Teaching and Learning English as a Foreign Language Meaning-focused Input Activities

9

CHAPTER II REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

This second chapter is divided into two parts. The first part is theoretical description that consists of some theories and definitions of related terms. The second part is theoretical framework that shows the step of conducting the research.

A. Theoretical Description

In this part, the writer will discuss some theories to support this study. These theories are teaching and learning English as a foreign language, vocabulary, vocabulary teaching and learning, vocabulary assessment, and Kemp instructional design.

1. Teaching and Learning English as a Foreign Language

Naturally, language is a mean of communication among people. In daily life, people communicate their ideas using both spoken and written language. In order to be able to communicate, people involved in the communication must share the same language. In this globalization era, people from different countries can communicate each other since they share the same language which is English. English can be PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 10 seen as second or foreign language for non-native English speakers. People considering English as a second language are those who speak other native languages as their first language but they live in a country whose native language is English Gebhard, 1996. One of these examples is an Indonesian who lives in the United Kingdom. On the other hand, people considering English as a foreign language are those who live in a country whose first language is not English, such as Italy, Saudi Arabia, and Korea Gebhard, 1996. Since the researcher intends to design a vocabulary supplementary material for the eleventh grade students in Indonesia, this study will focus on English as a foreign language. Then, the goal of students learning English as a foreign language in their school is not to be able to use English as native speaker does but to pass English entrance exams to enter good high schools or universities Gebhard, 1996.

2. Vocabulary

In this part, the writer supplies the scope of vocabulary. Vocabulary is not always a single word but multiword units, word families, and core meanings. The further discussion is provided below.

a. Multiword Units

Multiword is groups of words like absolutely fantastic, at once, in a minute, portable TV, the United States of America, etc. If students want to fluently use language and want to sound like native-speakers, they have to be able to put words together in typical combinations quickly Pawley and Syder, 1983 as cited by Nation in Nunan, 2003. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 11 To learn multiword, there are some ways that students can use including deliberately learning them as units, search for them in texts, learning the patterns of combining words and pick them incidentally. Palmer 1925 as cited by Nation in Nunan 2003 points out that for beginner learner “the most fundamental guiding principle [for] those who are anxious to be proficient in foreign conversation … is this: Memorize perfectly the largest number of common and useful word-groups”

b. Word Families

There are three ways in counting running words produced by someone. The first is counting all words he or she produces including counting words which occur more than once. For the example, English is not a language only spoken by English people anymore. From the previous sentence, there are 11 eleven words or tokens including English which occurs twice. Second, count words based on their types. For the example, go and goes are counted as different types. Third, when learners know some basic English word building patterns such as plural, past tense, present tense, stem+ing, stem+ed, possessive, they will count them as one families. Then, it is realistic to count walk, walks, walked, walking as one word family Nation in Nunan, 2003.

c. Core Meanings

Core meaning is sense someone gets from sentences which have the similar meanings. Provide many sentences which share the same sense is very important in learning foreign language because it reduces the number of words PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 12 that students have to cope with. It also provides access to wide range of uses, and often contrasts with the learners’ first language Nation in Nunan, 2003.

3. Vocabulary Teaching and Learning

Developing a rich vocabulary is not only the matter of checking words in the dictionary. On the contrary, it can be reached through experiences and from the organizing and reorganizing of these experiences. However, most people, from childhood to adult, have not developed their vocabulary in organized and systematic way. Without a plan, their vocabulary grows sporadically Dale and O’Rourke, 1971. For example, someone taking a monthly test in the Reader’s Digest is not considered as taking an organized, systematic test. The test-taker may know some words, and then may successfully guess some of the unknown words. When he or she corrects the answer, he or she cannot remember the meanings of those words for a long time unless he or she has an unusual retentive memory. It happens because the words have no meaningful relationship. Therefore, it does not lead to systematic growth in vocabulary Dale and O’Rourke, 1971. Even, Dale and O’Rourke 1971 also mention that books with such intriguing titles as Word Power, Vocabulary Made Easy, Increase Your Word Power, and Thirty Days to a More Powerful Vocabulary contain helpful hints to increase someone’s vocabulary. However, as cited by Dale and O’Rourke 1971 from Lloyd and Warfel’s volume American English in Its Cultural Setting, “the road to a big vocabulary is a long one”. Moreover, these books tend to mislead the reader that PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 13 they are lack of vocabulary and memorizing a few more words will fix everything up. Conversely, those books do not provide an organized programme for vocabulary study. In order to create an organized, systematic programme, plan is needed. Then, an effective programme usually requires teachers who are actively interested. Teacher enthusiasm can fulfill any weaknesses in the materials. A systematic programme of vocabulary development is not too excessive but conceptual. It must be suited with the school or college educational aim Dale and O’Rourke, 1971. In order to extend students’ vocabulary mastery, teachers should select the appropriate materials and develop classroom techniques and tasks. Then, the classroom techniques and tasks and vocabulary in the classroom are discussed as follows:

a. Classroom Techniques and Tasks

In this research, this section is functioned as the possible implication given to develop the classroom techniques and tasks.

1. Meaning-focused Input Activities

The “learning from meaning-focused input” strand involves learning through listening and reading. In vocabulary learning, learners have to know 98 percent of the running words for the minimum. Therefore, learners have already known 49 words out of 50 running words. At the most, there is only one word in every fifty running words that learners do not know Hu and Nation, 2000 in PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 14 Nunan 2003. That one unknown word can be learned through guessing from context without stopping the text comprehension process. In this very basic stage, learners focus on texts which density of new vocabulary is low. There are some possible classroom activities to support this strand. First, teacher can read for learners graded readers briefly. In the text, there is no difficult word. Therefore, teacher only gives quick translation or definition. Second, learners have silent extensive reading of graded text. Here, students’ autonomous to comprehend the texts and grasp other values are developed. Last, it also can be conducted through presentation-talks to each other, reading other learners’ writing and from interacting with the teacher Nation in Nunan, 2003.

2. Deliberate Learning Activities