
decode unfamiliar words, how to read with sufficient fluency to maximize
comprehension, and how to identify main ideas in narrative texts. In reading text,
9
students usually use metacognitive strategies. Metacognitive strategies refers to the
process of considering and regulating one`s own learning (Reading with
metacognition). The strategies can be used when they face problem in reading. They
can use strategies to overcome better with the information to interact and assess
which ones for use in the most appropriate times (Garcia, Ramayan, Sepe & Silor,
2014).
According to Timothy Shanahan (2010) there are metacognitive strategies that
can help the students learn from the text. The strategies are:
Activating prior knowledge/ predicting. Students think about what they
already know and use that knowledge in conjunction with other clues to construct
meaning from what they read or to hypothesize what will happen next in the text.
Activities related to the strategy are:
Pulling out main ideas. Pull out a main idea from the text and relates the idea
to their experience. Students` predict whether a similar experience might occur in the
text.
Halfway through the story. The Students predict what will happen at the end
of the story. The students` explain how they decided on their prediction, which
encourages them to make inferences about what they are reading and to look at the
deeper meaning of words and passages.
10
Questioning. Students develop and attempt to answer questions about the
important ideas in the text while reading, using words such as where or why to
develop their questions.
A technique of practices for questioning strategies are for example, by putting
words that are used to formulate questions (e.g., where, why) on index cards. The
students` answer questions using these words.
Visualizing. Students develop a mental image of what is described in the text.
A practice for visualizing is, first, students visualize what is described in the text and
remember what they read. Second, the students examine objects placed in front of
them, and later a picture depicting a scene. The students visualize and describe what
they saw.
Monitoring, clarifying, and fix up. Students pay attention to whether they
understand what they are reading, and when they do not, they reread or use strategies
that will help them understand what they have read.
A practice for doing strategies are first, relate each strategy to a traffic sign
(e.g., stop sign—stop reading and try to restate in your own words what is
happening in the text; U-turn—reread parts of the text that do not make sense).
Reading comprehension strategies on cards with their signs, and have students work
in pairs to apply the strategies to text they do not understand.
Drawing inferences. Students generate information that is important to
constructing meaning but that is missing from, or not explicitly stated in the text.
11
Activities to make students to practice these strategies are, looking for key
words that help them understand text, and drawing inferences from such words. For
example, a passage mentions “clowns” and “acrobats” is probably taking place in a
circus. Second, students’` identify key words in a sample passage of text and learn
about the passage from those words.
Summarizing/ Retelling. Students briefly describe, orally or in writing, the
main points of what they read. The strategy to practice summarizing is, the student
describe the text in his or her own words to a partner or a teacher.
Advantages of Reading Comprehension
“Positive associations formed from being read to be able lead to an increasing
interest in books” (Crook, 2010, p.3). it was told that the system of education is not
ready for employing other strategies and in the present condition intensive reading is
more effective, because the final goal for the students` was getting a good mark and
to be prepared for university entrance exam (Erfapour, 2013). Reading also helps to
build concentration and attention skills
Reading builds vocabulary. In elementary school the students learned how
to infer the meaning of one word by reading the context of the other words in the
sentence. The students get the same benefits from reading a book. While reading
books, especially challenging ones, the students will find themself exposed to many
new words e.
Reading helps self-esteem. The key reading benefits is that the more the
students read, the more knowledgeable they become. With more knowledge comes
12
more confidence. More confidence builds self-esteem. So it’s a chain reaction. Since
the students are so well read, people look to them for answers. The student’s feelings
about themselves get better.
Reading improves creativity. Reading about the diversity of life and expose
the students to new ideas and more information helps to develop the creative side of
the brain as it imbibes innovation into reader thinking process, perhaps the best
reading benefit of all.
Review of Related Studies
There are some researches similar to the current research. Garcia, Ramayan,
Sepe and Silor (2014) studied the students’ difficulties in reading comprehension and
their metacognitive strategies in analyzing the lesson in technology and livelihood
education in the college of education. The method of the research used random
survey to 30 respondents who were identified by putting their names on the bowl and
were chosen by picking up. The Findings revealed that comprehension is very
important to the Technology Livelihood Education students (TLE students). Reading
comprehension is incredibly complex and multifaceted and TLE students used of
metacognitive strategies to be aware of their thinking processes in reading
comprehension.
The second study was conducted by Sideridis, Mouzaki, Simos, and
Protopapas (2006) who deliberated the classification of students with reading
comprehension difficulties: the roles of motivation, affect, and psychopatholgy. The
method of research used quantitative research design with 87 students as the research
13
participants. The researcher used liner discriminant analyses. The results of this study
is the students with reading comprehension difficulties could be accurately predicted
by low cognitive skills and high competiveness. The conclusion of the study is that
motivation, emotions, and psychopathology play a pivotal role in explaining the
achievement tendencies of students with reading comprehension difficulties.
The third study was conducted by Wise, Sevcik, Morris (2010) who studied
the relationship between different measures of oral reading fluency and reading
comprehension in second-grade students who evidence different oral reading fluency
difficulties. The participants were second-grade students who were recruited for
participation in different reading intervention studies. Data analyzed were from
measures of nonsense-word oral reading fluency, real-word oral reading fluency, oral
reading fluency of connected text, and reading comprehension that were collected at
the pre-intervention time point. The result of the study is correlational and path
analyses indicated that real-word oral reading fluency was the strongest predictor of
reading comprehension performance in both samples and across average and poor
reading comprehension abilities.
The fourth, Febriani (2011) carried out a study on improving reading
comprehension through reciprocal teaching technique. It was conducted through
action research. The instruments used in this research involved the English test sheet,
observation sheets, and interview guidelines. The result shows the comprehension of
the students in the text through reciprocal teaching technique has been improved, the
post test result of the study in second cycle added 30 students who had been passed
14
the KKM or 81.08% students and derived mean score is 75.57. This means learning is
generally positive.
Several previous related studies above were conducted in reading
comprehension scope that show that reading comprehension bring many difficulties.
The current research in EED of UMY also studied reading comprehension which
focused on difficulties and strategies in reading. Similar method was applied in the
current research which used quantitative design. The one with qualitative method
added the wider scope in reading comprehension.
Conceptual framework
Reading comprehension is process to understand about main idea in text
which is read by someone. Reading comprehension needs concentration to understand
idea, opinion, and theory from textbooks. This process is very important for
increasing the level of reader, because reading is one part in English language
learning. Reading comprehension needs strategies to overcome the problem.
Many people have difficulties in reading comprehension. The difficulties in
reading comprehension probably deal with confusion of the meaning of words and
sentences, inability to connect ideas in a passage, and lack of concentration during
reading. Moreover, the other difficulties in reading comprehension are complex
sentence structure, phonological, and language processing.
Strategies are solution for reader when they face difficulties in reading
activities. The readers needs some methods to solve their problem in reading. The
strategies which might comfort the reader for increasing their ability in reading are
15
activating prior knowledge/predicting, questioning, visualizing, monitoring, drawing
inferences, and summarizing/retelling. The conceptual framework is presented in the
following chart.
Table 2.1. Conceptual framework of the study
Reading comprehension
Difficulties:
1. Meaning of word /Vocabulary
(Mehjadi.W.B, 2015).
2. Meaning of Sentences (Boroughs,
2012)
3. Complex sentence structure
(Boroughs, 2012).
4. Inability to connect ideas in a passage,
(Munková, Stranovská, Schuller, &
Müglová, 2014, p.201).
5. Lack of concentration during reading.
(Nathan v, Lauren, Sarah, Lee, Adam
& Natasha s, 2014).
6. Phonological (Sanahan, Mejer, &
Salvadore, 2015).
7. Language processing (Sanahan, Mejer,
Strategies
According to Sanahan (2010):
1.
Predicting
2.
Questioning
3.
Visualizing
4.
Monitoring
5.
Drawing inferences
16
Chapter Three
Research Methodology
This chapter discusses the research design research setting, population and
sample of the research, data gathering technique, and data analysis method.
Research Design
This research was designed by using quantitative research design.
According to Creswell (2012), quantitative research is a research in which
investigators manage a survey to a sample or to the entire population of people to
describe the attitudes, opinions, behaviors, or characteristics of the population. In
this research, the researcher conducted the research using descriptive quantitative.
The researcher used quantitative research, because the researcher conducted the
research to describe the difficulties that were faced by the students and the
strategies that they used in reading as generalization.
