The relationship between students’ anxiety and their english reading comprehension: a correlational study at the eighth grade students of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat

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THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN STUDENTS’

ANXIETY AND THEIR ENGLISH READING

COMPREHENSION

(A Correlational Study at the Eighth Grade Students of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat)

By:

SITA PRADHITA N

1110014000026

THE DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH EDUCATION

THE FACULTY OF TARBIYAH AND TEACHER

S’

TRAINING

THE SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH STATE ISLAMIC

UNIVERSITY

JAKARTA


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i ABSTRACT

Sita Pradhita N, (NIM: 1110014000026), The Relationship between Students’ Anxiety and Their English Reading Comprehension (A Correlational Study at the Eighth Grade Students of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat) Skripsi, English Education Department, Faculty of Tarbiyah and Teachers’ Training Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University Jakarta, 2014.

The objective of this study is to find the empirical evidence of the

relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension. The writer used survey method employing correlational study in which attempts to investigate whether or not anxiety has significant correlation

with students’ English descriptive reading comprehension by using Pearson Product moment formula. The instruments of this study are questionnaire and test. The writer used questionnaire that is designed by Saito et al. namely Foreign Language and Reading Comprehension (FLRAS) that contain 20 items and made another 20 items questionnaire with the same indicator as FLRAS. Further, 20 items of descriptive reading test are being used in order to get students English descriptive reading comprehension. The research findings showed rxy < rtable = 0.045 < 0.312. Hence, it can be concluded that Ho is accepted and Ha is rejected. Thus, based on the result, it can be concluded that there is no significant

relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading


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Jurusan Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris, Fakultas Ilmu Tarbiyah dan Keguruan, Universitas Islam Negeri Syarif Hidayatullah, Jakarta, 2014.

Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menemukan bukti empiris adanya hubungan antara kecemasan siswa dan kemampuan mereka dalam membaca teks deskriptif bahasa Inggris. Penulis menggunakan metode survey dengan desain korelasi untuk menginvestigasi apakah kecemasan mempengaruhi kemampuan siswa dalam membaca teks deskriptif bahasa Inggris dengan menggunakan rumus Pearson Product Moment. Instrumen yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini adalah angket dan tes. Penulis menggunakan angket yang didesain oleh Saito, dkk yaitu Foreign Language and Reading Comprehension (FLRAS) yang terdiri dari 20 soal dan menambahkan 20 soal dengan indikator yang sama seperti FLRAS. Kemudian, 20 soal tes deskriptif Reading digunakan untuk mengukur tingkat kemampuan membaca siswa dalam teks deskriptif bahasa Inggris.

Hasil dari analisis data menunjukan rxy < rtable = 0.045 < 0.312. Oleh karena itu, dapat disimpulkan bahwa Ho diterima dan Ha ditolak. Berdasarkan hasil tersebut, dapat diambil kesimpulan bahwa tidak ada hubungan yang signifikan antara kecemasan siswa dan kemampuan mereka dalam membaca teks deskriptif.


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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful. All praises be to Allah, the Lord of the worlds who has given His Mercy and Blessing upon the writer in completing this Skripsi. Peace and salutation always be upon the prophet Muhammad shallallahu ‘alaihi wa sallam, his family, his relatives, and his faithful followers.

In this occasion, the writer would like to express her greatest appreciation, honour and gratitude to her beloved parents (Wakhid and Supriyatin), for their valuable supports and moral encouragement in motivating the writer to finish her study. Then, the writer thanks to her beloved younger brother (Ulil Fuad) for his love and support to the writer in writing this Skripsi.

The writer also would like to express her deepest gratitude to her advisors, Drs. Bahrul Hasibuan, M.Ed. and Drs. Syauki, M. Pd., for their advices, guidances, corrections, and suggestions in finishing this Skripsi.

Her gratitude also goes to:

1. All lecturers of the Department of English Education. They have taught and educated the writer during her study at UIN Syarif Hidayatullah Jakarta.

2. Drs. Syauki, M.Pd., the Head of the Department of English Education.

3. Zaharil Anasy, M.Hum.,the Secretary of the Department of English Education. 4. Dra. Nurlena Rifa’i, MA., Ph. D, the Dean of Faculty of Tarbiyah and Teachers`

Training.

5. Her academic advisor, Didin N. Hidayat, MA TESOL, for his advices, guidance, suggestions, and support.

6. The headmaster and the English teacher of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat, Sarmuji, S.Pd and Muawannah, S.Pd who has given the opportunity to do the research at the school.

7. Her beloved best friends, Solehah girls, Nur Pratiwi, N. Yani Saniyatul A, Ummu Salamah, Siti Afifah, Sari Febrianti, Robi’atul Adawiyah, Listianty R. Maksum,


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9. Her beloved seniors, Anisa Primadini, S. Pd. for giving her love, care, and support.

10. All of her dorm-mates at “Oot Empire” for sharing their happiness.

11. Her beloved sisters Gita Chandra W, Amd.Kom, Eka Winarni, Triana Lestari S.i.kom and Ummi Basyiroh, SE for always helping, reminding and supporting her to finish the skripsi.

12. Any other person who’s the name cannot be mentioned one by one for their contribution to the writer during finishing her Skripsi. The words are not enough to say any appreciations for their help.

May Allah bless them for all of what they have done.

Finally, the writer feels that it is really pleasure for her to receive critics and suggestions to make this Skripsi better. She also hopes that this Skripsi would be beneficial, particularly for her and for those who are interested in it.

