situation. This interrupts the cyclical process of research and action, but is useful in bringing the research to a point of resolution, if only temporarily.
Burns 2010: 30 states that there are characteristics of action research, as follows:
1. Action research is contextual, small-scale and localized – it identifies and investigates problems within a specific situation.
2. It is evaluative and reflective as it aims to bring about change and improvement in practice.
3. It is participatory as it provides for collaborative investigation by teams of colleagues, practitioners and researchers.
4. Changes in practice are based on the collection of information or data which provides the impetus change.
Those descriptions show that this research design was suitable to use to overcome the students’ problems. I as the researcher focused my research on solving those
problems happening in grammar class using a teaching method, task-based language teaching. I also collaborated with my colleague as the observer to obtain
the objective data from her observation.
2. Procedures of Action Research
The steps of action research are illustrated by Kemmis and Mc Taggart as quoted by Burns 2010: 8, consisting of planning, action, observation, and
reflection. In the planning, some steps are used such as, identifying a problem or issue and develop a plan of action in order to bring about improvements in a
specific area of the research context. In the action step, the plan is a carefully perpustakaan.uns.ac.id
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considered one which involves some deliberate interventions into the teaching situation that the researcher put into action over an agreed period of time. The
interventions are ‘critically informed’ about the current situation and plan new and alternative ways of doing things. The observation involves the researcher in
observing systematically the effects of the action and documenting the context, actions and opinions of those involved. It is a data collection phase where the
researcher use ‘open-eyed’ and ‘open-minded’ tools to collect information about what is happening. And the last is the reflection step. At this point, the researcher
reflect on, evaluate and describe the effects of the action in order to make sense of what has happened and to understand the issue the researcher has explored more
clearly.
Figure 3.1 Cyclical AR model based on Kemmis and Mc Taggart 1988. perpustakaan.uns.ac.id
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From the description of the general procedures of action research, in the following I listed my procedures of the research conducted in grammar class.
1. First reflection Based on the pre research through pre-observation and pre-test, it was
obtained that the most class A students of the first grade of English Department Siliwangi University Tasikmalaya got difficulties in mastering English tenses in
Grammar class. They have low mastery of grammar especially tenses materials which they learn. They were difficult to differentiate nominal and verbal
sentences, use the correct form which is appropriate with its meaning and function. Based on those finding, the writer is interested in finding out the way to
improve their grammar mastery. 2. Fact finding Analysis
I conducted the pre observation to know why the students got difficulties in learning tenses. Based on the pre-observation result, it was found some reasons.
First, the students thought that grammar is one of the most difficult subjects to learn because there are a lot of rules to understand and use. And second, the
students’ motivation to study grammar needed improving. They had motivation to study grammar but sometime when they got a further explanation about some
materials, they tended to be confused and lazy to understand further. And forth, my way in teaching grammar needed improving. I tended to dominate the class so
it made the students passive during teaching learning. I also needed to improve my knowledge about teaching methodology to encourage students’ motivation
and to engage them in learning grammar. perpustakaan.uns.ac.id
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3. Planning Based on the fact findings, one of the best solutions to help the students
improve their grammar mastery is using the appropriate teaching methodologies. In this case, I used task-based language teaching to teach grammar. Before
implementing task-based in teaching grammar, I prepared some things needed in this research, such as, preparing the material, making lesson plan, and designing
the steps in doing the action, preparing list of students’ name and scoring, teaching aids, sheets for classroom observation, and test
4. Acting The problem faced by the students was poor in tenses in grammar class.
One of the main causes why the students were poor in it is they had low motivation to learn it. Therefore, I implemented Task-Based Language Teaching
in teaching grammar. Task-Based is believed can give contribution to the improvement of the students’ grammar mastery.
In this research, I implemented the activities in the classroom relates to the lesson plan I had already made divided into three steps in main activity, pre-task,
task cycle, and language focus. This research consists of two cycles. The materials covering in each cycle are English tenses consisting of Simple Present, Present
Continuous, Present Perfect, and Simple Past. 5. Observing
To measure the improvement of students’ tenses mastery in grammar class using Task-Based Language teaching, some instruments were used in this
research, such as tests, observation sheet, questionnaire, and teacher’s diary. Tests perpustakaan.uns.ac.id
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were used to measure the students’ tenses mastery. It was given to the students who were involved in the process of learning using Task-based in the end of each
cycle. The observation sheet was filled by the observer who assisted me to observe and monitor the whole part of the process of teaching learning using
Task-Based covering the students’ and teacher’s activities, the material conveyed by the teacher, the use of media during the process of teaching learning, and the
implementation of Task-Based. Meanwhile, questionnaire was spread to the students involving in the teaching learning process to know their responses about
the strengths and weaknesses of the process of teaching learning covering the implementation of Task-Based, the instructor’s capability. The last is diary. It is
written by me as the teacher to document the process of teaching learning and to enrich the data needed in this research.
6. Reflection In this stage, I and the observer studied and evaluated the data got from the
test, observation sheet, questionnaire and diary in each cycle. Those were done to know the strength and the weakness of teaching learning using Task-Based
Language Teaching to decide which indicators had improved. Next cycle would be conducted if
the result of the data analysis had not improved yet by revising the steps of teaching.
C. Technique of Collecting the Data