Setting of Research
The study was carried out at EED of UMY as the setting of this research.
The researcher chooses EED of UMY as the setting because EED of UMY
requires the students to read textbooks a lot. When the students read textbooks,
they face difficulties and they use various reading strategies. Therefore, EED of
UMY is suitable for the setting of this research because this research deals with
students’ reading difficulties and strategies.
Population and Sample
The population of this research were the students of batch 2014. The
students of this batch were chosen since they had enough reading experience and
they already know their difficulties and strategies in reading. The population of
17
students of batch 2014 was 160 students. According to Saleh (2011) the minimum
number use of sample is presented in the following guideline:
Table 3.1 Number of sample
Population
Sample
UP to 100
50%
101 to 500
30% to 50%
501 - 1000
20% – 30%
Above
15% – 20 %
Source: Saleh (2011)
The population of participant was 160 students at EED of UMY batch
2014. The sample taken was 64 students or it was about 40% of the population.
So, the number of population is appropriate with the theory by Saleh (2011).
Data Gathering Techniques
In this study, the researcher used questionnaire as the instrument to collect
the data. The questionnaire was used to measure difficulties in reading
comprehension and reading strategies. The researcher adapted the questioner
by Garcia et al; (2014). Seven categories of reading difficulty were meaning of
word / vocabulary (Mehjadi, 2015), meaning of sentences (Borough, 2012),
complex sentences structure (Borough, 2012), inability to connect ideas in a
passage (Munková, Stranovská, Schuller, & Müglová, 2014, p.201).
18
, lack of concentration during reading (Nathan v, Lauren, Sarah, Lee, Adam &
Natasha s, 2014), phonological processing (Sanahan, Mejer, & Salvadore, 2015).,
and language processing (Sanahan, Mejer, & Salvadore, 2015). These categories
consisted of fifteen items. Besides that, there were six categories of strategies in
reading. They were predicting, questioning, visualizing, monitoring / clarifying /
and fix up, drawing inferences, and summarizing / retelling. These categories
consisted of fifteen items and related with theory by Sanahan et al (2010). The
categories and item numbers of difficulties and strategies in reading are shown in
Table 3.2 and 3.3.
NO
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Table 3.2 The Category of Difficulties in Reading comprehension
Categories
Item numbers
Vocabulary
QD 1, QD 2, and QD 4
Meaning of sentences
QD 15
Complex sentences of structure
QD 3
Inability to connect ideas in a passage
QD 6, QD 7 , QD 8
Lack of concentration during reading
QD 5, QD, 9, QD 10, QD 11, QD 12
Phonological processing
QD 13
Language processing
QD 14
NO
1
2
3
4
5
6
Table 3.3 . The category of Stratgies in reading
Categories
Item of difficulties
Predicting
QS 13
Questioning
QS 14
Visualizing
QS 8 and QS 1
Monitoring / clarifying / and fix up QS 2,QS 5,QS 6,QS 7,QS 9, QS 10, and QS 12
Drawing inferences
QS 3
Summarizing
QS 4, QS 11, and QS 15
The researcher distributed questionnaires to EED of UMY students batch
2014 at the classroom. Students spent ten minutes to answer thirty items
questionnaire. After students finished answering questionnaire, the researcher
took the result. The researcher used 65 questionnaires was distributed to
participant of EED of UMY students batch 2014 in three class. 64 questionnaires
was collected from participant in class of EED of UMY students batch 2014. The
19
questionnaire item and guidelines of questionnaire item are attached in Appendix
1.
Validity
Validity is the measurement to indicate the level of certain instrument
(Arikunto, 2002). “Validity is the most important characteristic to consider when
constructing or selecting a test or measurement technique” (Postlethwaite, 2005,
p.39). The instrument is called valid when the instrument measures what the
researcher wants to measure and can reveal the data of the variables. The
researcher used construct validity. According to Cohen, Manion, and Morrison
(2011, p. 188) construct validity “concerns the extent to which a particular
measure or instrument for data collection conforms to the theoretical context in
which it is located”. Expert judgment from two lecturers of EED was used to
ensure the validity of the instrument.
Reliability
General Education Development testing service (2009) mentioned that
reliability is inversely related to the amount of measurement error in test scores.
That is, the more measurement error present in test scores, the less reliable the
test. In this study, the reliability performed used Cronbach`s Alpha Formula
techniques in SPSS 22.0 for Windows.
The range of reliability criteria is presented in the following table.
Table 3.4 The Criteria of Relliability (Alpha)
No Scale of realibility
Interpretation
1 0.8 - 1.0
Good
2 0.6 - 0.799
Moderate
3 < 0.6
Not Good
20
The item reliability of Difficulties was 0.6. It means the reliability of
Difficulties was in moderate level. The result of item reliability test of Strategies
was 0.6. This means that the reliability of Strategies was in moderate level too.
Data Analysis Method
The data analysis method is a process to clarify the specific result of
research with particular technique. This is to answer the research questions. This
includes determining how to assign numeric scores to the data, assessing the types
of scores to use, selecting a statistical program, and inputting the data into a
program, and then cleaning up the database for analysis (Creswell, 2012). As this
research uses quantitative method, the researcher make the results into a writing
form that is easy to be understood and interpreted.
The researcher computed the data using electronic software for analysis
(SPSS 22 program). The researcher calculated the level of student`s difficulties in
reading comprehension and reading strategies using by the students at EED of
UMY. Moreover, the researcher used scale referenced grading to measure the
difficulties in reading comprehension and strategies that were used by students
EED of UMY batch 2014. According to Sheridan (2016) the scale scores can be
divided into several intervals. The Scale reference grading in this research is
presented in figure 4 below:
Table 4. Scale referenced grading of difficulties and strategies in reading comprehension
Scale Score
Scale Score Range
Interpretation
4
3.25 - 4.0
Always / Very High
3
2.5 - 3.24
Sometimes / High
2
1.75 - 2.4
Rarely / Medium
1
1 - 1.74
Never / Low
20
Chapter Four
Results and Discussion
This chapter describes the results of the research. As this study used
descriptive quantitative, the researcher described the results of the research
completely by using tables. The results essentially answered the research question.
This chapter also shows the researcher’s discussion on the results.
Results
The table below shows the categories of difficulties in reading comprehension
and describes the result of data analysis from categories of difficulties in reading
comprehension. The table also describes the result of data analysis from fifteen items.
The interpretation written on this table was based on scale referenced grading
presented in chapter three.
No
Categories
Phonological
1
processing
2 Complex sentences
3
Meaning of word
/vocabulary
Table 4.1 Difficulties in reading comprehension
Statement
Mean Average Interpretation
I get difficulty to read the word that I dont know the
QD 13
2.80 2.80 Sometimes
pronunciation
QD 3 I have difficulty in understanding complex sentences
2.75 2.75 Sometimes
I have difficulty in understanding word that is almost same
QD 1
2.47
as other word.
Item
QD 2 I have difficulty in understanding difficult words that I read. 2.75
QD 4
QD 5
QD 9
4 Lack of concentration QD 10
QD 11
QD 12
5 Language Processing QD 14
QD 6
Inability to connect
6
QD 7
ideas in the passage
QD 8
7 Meaning of sentences QD 15
I always forget vocabulary the words I learn.
I forget what I just read
Ihave difficulty in reading directly from computer screen
I lack of concentration when I read
I ussualy get borred when I read
I ussualy get tired when I read
I read slowly
I have difficulty in understanding main idea in the text.
I have difficulty in understanding the details when I read.
I have difficultiy to connect one idea to another idea.
I don’t understand what I read.
2.63
2.30
2.33
2.41
2.88
2.69
2.41
2.39
2.42
2.28
2.11
2.61
Sometimes
2.51
Sometimes
2.41
Rarely
2.36
Rarely
2.11
Rarely
21
The table 4.2 below shows the result of data analysis of metacognitive strategies
used by the students in reading comprehension.
Table 4.2 Strategies in reading
No Categories
Item
Statement
Mean Average Interpretation
3.06
3.06
1 Predicting
QS 13 I use previous knowledge when I read.
Sometimes
QS 2 I underline or highlight main idea what I read.
3.25
QS 5 Before I read, I decide the purpose for read.
2.64
Monitoring, QS 6 I read slowly and carefully to understand what I read. 3.08
Clarifying,
QS 7 I re-read when I lack of concentration.
3.30
2
3.04
Sometimes
and Fixing When I read, sometimes I stop and think what I
QS 9
3.13
UP
read.