Jakarta, December 9, 2014


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TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT... i

ACKNOWLEDGMENT... iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS... v

LIST OF TABLES ... viii

LIST OF FIGURES ... ix

LIST OF APPENDICES ... x

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION A. The Background of the Study... 1

B. The Formulation of the Problem... 3

C. The Limitation of the Problem ... 3

D. The Objectives of the Study... 3

E. The Significance of the Study ... ... 4

CHAPTER II: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK A. Anxiety ... 5

1. The Understanding of Anxiety ... 5

2. The Kinds of Anxiety …... 6

3. The Anxiety Factors and Symptoms... 7

1) Anxiety Factors ... 7

2) Anxiety Symptoms... 7

B. Reading... 9

1. The Understanding of Reading ... 9

2. The Understanding of Reading Comprehension... 10

3. The Objective of Reading... 12


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3. The Kinds of Descriptive Text………... 17

4. The Grammatical Features of a Factual Description……… 18

D. The Previous Related Study... 18

E. The Conceptual Framework……… 20

F. The Research Hypotheses... 20

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY A. The Place and Time of the Research ... 21

B. The Method of the Research ... 21

C. The Population and Sample... 21

1. The Population………... 21

2. The Sample………... 21

D. The Technique of Instrument and Data Collection ... 22

a. Questionnaire………... 22

b. Test………... 23

c. The Validity of Instrument………... 24

d. The Reliability of Instrument………... 26

E. The Technique of Data Analysis………... 27

F. The Statistical Hypotheses………... 28

CHAPTER IV: RESEARCH FINDING A. The Description of the Data ... ... 30

1. The Data of Students’ Anxiety Score and Students’ English Descriptive Reading Comprehension Score……… 30

2. The Relationship between Students’ Anxiety and Their English Descriptive Reading Comprehension Score... 31

B. The Analysis of the Data ... 32


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2. The Histogram………... 34

3. The Normality Test………... 35

4. The Correlational Result………... 37

C. The Interpretation of the Data ... 38

D. The Discussion of the Data... 38

E. The Hypotheses Test………... 40

CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION A. Conclusion ... 41

B. Suggestion ... 41

REFERENCES... 42


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Table 3.2 The Questionnaire Scoring ……… 23 Table 3.3 The Indicators of English Descriptive Reading Comprehension Test 24

Table 3.4 The Anxiety Questionnaire ………. 25 Table 3.5 The English Descriptive Reading Comprehension Test …………. 25 Table 3.6 The Reliability of Questionnaire ………. 26 Table 3.7 The Level of Correlation ... ……. 28 Table 4.1 The Summary Score of Anxiety (X) and English Descriptive Reading

Comprehension Score (Y) ……….. 31 Table 4.2 The Frequency of Anxiety Score ………. 33 Table 4.3 The Frequency of English Descriptive Reading Comprehension

Score…... 34 Table 4.4 The Normality Data of Variable X and Y ……… 35 Table 4.5 The Result of Correlation Calculation ……….. 37


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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 4.1 The Anxiety Score ……… 34 Figure 4.2 The English Descriptive Reading Comprehension Score ………… 35 Figure 4.3 The normal Q-Q Plot of Anxiety Score ……… 36 Figure 4.4 The Normal Q-Q Plot of English Descriptive Reading Comprehension


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APPENDIX 3 The Correlation Score of X and Y Variable

APPENDIX 4 The Questionnaire of students’ anxiety

APPENDIX 5 The Students’ English Descriptive Reading Comprehension Test APPENDIX 6 The Answer of Students’ Anxiety Test

APPENDIX 7 The Result of ANATES of English Descriptive Reading

Comprehension

APPENDIX 8 Surat Bimbingan Skripsi

APPENDIX 9 Surat Izin Penelitian

APPENDIX 10 Surat Keterangan Penelitian


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CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

A.

The Background of The Study

Reading is one of the most essential skills in language learning. It is in line with McDonough and Christopher Saw who state that “.... reading is the most important foreign language skill.”1 Reading becomes essential for everyone in order to increase

his or her knowledge. This idea is supported by Grabe and Stoller in John Cabansag’s

statement that “Of the fourth skill, reading can be regarded as specifically important because reading is assumed to be a central means of learning new information.”2 Thus, reading is an important subject to be learnt by the students, because it can help them to get new information in order to enhance their knowledge. Further, regarding to the importance of the reading skill, it is taught in the school as a part of English subject starting from junior high school until university level in Indonesian educational system.

However, during the writer did Praktek Profesi Keguruan Terpadu (PPKT) at SMP Islamiyah Ciputat, she observed and interviewed the students and got a fact that many students still get difficulties in learning reading skill because, reading has a very complex process in which the students (the reader) have to find information conveyed by the writer in the written form. On the other hand, while reading the students also have to guess, predict, check and ask about what they are looking for.3 Thus, many students still get low score in English reading comprehension.

1

Jo McDonough & Christopher Shaw, Materials and Methods in ELT: A Teachers’ Guide, (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1993), p. 89.

2

John N. Cabansag, Ph.D, English Language Anxiety and Reading Comprehension Performance of College Students in a State University, Journal of Arts, Science, and Commerce, IV, 2013. p. 22.

3

Francoise Grellet, Developing Reading Skill, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), p. 8.


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That English reading comprehension low score can be influenced by some factors. One of those factors is because the reading text that written in a foreign language. In addition, another factors also stated by Gardner, 1960; Lehmann, 2006 and Shams, 2008 in John N. Cabansag that motivation, attitudes, anxiety, learning achievements, aptitudes, intelligence, age personalities, etc are identified as several factors that influence students to learn a foreign language.4 Further, according to

Jingjing Cui’s statement, anxiety has been considered influencing students’ in learning new language.5 Thus, the writer would like to identify anxiety as the factor that influence students’ English reading comprehension low score.

Anxiety can be experienced when students are going to take their reading test in the classroom. Thomas J. Huberty states that in the school context, students will become anxious when they are being assessed or when they are taking a test or public performance.6 Accordingly, when students are taking a reading test, they may feel nervous or else anxious when they deal with one or several materials of the test that they do not understand completely. Moreover, they may afraid of making mistake, lack of vocabulary mastery, or fear of getting low score in reading test, etc. In addition, John J. DeBoer & Martha Dallmann state that “One cannot learn well, in reading or in anything else if he is distracted by anxieties, frustrations, and the sense

of failure.”7

Thus, it is important to know further about anxiety, its causes and its relationship with reading comprehension.

