Communicative Competence Model Theoretical Bases in Competency-Based Curriculum

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CHAPTER III METHODOLOGY

This chapter presents research method, research participants, research instruments, data gathering techniques, data analysis technique, and research procedures.

A. Research Method

This research was a survey research. According to Ary, Jacobs, and Razavieh 2002, p. 27 there are two instruments that are usually used in a survey research, those are interviews and questionnaires. A survey research often took the form of a questionnaire that was sent out to a group of people about a particular topic. It was used to measure group’s attitudes, opinions, and perceptions Wiersma, 2005, p. 169. For that reason, this research used those instruments to answer the problem formulation. According to Ary, et al. 2002, p. 28 state that there are the advantage and disadvantage of using the survey research. The advantage of using the survey research is that substantial amounts of information can be collected in a relatively short time. One disadvantage, however, is that the number of people who response to questionnaires, especially when it is mailed, is often low. A low response rate raises the question on how much the information obtained actually represents the attitudes, opinions, and characteristics of the group as a whole. In obtaining the data, the researcher used qualitative method. Qualitative method was described as approaches 27 used to gather data systematically, but the data were purely descriptive, and therefore not numerical Sprinthall, 1991, p. 100. Thus, in this research, the researcher would interpret the data in form of numbers into words.

B. Research Participants

Sprinthall et al. 1991, p. 27 reveal that the term population refers to the group of persons, things, or events that share at least one common characteristic. In this study, the population of this research was the eighth grade of SMP BPK Penabur Indramayu. There were 20 students, namely 13 males and 7 females. The participants of this research were the eighth grade students of SMP BPK Penabur Indramayu 20072008 academic year.

C. Research Instruments

There were three research instruments in this study, namely observation, interview, and questionnaire. 1. Observation The first instrument was the observation. In this study, the researcher chose to be a complete observer, that was the researcher observed the activities of the class without in any way becoming a participant in those activities Fraenkel, Jack, and Norman, 1993, p. 384. This observation had a purpose, namely to discover how the condition of the class was. 2. Interview The next instrument was the interview. Fetterman in Fraenkel et al. 1993, p. 385 stated that the purpose of interviewing people was to find out what is on their 28 thinking or how they feel about a particular thing. The researcher asked about the teacher’s perception of the text modelling and how she implemented it. The respondent was open to reply in her own expressions, and to answer either in brief or at length. Then, the responses were recorded by taking notes during the interview and with a voice recorder. 3. Questionnaire The last instrument was the questionnaire. In this study, a questionnaire was instrument of the study to gather information through the students’ written responses to a list of questions Ary et al., 1990, p. 418. There were two types of questionnaires, namely structured, or closed, and unstructured, or opened-ended questions Ary et al., 1990, p. 424. In order to gather the students’ perceptions on the use of text modelling, the researcher employed the closed questionnaire. The closed questions allowed individual to pick the response that best represented hisher belief or opinion. It meant that the students could directly choose what they want and the opinions could directly be completed. On the closed questions, the researcher provided thirteen closed questions. In the closed questions, for positive statements, the students might choose a number between 4 until 1 in a Likert scale. The Likert scale indicated their level of agreement on a range from strongly agree to strongly disagree Ary et al., 1990, p. 425. Score or number 4 is strongly agree, 3 is for agree, 2 is for disagree, and 1 is for strongly disagree.

D. Data Gathering Technique

This research was conducted when the class in progress of 20072008 academic year. The observation was conducted on February 7, 2008. Then, the