QS 10 When the reading is difficult, I pay more attention.
2.83
3.13
QS 12 I re- read again, if I don’t understand.
I believe that it is easier to understand a reading
QS1 passage if we memorize some of the information in
2.75
3 Visualizing
2.91
Sometimes
it.
To remember what I read, I try to imagine or
QS 8
3.08
visualize the information what I read.
QS 4 I summarize main idea when I read.
2.78
4 Summarizing QS 11 I conclude what I read orally.
2.88
Sometimes
2.89
2.98
QS 15 I use key word to summarize what I read.
Drawing
I complete my reading with other references, when
5
QS 3
2.67
2.67
Sometimes
Inferences
I read a main idea.
I use question words (what, who, when, where,
6 Questioning QS 14
2.47
2.47
Rarely
why and how) for understanding what I read.
This table shows the categories of metacognitive strategies in reading used the
EED students of UMY batch on 2014 and describe the result of data analysis of the
mean point from categories of metacognitive strategies. Also, this table describe the
result analysis of fifteen question. Also, the interpretation was written on this table.
The result of this table is suitable with scale on chapter three.
Difficulties in reading comprehension
There are seven categories of difficulties in reading comprehension. The result
of seven categories of difficulties in reading comprehension based on the range from
22
the highest to the lowest score shown in table 4.1 are phonological processing
followed by complex sentences, meaning of word / vocabulary, lack of concentration
during reading, language processing, Inability to connect ideas in a passage, and
meaning of sentences. The result of each category of difficulties in reading
comprehension is described below.
Phonological processing
The students have difficulties in phonological processing in reading
comprehension. The data description of phonological processing category is shown
in table 4.3.
Table 4.3 phnological processing
Mean
Minimum
2.80
Maximum
1
N of Items
4
1
The item of difficulties related to phonological processing was shown by the
mean score of 2.80. This score is in the category of “sometimes” as presented in table
4, page 18. This means the students ‘sometimes’ face difficulties related to
phonological processing when they read.
Complex Sentences.
The result shows that the students have difficulties related to complex
sentences in reading comprehension. Table 4.4 shows the statistic description of
Complex sentence difficulties.
23
Table 4.4 complex sentences
Mean
2.75
Minimum
Maximum
2
N of Items
4
1
The mean of complex sentence difficulties in reading comprehension was 2.75
that was in category of “sometimes”. Therefore, the EED of UMY students batch
2014 sometimes face the complex sentences as difficulties in reading comprehension.
Meaning of word / vocabulary.
The result shows that the students have difficulties related to meaning of word
or vocabulary in reading comprehension. Table 4.5 shows the statistic description of
Meaning of word / vocabulary difficulties.
Table 4.5 Meaning of word / vocabulary
Number of
Mean
2.615
Minimum
Maximum
2.469
2.750
Items
3
The mean average of the difficulties related to meaning of word or vocabulary
was 2. 61 that was in the category of ‘sometimes’. This means that the EED of UMY
students batch 2014 ‘sometimes’ face the difficulties related to meaning of word /
vocabulary in reading comprehension.
24
Lack of concentration during reading
The result shows that students have difficulties in reading comprehension
because they lack of concentration during reading. The result can be seen in the table
below.
Mean
Table 4.6 Lack of concentration
Minimum
Maximum
N of Items
2.519
2.297
2.875
5
The mean average of lack of concentration was 2.51 that was in the category of
‘sometimes’. This means that the students ‘sometimes’ lack of concentration when
they read.
Language processing
The result in table 4.7 shows the score of language processing as difficulties
in reading comprehension.
Table 4.7 Language Processing
Mean
2.41
Minimum
1
Maximum
N of Items
4
1
The mean average of language processing was 2.41 that was in category of
“rarely”. This shows that the EED of UMY students rarely face language
processing as difficulties in reading comprehension.
25
Inability to connect ideas in a passage
The result shows the score of inability to connect ideas in a passage as
difficulties in reading comprehension. The result as seen in table below.
Table 4.8 Inability to connect ideas in passage
Mean
Minimum
2.365
Maximum
2.281
N of Items
2.422
3
The mean average of inability to connect ideas in passage was 2.36 that was in
category of “rarely”. Therefore, the students` of EED of UMY ‘rarely’ face inability
to connect ideas in passage as difficulties in reading comprehension.
Meaning of sentences.
The result shows the score of meaning of sentences as difficulties in reading
comprehension. The result can be seen in the table below.
Mean
2.11
Table 4.9 Meanng of sentences
Minimum
Maximum
N of Items
1
4
1
The mean average of meaning of sentences was 2.11 that was in the category
of “rarely”. This shows the students of EED of UMY rarely face the difficulties
related to meaning of sentences in reading comprehension.
26
Metacognitive strategies in reading comprehension
The metacognitive strategies present some reading strategies that were used
by students. There were six categories of metacognitive strategies in reading. The
result of data analysis of the categories was ordered from the highest to the lowest as
presented in table 4.2 page 18. They are predicting followed by monitoring,
clarifying, and fixing up, visualizing, summarizing, drawing inferences, and
questioning. The result of each category of metacognitive strategies is described
below.
Predicting. The Result of description of predicting as a reading strategy used
by the students is shown in table 4.10.
Mean
Table 4.10 Predicting
Minimum Maximum
3.06
2
4
N of Items
1
The mean average of predicting was 3.06 that was in category of ‘sometimes’,
so the EED of UMY students batch 2014 ‘sometimes’ use predicting as one of the
strategies in reading.
Monitoring, clarifying, and fixing up. The result of the data analysis on
metacognitive strategies such as monitoring, clarifying, and fixing up can be seen in
the table below.
27
Table 4.11 Monitoring, clarifying and fixing -up
Mean
Minimum
3.049
Maximum
2.641
N of Items
3.297
7
The mean average of monitoring, clarifying, and fixing- up was 3.04 that was
in category of ‘sometimes’, so the EED of UMY students batch 2014 ‘sometimes’
use monitoring, clarifying, and fixing-up as strategies in reading.
Visualizing. The result of data analysis on the visualizing strategy is shown in
the table below.
Table 4.11 Visualizing
Mean
2.914
Minimum
Maximum
2.750
N of Items
3.078
2
The mean average of visualizing was 2.91 that was in the category of
‘sometimes’, so the EED of UMY student ‘sometimes’ use visualizing as strategies in
reading.
Summarizing / retelling. The result of summarizing / retelling can be seen in
table below
Table 4.12 Summarizing
Mean
2.885
Minimum
2.781
Maximum
2.984
N of Items
3
28
The mean average of summarizing / retelling was 2.88 that was in the
category of ‘sometimes’. Therefore, the EED of UMY students ‘sometimes’ use
summarizing / retelling as their strategies in reading.
Drawing Inference. The result of data analysis on drawing inference is
shown in table 4.13.
Table 4.13 Drawing inferences
Mean
Minimum
2.67
Maximum
1
N of Items
4
1
The mean average of drawing inference was 2.67 that was in the category of
‘sometimes’. Therefore, the EED of UMY students ‘sometimes’ use drawing
inference as their strategies in reading.
Questioning. The result of the data analysis on using questioning as reading
strategy can be seen in table 4.14.
Mean
Table 4.14 Questioning
Minimum
Maximum
2.47
1
4
N of Items
1
The mean average of questioning was 2.47 that was in the category of
‘rarely’. It means that EED of UMY students batch 2014 ‘rarely’ use questioning as
their reading strategies.
29
Discussion
The result shows the description of the students` difficulties in reading
comprehension. The difficulties in reading comprehension were sometimes faced by
the students when they read. They were phonological processing, complex sentences,
meaning of word / vocabulary, lack of concentration during reading, language
processing, inability to connect ideas in a passage, and meaning of sentences. In
addition, the students used six metacognitive strategies when they read. They were
predicting, monitoring, clarifying, and fix up, visualizing, summarizing, drawing
inferences, and questioning.
Difficulties of reading comprehension. The data analysis shows that out of
seven difficulties in reading comprehension, the highest difficulty was related to the
category of phonology processing. The mean of phonological processing was 2.80.
This means the students sometimes face phonological processing. This result is
appropriate with Sanahan et al. (2015) who mentioned that readers have a specific
weakness in phonological processing. They might fail understanding phonetic coding.
In this research, the statement on number thirteen “I get difficulty reading the words
that I didn’t know the pronunciation” represented the students’ difficulties in reading
related to the phonological processing especially the phonetic coding.