Moreover, the writer would like to investigate the relationship between

students’ anxiety and their English reading comprehension for the eighth grade students of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat. The writer would like to do the research at SMP Islamiyah Ciputat because, during the observation, the writer found out many

4

Cabansag, op.cit., p. 21.

5Jingjing Cui, Research on High School Students’ English Learning Anxiety, Journal of

Language Teaching and Research, 2, 2011, p. 875. 6

Thomas J. Huberty, Test and Performance Anxiety, Student Services, 2009, p. 12 7

John J. DeBoer & Martha Dallmann, The Teaching of Reading Revised Edition, (New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, Inc, 1964), p. 28.


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students still get low score in reading comprehension. The students’ English reading

comprehension low score are mostly below Minimum Mastery Criterion- Kriteria Ketuntasan Minimal (KKM). Whereas, the KKM for English subject at SMP Islamiyah is seventy five. The writer believes that psychological factor, in this case

anxiety, also influences the students’ understanding in reading texts. The students that

have high anxiety might have difficulties in understanding reading texts. Meanwhile, the students that have low anxiety might have better understanding in reading texts.

From the background above, the writer is interested in conducting further

research about the relationship between students’ anxiety and their English reading comprehension in this “Skripsi” under the title” “The Relationship between

Students’ Anxiety and Their English Reading Comprehension” (A Correlational

Study at the Eighth Grade Students of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat).

B. The Limitation of the Problem

Based on the background of the study, the writer limits the research only on the relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension at the Eighth grade students of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat.

C. The Formulation of the Study

Based on the limitation of problem, here is the formulation of problem that the writer wants to find out:

“Is there any significant relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension?”

D. The Objective of the Study

According to the problems, the objective of this research are to find empirical evidence of whether or not there is any significant relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension.


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E. The Significance of the Study

The result of the research can provide the information for three groups of people, as follow:

1. The writer

The result of this research is to fulfill the requirement of graduation. Moreover, it is also intended to give more understanding about the relationship

between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension at

the eighth grade students of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat. 2. The Teacher

The result of the research also expected to be useful for English teachers in order to know more about psychological factor, in this case anxiety and also to improve their students’ English reading comprehension.

3. The students

The writer hopes the result of this research can encourage the students to improve their reading comprehension skill.


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CHAPTER II

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

A.

ANXIETY

1.

The Understanding of anxiety

Spielberger in Brown defines anxiety as “the subjective feeling as tension, apprehension, nervousness, and worry associated with an arousal of the autonomic

nervous system.”1

Mish states, “Anxiety is abnormal and overwhelming sense of apprehension and fear often marked by psychological signs (as sweating, tension, and increase pulse), by doubt concerning the reality and nature of the threat, and by

self-doubt one’s capacity to cope with it.”2

Both definitions given by Spileberger and Mish have the same definition with stating tension and apprehension as the term of anxiety. However, Spileberger only states the subjective feeling of anxious person besides, Mish states a lot more about psychological factors that mostly suffered by anxious people.

Additionally, Jefrey S. Nevid et al. also state that “(anxiety) adalah suatu keadaan apprehensi atau keadaan khawatir yang mengeluhkan bahwa sesuatu yang buruk akan segera terjadi.”3 Further, I. G. Sarason (1978) in Zeidner states that

“…anxiety is a reaction to a perceived threat and incapacity to cope with the

situational challenge in a satisfactory way. An anxious person feels he or she cannot meet the demand of this call.”4 Based on those definitions, the experts mostly mention the same term of anxiety as fear or worry about something bad is going to happen. Nevertheless, Sarason defines the term anxiety more clearly rather than the

1

H. Douglas Brown, Principles of Language Learning, (New York: Pearson Education, 2007), p. 161.

2

Frederick C. Mish, Webster’s Ninth Collegiate Dictionary, (Springfield: Merriam Webster Inc. 1998), p. 93.

3

Jeffrey S. Nevid, Spencer A. Rathus & Beverly Greene, Psikologi Abnormal, (Jakarta: PT Erlangga, 2005), Edisi ke-5, p. 163.

4

Moshe Zeidner, Test Anxiety, The State of the Art, (New York: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1998), p. 17.


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term anxiety that defined by Nevid with asserting a perceived threat that made people feels anxious or afraid with something bad that is going to happen.5

Dusek (1998) in Schunk et al. defines anxiety as “an unpleasant feeling or

emotional state that has physiological and behavioral concomitants, and that is

experienced in formal testing or other evaluative situations”6

Furthermore, according to Jeanne Ellis Ormrod statement “You are a victim of anxiety: you have a feeling of uneasiness and apprehension about an event because you’re not sure what is outcome

will be.”7

There is no same word mentioned by both researcher but, their definitions are correlate one another in which Schunk states an unpleasant feeling that is experienced in formal testing or other evaluative situation. Ormrod then make it clear with stating people are concern with the result that they are still not sure.

To sum up, the writer concludes anxiety as an uncomfortable feelings towards situation that they think they cannot deal with. Anxious person will focus on thinking the negative result are going to happen rather than the positive result. Mostly people will become anxious if they are being evaluated. Likewise, anxiety can usually be noticed with some psychological signs such as sweating, trembling, or heart beating, etc.

2. The Kinds of Anxiety

Jeanne Ellis Ormrod divides the types of anxiety into two types, state anxiety and trait anxiety. She states “Such temporary feelings of anxiety are instances of state

anxiety.”8

Another definition of state anxiety defined by Thomas J. Huberty which is

“State anxiety refers to anxiety that occurs in a specific situations and usually has a clear trigger.”9 It means that state anxiety is an anxious feeling that felt by the people

only when they face a specific situation and in a short time. Otherwise, trait anxiety is

5

Nevid, loc. cit.

