Research Method Research Participants

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CHAPTER III METHODOLOGY

This chapter discusses the research methodology. It consists of six parts. They are the elaboration on the research method, the research participants, the research instrument, the data gathering techniques, the data analysis techniques, and the last is the research procedure.

A. Research Method

The method used in the study was a survey. Survey is “a procedure to gather and describe the characteristics, attitudes, opinions of the students, teachers, or any other people who are important to a study” Brown and Rodgers, 2002: 142. In the study, the writer would like to find out the mastery of the sixth semester students of the English Language Education Study Program of Sanata Dharma University on using the non-finite clauses. The writer constructed a test in order to measure the non-finite clauses mastery of the sixth semester students. Bachman 1995: 2 says that tests are commonly applied as a criterion to measure the language capabilities in second language acquisition research. In other words, they can provide information about the effectiveness of teaching and learning processes. In addition, Bachman 1995: 3 states that language teachers usually administer tests to diagnose strengths and weaknesses of the students. Based on those facts, the writer chose a test as the instrument to gather the data. 35

B. Research Participants

The target population of the research was the sixth semester students of the English Language Education Study Program of Sanata Dharma University in the academic year of 20072008. They were chosen because they had learned the non- finite clauses comprehensively in Structure V course without considering whether they passed the course or not. The main point was that the students had been exposed to the rules and the use of the non-finite clauses during the course. Investigating all the target population was not efficient since there was writer’s time limit. Therefore, the writer chose a sample from the target population to represent the entire population. In choosing the sample, the writer used cluster sampling procedure. As stated by Wiersma 1999: 292, the cluster sampling is a procedure to choose the sample which involves the random selection of clusters from the bigger population of clusters. This sampling method was chosen because of two reasons. The first was that this sampling method was easier to conduct since the writer did not need to make new clusters. The existing clusters were used instead of making new clusters. The second reason was that the sixth semester students of the English Education Study Program were assumed to share the same level of mastery in using the non-finite clauses because they had learned about the non-finite clauses in the same semester. Therefore, there would be no big differences among the achievement in each cluster. Seeing those two reasons explained above, this sampling method was believed to be appropriate for the research. The population was divided into four PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 36 classes. In this study, the writer only involved two classes out of four classes from the sixth semester students to be the sample of the research.

C. Research Instrument