The second highest difficulty faced by the students was related to complex
sentences. The result is appropriate with Boroughs (2012) who said that the readers
face difficulty because they are unfamiliar with complex sentence structures that
30
occur in written language that usually do not occur in oral language. This difficulty
was shown in the statement ‘I have difficulty understanding complex sentences’.
On the contrary, the students ‘rarely’ face difficulties related to the meaning
of sentences as shown by the lowest score of mean 2.11. This means that that students
rarely misunderstand the meaning of sentences when they read. The category of this
difficulty is shown in item ‘I do not understand what I read’. Therefore, Boroughs’
(2012) statement which stated that many students have comprehension problems
because they have difficulty interpreting the meaning in sentences is not highly
reflected in EED of UMY students.
Metacognitive strategies in reading comprehension. In reading, the
students apply some metacognitive strategies. The data analysis shows that from
seven difficulties in reading comprehension, the highest strategy was related to the
category of predicting. The mean of predicting was 3.06. It means the students
sometimes use predicting when they do not understand to read text. The category of
predicting is shown in item ‘I use previous knowledge when I read’. This is
appropriate with statement by Sanahan (2010). He said that the students think about
what they already know and use that knowledge in conjunction with other clues to
construct meaning from what they read or to hypothesize what will happen next n the
text.
The second highest strategy used by the students was visualizing. The result is
similar with by Sanahan (2010) who said that the students visualize what is described
in the text and remember what they read. Two items show this strategy. The first
31
statement is ‘I believe that it is easier to understand a reading passage if we
memorize some of the information in it’. The second is ‘To remember what I read, I
try to imagine or visualize the information what I read’. The mean average of two
statements was 2.91. It means the students of EED of UMY sometimes use
visualizing as their strategy when they read.
The result of data analysis showed that questioning was the lowest strategy in
reading used by the EED students of UMY batch 2014. The mean was 2.47. It means
the students rarely use questioning when they read. This strategy is represented in the
item ‘I use question words (what, who, when, where, why, and how) for
understanding what I read’. Sahanan (2010) stated that students develop and attempt
to answer questions about the important ideas in the text while reading, using words
such as “where” or “why”. However, this strategy is rarely used by the EED of UMY
students when they read.
32
Chapter Five
Conclusion and suggestion
This chapter describes the summary or conclusion of the research and suggestion to
overcome the problems in reading comprehension. The conclusion explains the result of this
research after the description of data analysis was presented in the previous chapter. The
suggestions in this study can be used to solve the problem of reading comprehension.
Conclusion
The final conclusion can be described as follows. The result on this research shows the
mean of seven categories of difficulties in reading comprehension and six categories of strategies
in reading.
The mean of categories of difficulties in reading comprehension of EED students of
UMY batch 2014 was calcu
Education Department of Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta
A Skripsi
Submitted to the Faculty of Language Education as a Partial Fulfillment of
the Requirements for the Degree of Sarjana Pendidikan
Author:
Didit Nur Yulianto
20120540052
English Education Department
Faculty of Language Education
Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta
December 2016
i
Table of Contents
Cover ……………………………………………………………………………………
i
Approval Sheet…………………………………………………………………………
ii
Statement of Authenticity……………………………………………………………..
iii
Motto …………………………………………………………………………………..
iv
Acknowledgment ………………………………………………………………………
v
Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………
vi
Table of Contents …………..………………………………………………………….
vii
Chapter one Introduction …………………………………………………………….
1
Background of the Research ……………………………………………………
1
Statement and Limitation of the Problem ………………………………………
2
Research Questions …………………………………………………………….
3
Objectives of the Study …………………………………………………………
3
Significances of the Study ………………………………………………………
3
Chapter Two Literature Review ………………………………………………………
4
Reading Comprehension …………………………………………………………
4
Process of Reading Comprehension ……………………………………………..
5
Difficulties of Reading Comprehension …………………………………………
5
Metacognitive strategies in reading ……………………………………………...
7
Advantages of reading comprehension ………………………………………….
9
Review of Related Studies ………………………………………………………
10
vii
Conceptual Framework …………………………………………………………. 12
Chapter Three Research Methodology………………………………………………
14
Research Design ……………………………………………………………….
14
Setting of Research …………………………………………………………….
14
Population and Sample …………………………………………………………
14
…………………………………………………..
15
Data Analysis Method ………………………………………………….............
19
Chapter Four Results and Discussion .….………,…………………………………..
20
Result …………………………………………………………………………..
20
Discussion ……………………………………………………………………..
29
Chapter Five Conclusion and suggestion …………………………………………..
32
Conclusion …………………………………………………………………….
32
Suggestion …………………………………………………………………….
33
References ……………………………………………………………………………
34
Appendix ……………………………………………………………………………..
37
Data Gathering Techniques
viii
Abstract
The lecturers of English Education Department of Universitas Muhammadiyah
Yogyakarta (EED of UMY) require the students to read English journals or textbooks. In
fulfilling this requirement the students face difficulties in reading comprehension. The students
also use strategies in reading. This research aimed to find out the students’ difficulties and
strategies in reading. The research used quantitative method using questioner as the instrument
distributed to 64 participants. The participants were EED of UMY students batch 2014. They
were chosen based on their availability and willingness. The data gathered were analyzed using
SPSS. Related to the difficulties the students faced in reading, the result showed that the mean
average of the category of phonological processing was 2.80 followed by complex sentences
2.75, meaning of word / vocabulary 2.61, lack of concentration during reading 2.51, language
processing 2.41, inability to connect ideas in a passage 2.36, and meaning of sentences 2.11. This
means the students only ‘sometimes’ faced these category of difficulties. From seven categories,
the highest difficulty the students of EED of UMY batch 2014 faced when reading was related to
phonological processing, while the lowest difficulty was related to meaning of sentences. In
addition, the result related to the strategies used by the students showed that the mean average of
the category of predicting was 3.06 followed by monitoring / clarifying / and fix up 3.04,
visualizing 2.91, summarizing / retelling 2.88, drawing inferences 2.67, and questioning 2.47.
This means the students only ‘sometimes’ used these strategies. From the six categories of
strategies, the most strategy used by the students was predicting and the least strategy used by
the students was questioning.
Keywords: reading comprehension, difficulties in reading, reading strategies
vi
1
Chapter One
Introduction
In this chapter, the researcher discusses the background of the research, the
statement of problem, limitation of problem, research question, objective of the
research, and significances of this research.
Background of the Research
Reading is a process determined by what the reader’s brain, emotions and
beliefs have brought to the reading such as the knowledge/information, strategies for
processing text, moods, fears and joys (Weaver, 2009). Because the result of reading
is comprehension or reading comprehension, people can improve their knowledge
and get inspiration from reading. For students, reading activity can make them
understand the materials that they want to learn better. They can improve their
information and knowledge through reading.
In reading, usually students have many problems. They have difficulties to
understand the main point of the text. They do not only need time to understand the
main idea in the text, but they also have to know the purpose of reading and the
benefit of reading. Students may have reading difficulties in understanding the main
idea, vocabulary, structure, and grammar in the texts. The problems on reading will
give influence to the students’ reading comprehension in the learning process.
To overcome the difficulties when reading, students usually have their own
strategies to help them understand the main idea or purpose in the text. Students need
the strategies in reading because they have problems such as vocabulary, and
2
phonological problems. The strategies are solution for students to improve their skills
in reading. The skills of reading will improve the strategies in reading.
As a student of English Education Department of Universitas Muhammadiyah
Yogyakarta (EED of UMY), the researcher believes that many activities in English
Education Department of UMY given by the lecturers will improve students’ reading
ability. However, reading activity is not easy for the students. The students, including
the researcher, have difficulties in reading. Based on the researcher’s experience, the
difficulties in reading comprehension often deal with vocabulary and getting the main
ideas. The structure and grammar in the text books also sometimes make the students
confused.
Considering the problems in reading comprehension faced by EED of UMY
students and the strategies used by the students, the researcher would like to
investigate students difficulties in reading comprehension and strategies of students at
EED of UMY.
Statement and Limitation of the Problem
The EED of UMY lecturers require the students to read English journals or
textbooks. The students also have to get more information from other sources. When
the students read the reading materials, vocabulary, structure, and grammar often
become their problems in comprehending the reading materials. Moreover, they also
often have difficulties in getting main ideas of the text. To overcome the difficulties
some strategies are usually used by the students.