6

Dale H. Schunk, Paul R. Pintrich, Judith L. Meece, Motivation in Education: Theory, Research, and Applications, (New Jersey: PEARSON Merrill Prentice Hall, 2008), p. 228.

7

Jeanne Ellis Ormrod, Educational Psychology: Developing Learners, (Boston: Pearson, 2011), Seventh Edition, p. 401.

8 Ibid. 9


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defined by Ormrod as “…. a pattern of responding with anxiety even in

nonthreatening situations”10

In addition Huberty defines “Trait Anxiety refers to anxiety that is chronic and pervasive across situations and is not triggered by specific events.”11 Thus, in trait anxiety terms, it means that people will feel anxious for any situations they face.

To sum up, some experts mostly divides anxiety into two types, state and trait anxiety in which state anxiety is temporary anxious feeling depends on specific situation. Besidesو trait anxiety is an anxious feeling severed by people in every situation.

3. The Anxiety Factors and Symptoms a) Anxiety Factors

According to Jeffrey S. Nevid, some factors which can make people feel anxiety are:

1) Over self-prediction toward fear 2) Irrational faith

3) Over sensitivity toward threat 4) The sensitivity of anxiety 5) Wrong attribution body signal 6) Low self-efficacy.12

b) Anxiety Symptoms 1. Emotional Symptoms

(1) Feelings of tension (2) apprehension 2. Cognitive Symptoms

(1) Worry

(2) Thoughts about inability to cope 3. Psychological symptoms.

(1) Increased heart rate (2) Muscle tension

10Ormrod, loc. cit.

11

Huberty, loc.cit.


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(3) Other autonomic arousal symptoms. 4. Behavioral symptoms

(1) Avoidance of feared situations (2) Decreased task performance (3) Increased startle response.13

Another anxiety factors and symptoms also described by Thomas J. Huberty as follow:

Table 2.1

The Primary Characteristic of Anxiety14

Cognitive Behavioral Physiological

Concentration problems Motor restlessness Tics

Memory problems Fidgets Recurrent, localized pain

Attention problems Task avoidance Rapid heart rate

Oversensitivity Rapid speech Flushing of the skin

Difficulty solving problem Erratic behavior Perspiration

Worry Irritability Headaches

Cognitive dysfunction

- Distortion - Deficiencies

Withdrawal Muscle tension

Attributional style problems Perfectionism Sleeping problems

Lack of participation Nausea

Failure to complete task Vomiting

13

Michael W. Passer and Ronald E. Smith, Psychology: The Science of Mind and Behaviour, (New York: McGraw Hill Companies Inc. 2004), 2nd Edition, p. 513.

14


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Seeking easy task Enuresis

To sum up, there are five factors that can make people feel anxiety such as over self-prediction toward fear, irrational faith, over sensitivity toward threat, the sensitivity of anxiety, and wrong attribution body signal. Moreover, people who feel anxiety can experience emotional, cognitive, psychological and behavioral symptoms. When they are feeling anxious they may worry about something, avoid the task, rapid heart rate, feelings of tension, etc.

B. Reading

(1) The Understanding of Reading

Reading is one of the basic skills when students learning English language. In order to make sure that we know exactly what reading is, the writer writes some definitions of reading because, one simple definition will not enough to define the term of reading. Thus, here are some definitions of reading according to some experts.

John F. Savage and Jean F. Mooney define “Reading is a process of moving

through printed language to meaning.”15

Theorists actually have their own understanding what reading is. Most of them have the same perception. According to, William Grabe and Fredericka L. Stoller also state that “Reading is the ability to draw meaning from the printed page and interpret this information appropriately.”16 In addition, based on Naomi Flynn and Rhona Stainthorp describe “reading results from

ability to decode the print and to comprehend the language that is thus unlocked.”17

Based on those definitions, printed language’s word is being used by those authors to define the term of reading. However, they have different interpretation of the

15

John F. Savage and Jean F. Mooney, Teaching Reading to Children with Special Needs, (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc, 1997), p. 14.

16

William Grabe and Fredericka L. Stoller, Teaching and Researching Reading, (Harlow: Pearson Education, 2002), p. 9.

17

Naomy Flynn and Rhona Stainthorp, The Learning and Teaching of Reading and Writing, (West Sussex: Whurr Publishers, 2006), p. 42.


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remained definition of reading like Savage and Mooney give the shortest definition above with only state moving printed language to meaning. Meanwhile, Grabe & Stoller and Flynn & Stainthrop give the definition of reading more clearly in which they state interpret the information and comprehend the language based on the text they have read (printed language).

Another term of reading I. S. P Nation defines “reading skill is the skill of being able to recognize written forms and to connect them with their spoken forms and their

meanings.”18

Further, Harmer defines reading is an activity that use both eyes and brain in which the eyes will collect the idea or information and then send it to the brain then, the brain manages it.19 Both definitions do not have the same word as the term of reading. Nation emphasized on identifying reading text in order to know the meaning. Meanwhile, Harmer more emphasized on the process of comprehending the reading text.

The writer sums up, reading is a complex process which needs both the writer’s eyes and brain to get the information from the author’s message. In addition, reading is a kind of activities to understand a written language. Thus, the readers need to get the meaning not only for each words but also they need to understand the information that the author try to convey.

(2) The Understanding of Reading Comprehension

As said by John F. Savage reading comprehension is “the process of acquiring or deriving meaning and understanding from printed language; involves cognitive

functioning related to what one reads.”20

Additionally, Linse in Nunan (ed) states that

“Reading comprehension refers to reading for meaning, understanding, and

18

I. S. P Nation, Teaching ESL/EFL Reading and Writing, (New York: Routledge, 2009), p. 9. 19

Jeremy Harmer, The Practice of English Language Teaching, (New York: Longman, 1991), New Edition, p. 190.

20


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entertainment.”21

From those definitions, it clearly states that both author emphasized on meaning and understanding. Thus, in the reading process, the readers not only read the text but they need to comprehend and find out what the author tried to convey based on the text they read.