3
In this research, the researcher wanted to focus the study on the students’
difficulties in reading comprehension. In addition, the researcher wanted to know
about the students’ strategies in reading as the next concern of this research. This
current research was limited to students of English Education Department of
Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta students, Batch 2014.
Research Questions
To administer this research, based on the background, the researcher
formulates the research questions. The formulated research questions are:
1. What are the students’ difficulties in reading comprehension at EED of UMY?
2. What are the students’ strategies in reading at EED of UMY?
Objectives of the Study
Based on the formulated research question, this research has two purposes.
They are:
1. To find out the students’ difficulties in reading comprehension at EED of
UMY.
2. To find out the students’ strategies in reading at EED of UMY.
Significances of the Study
There are some significances that can be achieved from this research. The
significances are addressed to the teachers, students, and other researcher.
This research is significant for the teachers, especially for the lecturers at EED
of UMY. They will get information about the difficulties of reading comprehension
faced by the students, so they can encourage the students to use more strategies in
4
reading. More strategies can help them comprehend reading better. Moreover, this
research is significant to the students. They will know the difficulties of reading
comprehension. Therefore, it is hoped that they will have intention to improve ability
on reading comprehension. The students might find other strategies to face their
difficulties in reading through this research. In addition, other researchers can use this
research as a reference of the information about reading comprehension difficulties
and reading strategies.
5
Chapter Two
Literature Review
This chapter presents several points related to the topic of this study. Several
theories are needed to support the study. The points will explain a review on reading
comprehension, the difficulties of reading comprehension, and the strategies in
reading. The researcher also presents conceptual framework of this study in this
chapter.
Reading Comprehension
Reading comprehension is a complex process that involves many different
variables and factors (McKee, 2012). “We define reading comprehension as the
process of simultaneously extracting and constructing meaning through interaction
and involvement with written language” (Snow, 2002, p. 11). The definition shows
that many aspects have relations with reading comprehension. The students might
have significant difficulties comprehending written text (Zein, Solis, Vaughn,
McCulley, 2012). The lack of vocabulary can be the source of the problem.
According to Nosratinia, Gaurabsari, and Sarabchian (2014), vocabulary learning
strategies and autonomy significantly predict reading comprehension.
Reading, and specifically comprehension, is a complex endeavor that requires
a variety of skills (Nayton, 2013). Further, Nayton asserts that comprehension is
fundamentally the goal of both reading and listening. He mentioned that numerous
theorists have sought to explain the specific skills that are most essential to reading
comprehension.
6
Process of Reading Comprehension
According to Griffiths, Sohlberg, and Biancarosa, (2011) comprehension
proses is the result from three levels in representation of the text`s meaning. The first
level is the sentence level representation. This level is sometimes called surface level.
In this level words are literally written to make a text being read. The second level is
the proposition level of representation. In this level, the reader takes the main ideas
from the literal text. The third is the level of situation model. This is the highest
level. In this level, the readers construct their understanding of the text and integrate
and update what they already know about the topic into more complex and holistic
conceptualization of the text.
Meanwhile, according to Perfetti and Stafura (2014), the components of
comprehension involve the role of memory, the use of inferences, and the updating of
mental models. Related to the comprehension process, Kulesz (2014) asserted that
creating a coherent mental representation of the text and employment of
comprehension processes depend on limited attentional as well as working memory
resources.
Difficulties of Reading Comprehension
Reading comprehension difficulties can be identified early in students’ school
careers, and that this may be the best time to intervene (Beach & O`Connor, 2014).
Many factors that may have a role in problems related to reading comprehension,
adopting an appropriate strategy of reading practice may have some effects in
7
improving the reading activities of the students and making the practices more
appealing to the students (Erfanpour, 2013).
Nathan, Laurent, Sarah, Lee, Adam, and Nathasa, (February, 2016) said that
“Comprehension relies on mastery of decoding; children who struggle to decode find
it difficult to understand and remember what has been read. Because their efforts to
grasp individual words are so exhausting, they have no resources left for
understanding”. The following are the signs of difficulties in reading comprehension.
Confusion about the meaning of words and sentences. Some aspects can be
the sources of confusion. They are as follow:
Word. The readers might have difficulties with words that have similar
lexical forms, and they might mix between the meanings of pairs of words because
they seem to be the same (Mehjadi, 2015).
Sentences. “Many students have comprehension problems because they have
difficulty interpreting the meaning in sentences” (Boroughs, 2012, p.3
). “Sentence complexity can create comprehension problems for struggling readers”
(Scott, 2009, p.185). Many children spell to read with silent process, but after read
they do not understand the meaning of the new sentence in the reading (Supriasmoro,
2013).
Inability to connect ideas in a passage, “Personal need for structure and
reading comprehension skill may be connected to schema theory” (Munková,
Stranovská, Schuller, & Müglová, 2014, p.201).
8
Lack of concentration during reading, Students have weaknesses to pay
attention to many controls, when they approach a reading task very passively
(Boroughs, 2012).
The other difficulties that the readers have when reading text is they do not
understand new sentences when reading the text. According to Boroughs (2012, p.6),
“One reason they might have difficulty is because they are unfamiliar with the
complex sentence structures that occur in written language that do not occur in oral
language”. According to Sanahan, Mejer, Salvadore (2015) said that “Some students
might have difficulties in reading comprehension such as phonological, and/or
language processing”.
Phonological processing. Many poor readers have a specific weakness in
phonological processing even through their other processing skills (auditory and
language processing) are strong.
Language processing. Language processing includes a variety of language
abilities including reading and writing. It is a broader term than phonological
processing.
Metacognitive Strategies in Reading
Reading strategies improve reading (Karami, 2008). According to Texas
Reading Agency (2004, p.9), “A strategy is a general set of steps used to solve
problems”. In beginning reading and literacy, problems can include learning how to
decode unfamiliar words, how to read with sufficient fluency to maximize
comprehension, and how to identify main ideas in narrative texts. In reading text,
9
students usually use metacognitive strategies. Metacognitive strategies refers to the
process of considering and regulating one`s own learning (Reading with
metacognition). The strategies can be used when they face problem in reading. They
can use strategies to overcome better with the information to interact and assess
which ones for use in the most appropriate times (Garcia, Ramayan, Sepe & Silor,
2014).
According to Timothy Shanahan (2010) there are metacognitive strategies that
can help the students learn from the text. The strategies are:
Activating prior knowledge/ predicting. Students think about what they
already know and use that knowledge in conjunction with other clues to construct
meaning from what they read or to hypothesize what will happen next in the text.
Activities related to the strategy are:
Pulling out main ideas. Pull out a main idea from the text and relates the idea
to their experience. Students` predict whether a similar experience might occur in the
text.
Halfway through the story. The Students predict what will happen at the end
of the story. The students` explain how they decided on their prediction, which
encourages them to make inferences about what they are reading and to look at the
deeper meaning of words and passages.
10
Questioning. Students develop and attempt to answer questions about the
important ideas in the text while reading, using words such as where or why to
develop their questions.
A technique of practices for questioning strategies are for example, by putting
words that are used to formulate questions (e.g., where, why) on index cards. The
students` answer questions using these words.
Visualizing. Students develop a mental image of what is described in the text.
A practice for visualizing is, first, students visualize what is described in the text and
remember what they read. Second, the students examine objects placed in front of
them, and later a picture depicting a scene. The students visualize and describe what
they saw.
Monitoring, clarifying, and fix up. Students pay attention to whether they
understand what they are reading, and when they do not, they reread or use strategies
that will help them understand what they have read.
A practice for doing strategies are first, relate each strategy to a traffic sign
(e.g., stop sign—stop reading and try to restate in your own words what is
happening in the text; U-turn—reread parts of the text that do not make sense).
Reading comprehension strategies on cards with their signs, and have students work
in pairs to apply the strategies to text they do not understand.
Drawing inferences. Students generate information that is important to
constructing meaning but that is missing from, or not explicitly stated in the text.
11
Activities to make students to practice these strategies are, looking for key
words that help them understand text, and drawing inferences from such words. For
example, a passage mentions “clowns” and “acrobats” is probably taking place in a
circus. Second, students’` identify key words in a sample passage of text and learn
about the passage from those words.
Summarizing/ Retelling. Students briefly describe, orally or in writing, the
main points of what they read. The strategy to practice summarizing is, the student
describe the text in his or her own words to a partner or a teacher.