Reading Study Group in Caldwell define reading comprehension as ”the process of simultaneously extracting and constructing meaning through interaction and

involvement with written language”22

Further, Paris and Hamilton in Israel and Duffy (ed) state that “Reading comprehension is only a subset of an ill-defined larger set of knowledge that reflects the communicative interactions among the intentions of the author/speaker, the content of the text/message, the abilities and purposes of the

reader/listener, and the context/situation of the interaction.”23

From both definition, the author do not have the same word to define the term of reading comprehension. Thus, it can be concluded that while reading there is always an interaction between the reader and the text that they read in order to get the information needed.

Additionally, Dona M. Scanlon, Kimberly L. Anderson, and Joan M. Sweeney

states that “comprehension is an active, constructive process in which the ultimate understanding of the text is determined by a combination of what is stated directly in

the text and the reader’s preexisting knowledge related to the topic of the text.”24

From that definition, it can be concluded that the reader not only absorb new information with their understanding towards the text but also, the reader also needs to relate the new information with their prior knowledge.

21

David Nunan (ed.), Practical Language Teaching: Young Learners, (New York: McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2006), p. 71.

22

Joanne Schudt Caldwell, Comprehension Assessment: A Classroom Guide, (New York: The Guilford Press, 2008), p. 4.

23

Susan E. Israel and Gerald G. Duffy (eds.), Handbook of Research on Reading Comprehension, (New York: Routledge, 2009), p. 32.

24

Dona M. Scanlon, Kimberly L. Anderson, and Joan M. Sweeney, Early Intervention for Reading Difficulties, ( New York: The Gulford Press, 2010) p. 276.


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Based on the definition above the writer concludes that reading comprehension is an active interaction from the reader in comprehending the author message in the written form. In addition, while reading, the reader not only absorbs new information but, the reader also needs to combine it with their prior knowledge.

(3) The Objective of Reading

When students read, they tend to have their own purpose. The following are some

purposes that mentioned in William Grabe and Fredericka L. Stoller’s book:

1) Reading to search for simple information 2) Reading to skim quickly

3) Reading to learn from text 4) Reading to integrate information

5) Reading to write (or search for information needed for writing) 6) Reading to critique texts

7) Reading for general comprehension.25

According to William in McDonough and Shaw, the purpose of reading are classified into:

a) Getting general information from the text b) Getting specific information from the text; and c) For pleasure or for interest.26

In addition Rivers and Temperley (1978: 187) list the following examples of some of the reasons that L2 students may need or want to read:27

a) to obtain information for some purpose or because we are curious about some topic

b) to obtain instructions on how to perform some task for our work or daily life c) to keep in touch with friends by correspondence or to understand business

letters

d) to know when or where something will take place or what is available

e) to know what is happening or has happened (as reported in newspapers, magazines, reports)

f) for enjoyment or excitement

25

Grabe and Stoller, op. cit., p. 13. 26

Jo McDonough and Christopher Shaw, Materials and Methods in ELT: A Teachers’ Guide, (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1993), p. 102.

27Ibid


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The different objective of reading is also stated by Harmer. He divided it into some areas. Here are some objectives of reading:

(a) Predictive Skills

The readers predict what they are going to read. The process of understanding the text is the process of seeing how the content of the text matches up to the prediction.

(b) Extracting Specific Information

Very often we read something because we want to extract specific bits of information to find out a fact.

(c) Getting the General Picture

We often read to things because we want to „get general picture’. We want to

have an idea of the main points of the text –an overview- without being too concerned with the details.

(d) Extracting Detail Information

A reader often has to be able to access text for detail information. (e) Recognising Function and Discourse Patterns

Recognising such discourse markers is an important part of understanding how a text is constructed. We understand paragraph structure and paragraph organisation and we recognise device for cohesion.

(f) Deducing Meaning from Context

Deduce the meaning of unfamiliar words from the context in which they appear.28

Overall, the readers may have their own purpose in reading whether for gain new information or enjoyment. Reading with specific purpose will help the readers to focus only on the relevant parts of a text that they needed. Thus, appropriate technique should they choose before they begin to read.

Francoise Grellet mentioned four techniques of reading, there are skimming, scanning extensive reading, and intensive reading.29

28

Harmer, op. Cit., pp. 183-184. 29

Francoise Grellet, Developing Reading Skill, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), p. 4.


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a) Skimming

Skimming serves as a substitute for careful reading. When you are skimming, be sure to move rapidly through the material, skipping the information you already familiar with. The purpose of skimming is to gain a quick overview in order to identify the main points.30

b) Scanning

Scanning is the process of quickly searching material in order locates the specific bits of information. When scanning, the reader doesn’t start at the beginning and read through to end. Instead, the reader only jumps around in the text trying to find and locate specific information need.31

c) Extensive Reading

“Extensive reading refers to reading which students do often (but not exclusively) away from the classroom. They may read novels, web pages, newspapers, magazines or any other reference material and it involve reading for pleasure. This is enhanced if students have a chance to choose what they want to read.”32 In addition, Carrell and Carson in Richard and Willy’s book state that

“extensive reading… generally involves rapid reading of large quantities of material or longer readings (e.g., whole books) for general understanding, with

the focus generally on the meaning what is being read than on the language.”33

30

Peter Mather and Rita McCarthy, Reading and All that Jazz, (Boston: Mc Graw Hill, 2007), pp. 486-487.

31Ibid.

, p. 480. 32

Jeremy Harmer, How to Teach English, (Oxford: Pearson Education Limited, 2007),New Edition, p. 99.

33

Jack C. Richard and Willy A. Renandya, Methodology in Language Teaching, (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002), p. 295.