Advantages of Reading Comprehension
“Positive associations formed from being read to be able lead to an increasing
interest in books” (Crook, 2010, p.3). it was told that the system of education is not
ready for employing other strategies and in the present condition intensive reading is
more effective, because the final goal for the students` was getting a good mark and
to be prepared for university entrance exam (Erfapour, 2013). Reading also helps to
build concentration and attention skills
Reading builds vocabulary. In elementary school the students learned how
to infer the meaning of one word by reading the context of the other words in the
sentence. The students get the same benefits from reading a book. While reading
books, especially challenging ones, the students will find themself exposed to many
new words e.
Reading helps self-esteem. The key reading benefits is that the more the
students read, the more knowledgeable they become. With more knowledge comes
12
more confidence. More confidence builds self-esteem. So it’s a chain reaction. Since
the students are so well read, people look to them for answers. The student’s feelings
about themselves get better.
Reading improves creativity. Reading about the diversity of life and expose
the students to new ideas and more information helps to develop the creative side of
the brain as it imbibes innovation into reader thinking process, perhaps the best
reading benefit of all.
Review of Related Studies
There are some researches similar to the current research. Garcia, Ramayan,
Sepe and Silor (2014) studied the students’ difficulties in reading comprehension and
their metacognitive strategies in analyzing the lesson in technology and livelihood
education in the college of education. The method of the research used random
survey to 30 respondents who were identified by putting their names on the bowl and
were chosen by picking up. The Findings revealed that comprehension is very
important to the Technology Livelihood Education students (TLE students). Reading
comprehension is incredibly complex and multifaceted and TLE students used of
metacognitive strategies to be aware of their thinking processes in reading
comprehension.
The second study was conducted by Sideridis, Mouzaki, Simos, and
Protopapas (2006) who deliberated the classification of students with reading
comprehension difficulties: the roles of motivation, affect, and psychopatholgy. The
method of research used quantitative research design with 87 students as the research
13
participants. The researcher used liner discriminant analyses. The results of this study
is the students with reading comprehension difficulties could be accurately predicted
by low cognitive skills and high competiveness. The conclusion of the study is that
motivation, emotions, and psychopathology play a pivotal role in explaining the
achievement tendencies of students with reading comprehension difficulties.
The third study was conducted by Wise, Sevcik, Morris (2010) who studied
the relationship between different measures of oral reading fluency and reading
comprehension in second-grade students who evidence different oral reading fluency
difficulties. The participants were second-grade students who were recruited for
participation in different reading intervention studies. Data analyzed were from
measures of nonsense-word oral reading fluency, real-word oral reading fluency, oral
reading fluency of connected text, and reading comprehension that were collected at
the pre-intervention time point. The result of the study is correlational and path
analyses indicated that real-word oral reading fluency was the strongest predictor of
reading comprehension performance in both samples and across average and poor
reading comprehension abilities.
The fourth, Febriani (2011) carried out a study on improving reading
comprehension through reciprocal teaching technique. It was conducted through
action research. The instruments used in this research involved the English test sheet,
observation sheets, and interview guidelines. The result shows the comprehension of
the students in the text through reciprocal teaching technique has been improved, the
post test result of the study in second cycle added 30 students who had been passed
14
the KKM or 81.08% students and derived mean score is 75.57. This means learning is
generally positive.
Several previous related studies above were conducted in reading
comprehension scope that show that reading comprehension bring many difficulties.
The current research in EED of UMY also studied reading comprehension which
focused on difficulties and strategies in reading. Similar method was applied in the
current research which used quantitative design. The one with qualitative method
added the wider scope in reading comprehension.
Conceptual framework
Reading comprehension is process to understand about main idea in text
which is read by someone. Reading comprehension needs concentration to understand
idea, opinion, and theory from textbooks. This process is very important for
increasing the level of reader, because reading is one part in English language
learning. Reading comprehension needs strategies to overcome the problem.
Many people have difficulties in reading comprehension. The difficulties in
reading comprehension probably deal with confusion of the meaning of words and
sentences, inability to connect ideas in a passage, and lack of concentration during
reading. Moreover, the other difficulties in reading comprehension are complex
sentence structure, phonological, and language processing.
Strategies are solution for reader when they face difficulties in reading
activities. The readers needs some methods to solve their problem in reading. The
strategies which might comfort the reader for increasing their ability in reading are
15
activating prior knowledge/predicting, questioning, visualizing, monitoring, drawing
inferences, and summarizing/retelling. The conceptual framework is presented in the
following chart.
Table 2.1. Conceptual framework of the study
Reading comprehension
Difficulties:
1. Meaning of word /Vocabulary
(Mehjadi.W.B, 2015).
2. Meaning of Sentences (Boroughs,
2012)
3. Complex sentence structure
(Boroughs, 2012).
4. Inability to connect ideas in a passage,
(Munková, Stranovská, Schuller, &
Müglová, 2014, p.201).
5. Lack of concentration during reading.
(Nathan v, Lauren, Sarah, Lee, Adam
& Natasha s, 2014).
6. Phonological (Sanahan, Mejer, &
Salvadore, 2015).
7. Language processing (Sanahan, Mejer,
Strategies
According to Sanahan (2010):
1.
Predicting
2.
Questioning
3.
Visualizing
4.
Monitoring
5.
Drawing inferences
16
Chapter Three
Research Methodology
This chapter discusses the research design research setting, population and
sample of the research, data gathering technique, and data analysis method.
Research Design
This research was designed by using quantitative research design.
According to Creswell (2012), quantitative research is a research in which
investigators manage a survey to a sample or to the entire population of people to
describe the attitudes, opinions, behaviors, or characteristics of the population. In
this research, the researcher conducted the research using descriptive quantitative.
The researcher used quantitative research, because the researcher conducted the
research to describe the difficulties that were faced by the students and the
strategies that they used in reading as generalization.
Setting of Research
The study was carried out at EED of UMY as the setting of this research.
The researcher chooses EED of UMY as the setting because EED of UMY
requires the students to read textbooks a lot. When the students read textbooks,
they face difficulties and they use various reading strategies. Therefore, EED of
UMY is suitable for the setting of this research because this research deals with
students’ reading difficulties and strategies.
Population and Sample
The population of this research were the students of batch 2014. The
students of this batch were chosen since they had enough reading experience and
they already know their difficulties and strategies in reading. The population of
17
students of batch 2014 was 160 students. According to Saleh (2011) the minimum
number use of sample is presented in the following guideline:
Table 3.1 Number of sample
Population
Sample
UP to 100
50%
101 to 500
30% to 50%
501 - 1000
20% – 30%
Above
15% – 20 %
Source: Saleh (2011)
The population of participant was 160 students at EED of UMY batch
2014. The sample taken was 64 students or it was about 40% of the population.
So, the number of population is appropriate with the theory by Saleh (2011).
Data Gathering Techniques
In this study, the researcher used questionnaire as the instrument to collect
the data. The questionnaire was used to measure difficulties in reading
comprehension and reading strategies. The researcher adapted the questioner
by Garcia et al; (2014). Seven categories of reading difficulty were meaning of
word / vocabulary (Mehjadi, 2015), meaning of sentences (Borough, 2012),
complex sentences structure (Borough, 2012), inability to connect ideas in a
passage (Munková, Stranovská, Schuller, & Müglová, 2014, p.201).
18
, lack of concentration during reading (Nathan v, Lauren, Sarah, Lee, Adam &
Natasha s, 2014), phonological processing (Sanahan, Mejer, & Salvadore, 2015).,
and language processing (Sanahan, Mejer, & Salvadore, 2015). These categories
consisted of fifteen items. Besides that, there were six categories of strategies in
reading. They were predicting, questioning, visualizing, monitoring / clarifying /
and fix up, drawing inferences, and summarizing / retelling. These categories
consisted of fifteen items and related with theory by Sanahan et al (2010). The
categories and item numbers of difficulties and strategies in reading are shown in
Table 3.2 and 3.3.