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15

d) Intensive Reading

Intensive reading refers to “detailed focus on the construction of reading texts which take place usually (but not always) in classroom. Teacher may ask students to look extracts from magazine, poems, internet websites, novel, plays, and wide range of other text genres.”34 Further, Richard and Willy state that “In intensive reading, students normally work with short text with close guidance by the teacher. The aim of intensive reading is to help students obtain detailed meaning from the texts, to develop reading skills- such as identifying main ideas and recognizing text connectors- and to enhance vocabulary and grammar

knowledge.”35

(4) The Reading Comprehension Influence Factors

There are some factors that can influence students’ reading comprehension. Larry

A. Harris and Carl B. Smith mention some factors that has been identified as the primary determinants of reading comprehension, they are: background experience, language abilities, thinking abilities, affection (interests and motivation, attitudes and beliefs, and feelings), and reading purposes.36

Further, DeBoer and Dallmann state some causes that makes students get difficulties in comprehending reading text, those are:

1. Limited Intelligence

2. Undesirable Physical Factors

3. Overemphasis On Word Recognition 4. Overemphasis On Oral Reading

5. Insufficient Background for Reading A Selection

6. Failure to adjust reading technique to reading purpose and type of reading material.

34

Harmer, op. cit., 2007, pp. 99-100. 35

Richard, op. cit., p. 296. 36

Larry A. Harris and Carl B. Smith, Reading Instruction, Diagnostic Teaching in the Classroom, (New York: Richard C. Owen Publishers, Inc, 1980), p. 207.


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7. Lack of appropriate teacher guidance.37

The writer sums up that the students or the reader will get difficulties in comprehending reading text if they do not have background knowledge, poor vocabulary mastery, or curiosity to read a text, etc.

(5) The Types of Reading Text

When the students read a text, they may not know what kind of text they read. Thus, the information of the types of reading need to be introduced to the students to facilitate them in understanding the function of the text they read. There are many types of reading text in English.

According to Anderson and Anderson, text has two categories, those are literary and factual:

1. Literary text are narratives, poems and dramas. These text types are used to tell us about human experiences, usually in an imaginative way. The purpose is to make readers and listeners think, laugh, cry or be entertained.

2. Factual types present information or ideas. The purpose of these text is to inform, instruct, educate, or persuade the listener or reader. The main factual text types are:

 Explanation  Information report  Discussion

 Exposition  Recount

 Factual description  Procedure

 Procedural recount.38

From some types that mentioned above, the second grade of junior high school students learn the three types of text, descriptive, narrative and recount text. However, the writer will only focuses on explaining descriptive text.

37

John J. DeBoer & Martha Dallmann, The Teaching Reading, (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc, 1960), pp. 132-134.

38


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17

C. Descriptive Text

(1) The Understanding of Descriptive Text

Descriptive text is a part of factual genres. As Anderson and Anderson define description as “A particular person, place or thing. Its purpose to tell about the subject by describing its features including personal opinions. A factual description differs from an information report because describes a specific subject rather than a general group.”39

It means that descriptive text is factual genres in which describes about a specific subject and usually tells about its characteristics. Further, Withson and Burks define

“Description also gives sense impressions such as the feel, sound, taste, smell, and

look of things. Emotion (feelings) may be described too, like happiness, fear, loneliness, gloom, joy, comfort, etc then, description helps the reader through his/her imagination to visualize a scene or a person, or to understand a sensation or an

emotion.”40It means that descriptive text is used to describe someone’s feeling which

is written to make another people know how it feels.

(2) The Objective of Descriptive Text

Barbara Fine Clouse divides the objective of description into six, they are: a. To entertain

b. To express feelings c. To relate experience

d. To inform (for a reader unfamiliar with the subject) e. To inform (to create a fresh appreciation for the familiar)

f. To persuade (to convince the reader that some music degrade women).41

(3) The Kinds of Descriptive Text

According to Anderson and Anderson factual description includes:

39

Anderson and Anderson, op. cit., p. 26. 40

George E. Wishon and Julia M. Burks, Let’s Write English, (Canada: Atlantis Publisher, 1980), p. 128.

41


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 Descriptions of particular building  Description of specific animal  Descriptions of a particular place  Descriptions of a specific person.42

(4) The Grammatical Features of a Factual Descriptive

Factual descriptions usually include the following grammatical features:  Verbs in the present tense

 Adjectives to describe the features of the subject

 Topic sentences to begin paragraphs and organise the various aspects of the description.43

D. The Previous Related Study

The research about students’ anxiety and their reading comprehension was done

by Noneng Suryati, Farid Ghaemi & Naeemah Kharaghani, and Yu-Hsiu Liu & Keiko K. Samimy.

Noneng Suryati, in her skripsi “the correlation between students’ anxiety and their achievement in reading comprehension (A correlational study at the eighth grade

of SMP PGRI Ciputat) aims to describe the correlation between students’ anxiety and

their achievement in Reading Comprehension at the first semester of academic year 2010 at SMP PGRI 1 Ciputat. She conducted a correlational research by using quantitative descriptive. The technique of collecting data are questionnaire and reading comprehension test to the 40 students. The finding of this study is there is no significance relationship between students’ anxiety and their achievement in Reading

Comprehension. It means that either low or high the score of students’ anxiety does not effect on students’ achievement in Reading Comprehension.44

42

Anderson and Anderson, loc. Cit.

43

Ibid. 44

Noneng Suryati, The Correlation between Students’ Anxiety and Their Achievement in

Reading Comprehension, (Skripsi SI Fakultas Ilmu Tarbiyah dan Keguruan Universitas Islam Negeri Jakarta, 2009), Unpublished.