NO
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Table 3.2 The Category of Difficulties in Reading comprehension
Categories
Item numbers
Vocabulary
QD 1, QD 2, and QD 4
Meaning of sentences
QD 15
Complex sentences of structure
QD 3
Inability to connect ideas in a passage
QD 6, QD 7 , QD 8
Lack of concentration during reading
QD 5, QD, 9, QD 10, QD 11, QD 12
Phonological processing
QD 13
Language processing
QD 14
NO
1
2
3
4
5
6
Table 3.3 . The category of Stratgies in reading
Categories
Item of difficulties
Predicting
QS 13
Questioning
QS 14
Visualizing
QS 8 and QS 1
Monitoring / clarifying / and fix up QS 2,QS 5,QS 6,QS 7,QS 9, QS 10, and QS 12
Drawing inferences
QS 3
Summarizing
QS 4, QS 11, and QS 15
The researcher distributed questionnaires to EED of UMY students batch
2014 at the classroom. Students spent ten minutes to answer thirty items
questionnaire. After students finished answering questionnaire, the researcher
took the result. The researcher used 65 questionnaires was distributed to
participant of EED of UMY students batch 2014 in three class. 64 questionnaires
was collected from participant in class of EED of UMY students batch 2014. The
19
questionnaire item and guidelines of questionnaire item are attached in Appendix
1.
Validity
Validity is the measurement to indicate the level of certain instrument
(Arikunto, 2002). “Validity is the most important characteristic to consider when
constructing or selecting a test or measurement technique” (Postlethwaite, 2005,
p.39). The instrument is called valid when the instrument measures what the
researcher wants to measure and can reveal the data of the variables. The
researcher used construct validity. According to Cohen, Manion, and Morrison
(2011, p. 188) construct validity “concerns the extent to which a particular
measure or instrument for data collection conforms to the theoretical context in
which it is located”. Expert judgment from two lecturers of EED was used to
ensure the validity of the instrument.
Reliability
General Education Development testing service (2009) mentioned that
reliability is inversely related to the amount of measurement error in test scores.
That is, the more measurement error present in test scores, the less reliable the
test. In this study, the reliability performed used Cronbach`s Alpha Formula
techniques in SPSS 22.0 for Windows.
The range of reliability criteria is presented in the following table.
Table 3.4 The Criteria of Relliability (Alpha)
No Scale of realibility
Interpretation
1 0.8 - 1.0
Good
2 0.6 - 0.799
Moderate
3 < 0.6
Not Good
20
The item reliability of Difficulties was 0.6. It means the reliability of
Difficulties was in moderate level. The result of item reliability test of Strategies
was 0.6. This means that the reliability of Strategies was in moderate level too.
Data Analysis Method
The data analysis method is a process to clarify the specific result of
research with particular technique. This is to answer the research questions. This
includes determining how to assign numeric scores to the data, assessing the types
of scores to use, selecting a statistical program, and inputting the data into a
program, and then cleaning up the database for analysis (Creswell, 2012). As this
research uses quantitative method, the researcher make the results into a writing
form that is easy to be understood and interpreted.
The researcher computed the data using electronic software for analysis
(SPSS 22 program). The researcher calculated the level of student`s difficulties in
reading comprehension and reading strategies using by the students at EED of
UMY. Moreover, the researcher used scale referenced grading to measure the
difficulties in reading comprehension and strategies that were used by students
EED of UMY batch 2014. According to Sheridan (2016) the scale scores can be
divided into several intervals. The Scale reference grading in this research is
presented in figure 4 below:
Table 4. Scale referenced grading of difficulties and strategies in reading comprehension
Scale Score
Scale Score Range
Interpretation
4
3.25 - 4.0
Always / Very High
3
2.5 - 3.24
Sometimes / High
2
1.75 - 2.4
Rarely / Medium
1
1 - 1.74
Never / Low
20
Chapter Four
Results and Discussion
This chapter describes the results of the research. As this study used
descriptive quantitative, the researcher described the results of the research
completely by using tables. The results essentially answered the research question.
This chapter also shows the researcher’s discussion on the results.
Results
The table below shows the categories of difficulties in reading comprehension
and describes the result of data analysis from categories of difficulties in reading
comprehension. The table also describes the result of data analysis from fifteen items.
The interpretation written on this table was based on scale referenced grading
presented in chapter three.
No
Categories
Phonological
1
processing
2 Complex sentences
3
Meaning of word
/vocabulary
Table 4.1 Difficulties in reading comprehension
Statement
Mean Average Interpretation
I get difficulty to read the word that I dont know the
QD 13
2.80 2.80 Sometimes
pronunciation
QD 3 I have difficulty in understanding complex sentences
2.75 2.75 Sometimes
I have difficulty in understanding word that is almost same
QD 1
2.47
as other word.
Item
QD 2 I have difficulty in understanding difficult words that I read. 2.75
QD 4
QD 5
QD 9
4 Lack of concentration QD 10
QD 11
QD 12
5 Language Processing QD 14
QD 6
Inability to connect
6
QD 7
ideas in the passage
QD 8
7 Meaning of sentences QD 15
I always forget vocabulary the words I learn.
I forget what I just read
Ihave difficulty in reading directly from computer screen
I lack of concentration when I read
I ussualy get borred when I read
I ussualy get tired when I read
I read slowly
I have difficulty in understanding main idea in the text.
I have difficulty in understanding the details when I read.
I have difficultiy to connect one idea to another idea.
I don’t understand what I read.
2.63
2.30
2.33
2.41
2.88
2.69
2.41
2.39
2.42
2.28
2.11
2.61
Sometimes
2.51
Sometimes
2.41
Rarely
2.36
Rarely
2.11
Rarely
21
The table 4.2 below shows the result of data analysis of metacognitive strategies
used by the students in reading comprehension.
Table 4.2 Strategies in reading
No Categories
Item
Statement
Mean Average Interpretation
3.06
3.06
1 Predicting
QS 13 I use previous knowledge when I read.
Sometimes
QS 2 I underline or highlight main idea what I read.
3.25
QS 5 Before I read, I decide the purpose for read.
2.64
Monitoring, QS 6 I read slowly and carefully to understand what I read. 3.08
Clarifying,
QS 7 I re-read when I lack of concentration.
3.30
2
3.04
Sometimes
and Fixing When I read, sometimes I stop and think what I
QS 9
3.13
UP
read.
QS 10 When the reading is difficult, I pay more attention.
2.83
3.13
QS 12 I re- read again, if I don’t understand.
I believe that it is easier to understand a reading
QS1 passage if we memorize some of the information in
2.75
3 Visualizing
2.91
Sometimes
it.
To remember what I read, I try to imagine or
QS 8
3.08
visualize the information what I read.
QS 4 I summarize main idea when I read.
2.78
4 Summarizing QS 11 I conclude what I read orally.
2.88
Sometimes
2.89
2.98
QS 15 I use key word to summarize what I read.
Drawing
I complete my reading with other references, when
5
QS 3
2.67
2.67
Sometimes
Inferences
I read a main idea.
I use question words (what, who, when, where,
6 Questioning QS 14
2.47
2.47
Rarely
why and how) for understanding what I read.
This table shows the categories of metacognitive strategies in reading used the
EED students of UMY batch on 2014 and describe the result of data analysis of the
mean point from categories of metacognitive strategies. Also, this table describe the
result analysis of fifteen question. Also, the interpretation was written on this table.
The result of this table is suitable with scale on chapter three.
Difficulties in reading comprehension
There are seven categories of difficulties in reading comprehension. The result
of seven categories of difficulties in reading comprehension based on the range from
22
the highest to the lowest score shown in table 4.1 are phonological processing
followed by complex sentences, meaning of word / vocabulary, lack of concentration
during reading, language processing, Inability to connect ideas in a passage, and
meaning of sentences. The result of each category of difficulties in reading
comprehension is described below.
Phonological processing
The students have difficulties in phonological processing in reading
comprehension. The data description of phonological processing category is shown
in table 4.3.
Table 4.3 phnological processing
Mean
Minimum
2.80
Maximum
1
N of Items
4
1
The item of difficulties related to phonological processing was shown by the
mean score of 2.80. This score is in the category of “sometimes” as presented in table
4, page 18. This means the students ‘sometimes’ face difficulties related to
phonological processing when they read.
Complex Sentences.
The result shows that the students have difficulties related to complex
sentences in reading comprehension. Table 4.4 shows the statistic description of
Complex sentence difficulties.
23
Table 4.4 complex sentences
Mean
2.75
Minimum
Maximum
2
N of Items
4
1
The mean of complex sentence difficulties in reading comprehension was 2.75
that was in category of “sometimes”. Therefore, the EED of UMY students batch
2014 sometimes face the complex sentences as difficulties in reading comprehension.
Meaning of word / vocabulary.
The result shows that the students have difficulties related to meaning of word
or vocabulary in reading comprehension. Table 4.5 shows the statistic description of
Meaning of word / vocabulary difficulties.