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19

Secondly, the research that had done by Farid Ghaemi and Naeemeh Kharaghani with the title is A Case Study of a Foreign Language Learner with Severe Learning Problem: The Role of Anxiety. The purpose of the study is to investigate some learning problems that a foreign language learner usually deal with. They conducted qualitative study in this research. The participant in this study was an elementary level EFL English learner, he was 27 years old. The instrument that they used were questionnaire that adapted by some experts. The first questionnaire was adapted from Ehram (1996, p.307), this questionnaire was used in order to find out about the biographic of the participant. The second instrument was Horwitz questionnaire. Horwitz questionnaire is used to take the data of foreign language classroom anxiety. The questionnaire was a likert type scale with five possible responses ranging from

“strongly disagree” to “strongly agree”. Another questionnaire was adapted from

Ehram also, but it is intended to take the data about motivation and strategies questionnaire. This questionnaire was a five point Likert scale ranges from: not at all, not very much, a fair moment, a lot and really nervous about it. The result shows that he was anxious in English Language Classrooms.45

Third, the related research that the writer choose is from Yu-Hsiu Liu and Keiko K. Samimy. The research is about Survey on Anxiety in Reading Chinese-English Syntactic Differences: A Case of English Reading Anxiety in Taiwanese University Students. The study is aimed to investigate the potential role of Chinese-English syntactic differences in English reading anxiety. They conducted qualitative research with the participants are 189 Taiwanese university students. They adapted foreign language reading anxiety scale from Saito, Horwitz and Garza, 1999. In addition, the survey of anxiety in reading Chinese-English syntactic differences used self-designed measure. The research result of this study shows that Chinese-English syntactic

45

Farid Ghaemi and Naeemeh Kharaghani, A Case Study of a Foreign Language Learner with Severe Learning Problem: The Role of Anxiety, Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 1, 2011.


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differences in the passive and relative constructions were a significant factor attributing to the participant English reading anxiety.46

E. The Conceptual Framework

Reading is one of the subjects that needed to be learned by the students in Indonesia. But, some students still get difficulty to understand the reading text. One of the problems that may influence students understanding towards reading material is the difficulty of reading material itself since it is mostly written in English (foreign language). In addition, another factor that may influence students comprehension is psychological condition, in this case is anxiety. The students who is troubled with anxiety may feel incapable to achieve a good result on the test or the task that the teacher gave. Thus, in a process of achieving a good result, the students would feel difficult to concentrate, to remember ideas and to learn something new. Consequently, those negative feelings will influence their comprehension towards what they read. Hence, the writer intends to investigate whether students with high anxiety will get low score in English reading comprehension, meanwhile the students with low anxiety will get a high score in English reading comprehension. To know

the students’ anxiety, it should be gives the students a questionnaire. The

questionnaire is to prove the relationship between students’ anxiety and their English reading comprehension.

F. The Research Hypotheses

The hypotheses of this research is formulated as follow:

Ho : The higher students’ anxiety does not guarantee the lower students’ English

descriptive reading comprehension.

Ha : The higher students’ anxiety, the lower students’ English descriptive reading

comprehension.

46

Yu-Hsiu Liu and Keiko K. Samimy, Survey on Anxiety in Reading Chinese-English Syntactic Differences: A Case of English Reading Anxiety in Taiwanese University Students, Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 2, 2012.


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21

CHAPTER III

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

A. The Place and Time of the Research

The writer conducted the research at SMP Islamiyah Ciputat which is located at Jl. KH. Dewantara No. 23 Ciputat 15411 Tangerang Selatan. The research was held form October 31th to November 7th, 2014.

B. The Method of the Research

The method of this research is survey employing correlational study. The correlational research design was chosen to find out whether or not the relationship exist between two variables of the research. The independent variable of the research is students’ anxiety as X variable and the dependent variable is English reading comprehension score as Y variable.

C. The Population and Sample 1. The population

The population of this research is the eighth grade students of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat in the academic year 2014/2015. There are 255 students who are divided into six classes.

2. The Sample

In taking sample, the writer used random cluster sampling because it is more practical to use in a large number of populations. Based on the cluster that is used by the writer in taking the sample, she randomly took 8.1 class which has 40 students in it.


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D. The Technique of Instrument and Data Collection

To collect the data, the writer use two instruments. They were questionnaire for assessing students’ anxiety level and descriptive reading comprehension test to measure students’ reading comprehension.

a. Questionnaire

The writer adapted anxiety questionnaire that designed by Saito et al. (1999) namely Foreign Language and Reading Anxiety Scale (FLRAS) that contain 20 items and made another 20 items questionnaire with the same indicator as FLRAS in order to avoid invalid and unreliable data. Here the indicators of Foreign Language Reading Anxiety Scale (FLRAS):

Table 3.1

The FLRAS Questionnaire

No. Indicator Total Key Number

1. Students’ self-report of anxiety over various aspects of reading

14 1, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 10, 11, 17, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25

2. Their perception of reading difficulties in the target language

13 2, 6, 9, 12, 13, 14, 18, 19, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30

3. Their perception of the relative difficulty of reading as compared to the difficulty of other language skills.

13 15, 16, 20, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40


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23

The questionnaire in this study is a Likert Type questionnaire which provided the students with five responses option Strongly agree (Sangat Setuju, SS), Agree (Setuju, S), Neutral (Netral, N), Disagree, (Tidak Setuju, TS), Strongly Disagree (Sangat Tidak Setuju, STS). The degree of scale is described as follow:

Table 3.2

The Questionnaire scoring

Scale Affirmative Statement

Score

Negative Statement Score

Strongly Agree 5 1

Agree 4 2

Neutral 3 3

Disagree 2 4

Strongly Disagree 1 5

The questionnaire will be translated into Bahasa Indonesia. This is aimed to avoid the possibility of different perception in understanding the statement. Therefore, using bahasa Indonesia in the statement will be useful for students to understand and answer the question.

b. Test

The test instrument played an important role in collecting the data. In this research, the writer administered test to the students to know about student English descriptive reading comprehension score. The writer will use multiple choice types in order to make it more objective to score. The reading material and its question were selected from students’ book and other sources which was suitable with their level. Here the indicators of descriptive reading comprehension test.