Table 4.5 Meaning of word / vocabulary
Number of
Mean
2.615
Minimum
Maximum
2.469
2.750
Items
3
The mean average of the difficulties related to meaning of word or vocabulary
was 2. 61 that was in the category of ‘sometimes’. This means that the EED of UMY
students batch 2014 ‘sometimes’ face the difficulties related to meaning of word /
vocabulary in reading comprehension.
24
Lack of concentration during reading
The result shows that students have difficulties in reading comprehension
because they lack of concentration during reading. The result can be seen in the table
below.
Mean
Table 4.6 Lack of concentration
Minimum
Maximum
N of Items
2.519
2.297
2.875
5
The mean average of lack of concentration was 2.51 that was in the category of
‘sometimes’. This means that the students ‘sometimes’ lack of concentration when
they read.
Language processing
The result in table 4.7 shows the score of language processing as difficulties
in reading comprehension.
Table 4.7 Language Processing
Mean
2.41
Minimum
1
Maximum
N of Items
4
1
The mean average of language processing was 2.41 that was in category of
“rarely”. This shows that the EED of UMY students rarely face language
processing as difficulties in reading comprehension.
25
Inability to connect ideas in a passage
The result shows the score of inability to connect ideas in a passage as
difficulties in reading comprehension. The result as seen in table below.
Table 4.8 Inability to connect ideas in passage
Mean
Minimum
2.365
Maximum
2.281
N of Items
2.422
3
The mean average of inability to connect ideas in passage was 2.36 that was in
category of “rarely”. Therefore, the students` of EED of UMY ‘rarely’ face inability
to connect ideas in passage as difficulties in reading comprehension.
Meaning of sentences.
The result shows the score of meaning of sentences as difficulties in reading
comprehension. The result can be seen in the table below.
Mean
2.11
Table 4.9 Meanng of sentences
Minimum
Maximum
N of Items
1
4
1
The mean average of meaning of sentences was 2.11 that was in the category
of “rarely”. This shows the students of EED of UMY rarely face the difficulties
related to meaning of sentences in reading comprehension.
26
Metacognitive strategies in reading comprehension
The metacognitive strategies present some reading strategies that were used
by students. There were six categories of metacognitive strategies in reading. The
result of data analysis of the categories was ordered from the highest to the lowest as
presented in table 4.2 page 18. They are predicting followed by monitoring,
clarifying, and fixing up, visualizing, summarizing, drawing inferences, and
questioning. The result of each category of metacognitive strategies is described
below.
Predicting. The Result of description of predicting as a reading strategy used
by the students is shown in table 4.10.
Mean
Table 4.10 Predicting
Minimum Maximum
3.06
2
4
N of Items
1
The mean average of predicting was 3.06 that was in category of ‘sometimes’,
so the EED of UMY students batch 2014 ‘sometimes’ use predicting as one of the
strategies in reading.
Monitoring, clarifying, and fixing up. The result of the data analysis on
metacognitive strategies such as monitoring, clarifying, and fixing up can be seen in
the table below.
27
Table 4.11 Monitoring, clarifying and fixing -up
Mean
Minimum
3.049
Maximum
2.641
N of Items
3.297
7
The mean average of monitoring, clarifying, and fixing- up was 3.04 that was
in category of ‘sometimes’, so the EED of UMY students batch 2014 ‘sometimes’
use monitoring, clarifying, and fixing-up as strategies in reading.
Visualizing. The result of data analysis on the visualizing strategy is shown in
the table below.
Table 4.11 Visualizing
Mean
2.914
Minimum
Maximum
2.750
N of Items
3.078
2
The mean average of visualizing was 2.91 that was in the category of
‘sometimes’, so the EED of UMY student ‘sometimes’ use visualizing as strategies in
reading.
Summarizing / retelling. The result of summarizing / retelling can be seen in
table below
Table 4.12 Summarizing
Mean
2.885
Minimum
2.781
Maximum
2.984
N of Items
3
28
The mean average of summarizing / retelling was 2.88 that was in the
category of ‘sometimes’. Therefore, the EED of UMY students ‘sometimes’ use
summarizing / retelling as their strategies in reading.
Drawing Inference. The result of data analysis on drawing inference is
shown in table 4.13.
Table 4.13 Drawing inferences
Mean
Minimum
2.67
Maximum
1
N of Items
4
1
The mean average of drawing inference was 2.67 that was in the category of
‘sometimes’. Therefore, the EED of UMY students ‘sometimes’ use drawing
inference as their strategies in reading.
Questioning. The result of the data analysis on using questioning as reading
strategy can be seen in table 4.14.
Mean
Table 4.14 Questioning
Minimum
Maximum
2.47
1
4
N of Items
1
The mean average of questioning was 2.47 that was in the category of
‘rarely’. It means that EED of UMY students batch 2014 ‘rarely’ use questioning as
their reading strategies.
29
Discussion
The result shows the description of the students` difficulties in reading
comprehension. The difficulties in reading comprehension were sometimes faced by
the students when they read. They were phonological processing, complex sentences,
meaning of word / vocabulary, lack of concentration during reading, language
processing, inability to connect ideas in a passage, and meaning of sentences. In
addition, the students used six metacognitive strategies when they read. They were
predicting, monitoring, clarifying, and fix up, visualizing, summarizing, drawing
inferences, and questioning.
Difficulties of reading comprehension. The data analysis shows that out of
seven difficulties in reading comprehension, the highest difficulty was related to the
category of phonology processing. The mean of phonological processing was 2.80.
This means the students sometimes face phonological processing. This result is
appropriate with Sanahan et al. (2015) who mentioned that readers have a specific
weakness in phonological processing. They might fail understanding phonetic coding.
In this research, the statement on number thirteen “I get difficulty reading the words
that I didn’t know the pronunciation” represented the students’ difficulties in reading
related to the phonological processing especially the phonetic coding.
The second highest difficulty faced by the students was related to complex
sentences. The result is appropriate with Boroughs (2012) who said that the readers
face difficulty because they are unfamiliar with complex sentence structures that
30
occur in written language that usually do not occur in oral language. This difficulty
was shown in the statement ‘I have difficulty understanding complex sentences’.
On the contrary, the students ‘rarely’ face difficulties related to the meaning
of sentences as shown by the lowest score of mean 2.11. This means that that students
rarely misunderstand the meaning of sentences when they read. The category of this
difficulty is shown in item ‘I do not understand what I read’. Therefore, Boroughs’
(2012) statement which stated that many students have comprehension problems
because they have difficulty interpreting the meaning in sentences is not highly
reflected in EED of UMY students.
Metacognitive strategies in reading comprehension. In reading, the
students apply some metacognitive strategies. The data analysis shows that from
seven difficulties in reading comprehension, the highest strategy was related to the
category of predicting. The mean of predicting was 3.06. It means the students
sometimes use predicting when they do not understand to read text. The category of
predicting is shown in item ‘I use previous knowledge when I read’. This is
appropriate with statement by Sanahan (2010). He said that the students think about
what they already know and use that knowledge in conjunction with other clues to
construct meaning from what they read or to hypothesize what will happen next n the
text.
The second highest strategy used by the students was visualizing. The result is
similar with by Sanahan (2010) who said that the students visualize what is described
in the text and remember what they read. Two items show this strategy. The first
31
statement is ‘I believe that it is easier to understand a reading passage if we
memorize some of the information in it’. The second is ‘To remember what I read, I
try to imagine or visualize the information what I read’. The mean average of two
statements was 2.91. It means the students of EED of UMY sometimes use
visualizing as their strategy when they read.
The result of data analysis showed that questioning was the lowest strategy in
reading used by the EED students of UMY batch 2014. The mean was 2.47. It means
the students rarely use questioning when they read. This strategy is represented in the
item ‘I use question words (what, who, when, where, why, and how) for
understanding what I read’. Sahanan (2010) stated that students develop and attempt
to answer questions about the important ideas in the text while reading, using words
such as “where” or “why”. However, this strategy is rarely used by the EED of UMY
students when they read.
32
Chapter Five
Conclusion and suggestion
This chapter describes the summary or conclusion of the research and suggestion to
overcome the problems in reading comprehension. The conclusion explains the result of this
research after the description of data analysis was presented in the previous chapter. The
suggestions in this study can be used to solve the problem of reading comprehension.
Conclusion
The final conclusion can be described as follows. The result on this research shows the
mean of seven categories of difficulties in reading comprehension and six categories of strategies
in reading.
The mean of categories of difficulties in reading comprehension of EED students of
UMY batch 2014 was calcu