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Table 3.3

The Indicators of English Descriptive Reading Comprehension Test

No. Indicator Key Number

1. Determining the main idea of the text 1, 8, 37 2. Identifying the specific information based on

the text

4, 5, 11, 12, 13, 16, 19, 20, 22, 23, 26, 29, 30, 32, 33, 34,

3. Identifying the detail information based on

the text

2, 3, 6, 9, 17, 18, 21, 24, 27, 28, 31, 35

4. Identifying Implicitly stated information

based on the text

10, 14, 15, 25, 36, 38, 39, 40

5. Determining the purpose of the text. 7

Total 40

c. The Validity of Instrument

Validation of instrument is conducted to see whether the instrument is capable to collect the data or not. The writer got the standard coefficient validity minimum for this instrument with N=35 and coefficient validity is 0.334. To see the validity of instrument, the writer use SPSS 20 to measure the validity of questionnaire and Anates application to measure the validity of test. In validating questionnaire and test, the writer conducted the research in VIII-5 class of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat.

In questionnaire validity, the writer got 23 items from 40 items. The number of valid item are 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 9, 13, 14, 15, 16, 19, 20, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 30, 31, 33, 36, 39. The number of invalid study are 5, 6, 8, 10, 11, 12, 17, 18, 21, 26, 29, 32, 34, 35, 37, 38, and 40. The items that the writer used only 20 items which can be seen as below.


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25

Table 3.4

The Anxiety Questionnaire

Indicator Key Number

Students’ self-report of anxiety over various aspects of reading

1, 3, 4, 7, 22, 23, 24, 25

Their perception of reading difficulties in the target language

2, 13, 14, 19, 27, 28,

Their perception of the relative

difficulty of reading as compared to the difficulty of other language skills.

15, 16, 31, 33, 36, 39

Total Items 20

In test validity, the writer got 22 items valid from 40 items. The number of valid item are 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9, 11, 12, 16, 17, 18, 20, 21, 23, 24, 26, 27, 29, 31, 32, 33, 38. The number of invalid items are 1, 4, 6, 10, 13, 14, 15, 19, 22, 25, 28, 30, 34, 35, 36, 37, 39, 40. The items that the writer used only 20 items, that are: 5, 7, 8, 9, 11, 12, 16, 17, 18, 20, 21, 23, 24, 26, 27, 29, 31, 32, 33, 38. For further information of the validity of test (see appendix).

Table 3.5

The English Descriptive Reading Comprehension Test

No. Indicator Key Number

1. Determining the main idea of the text 8 2. Identifying the specific information based

on the text

5, 11,12, 16, 20, 23, 26, 29, 32, 33


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3. Identifying the detail information based on

the text

9, 17, 18, 21, 24, 27, 31

4. Identifying implicitly stated information

based on the text

38

5. Determining the purpose of the text. 7

Total 20

d. The Reliability of Instrument

The writer use SPSS 20 in order to know the reliability of questionnaire. The result can be seen as below:

Table 3.6

The Reliability of Questionnaire

Reliability Statistics

Cronbach's Alpha N of Items

,803 40

From the result it can be seen that rresult = 0.803. Then the writer compared to rtable

with N=35 and 5% as significant level, that is rtable = 0.334. It can be conclude that the

instrument is reliable because rresult > rtable = 0.803 > 0.334

Moreover, the writer use Anates Application to find out the reliability and the significance of items that can be used for a test. The result shown that the writer got the reliability 0.86 (see appendix), thus we can conclude that the instrument is reliable.


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27

E. The Technique of Data Analysis

After getting the questionnaire data from the students, the writer needs to analyze the data and correlate the questionnaire score and English descriptive reading comprehension score.

In analyzing the data of the relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension, the writer use Pearson Product-Moment Correlation Coefficient.1

∑ ∑ ∑

√ ∑ ∑ ∑ ∑

Note :

r = Coefficient of correlation between X variable and Y variable (Koefisien korelasi antara variable X dan variable Y)

N = Number of respondents

∑XY = The sum of the products of X and Y scores for each students ∑X = The sum of X scores

∑Y = The sum of Y scores

∑X² = The sum of quadrate of each X scores ∑Y² = The sum of quadrate of each Y scores (∑X)² = The sum of the quadrate of ∑X scores (∑Y)² = The sum of the quadrate of ∑Y scores Significant critical value : 0.05 and 0.01

1

Budi Susetyo, Statistika untuk Analisis Data Penelitian, (Bandung: PT Refika Aditama, 2010), p. 121


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After the r was found then the writer interprets the correlation based on following level of correlation.

Table 3.7

The Level of Correlation2

Product Moment ( r ) Interpretation

0.00 – 0.199 Very low Correlation

0.20 – 0.399 Low correlation

0.40 – 0.599 Moderate Correlation

0.60 – 0.799 High Correlation

0.80 – 1.000 Very High Correlation

F. The Statistical Hypotheses

To know whether there is any significant relationship or not between X and Y variables, the writer formulate Ho (Null Hypothesis) and Ha (Alternative Hypothesis) as follows:

a. Null Hypothesis (Ho) : There is no significant relationship between X variable (Students’ Anxiety) and Y variable (students’ English descriptive reading comprehension)

b. Alternative Hypothesis (Ha) : There is significant relationship between X variable (Students’Anxiety) and Y variable (students’ English descriptive reading comprehension)

2

Sugiyono, Metode Penelitian Pendididkan (Pendekatan Kuantitatif, Kualitatif dan (R&D), (Bandung: Alfabeta, 2013), p. 257


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29

The significance hypotheses was formulated as follow:

H0 : r = 0

Ha : r ≠ 0

If rxy > rtablemeans there is significant relationship between X variable and Y variable. Ha is accepted and Ho is rejected.

If rxy < rtable means there is no significant relationship between X variable and Y variable. Ho is accepted and Ha is rejected.


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30

As mentioned in previous chapter, this study used survey method employing correlational study for investigating whether there is any significant relationship

between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension score or not.

To figure out and get the data of the study, the writer adapted anxiety questionnaire that designed by Saito et al. (1999) namely Foreign Language and Reading Anxiety Scale (FLRAS) that contain 20 items and made another 20 items questionnaire with the same indicator as FLRAS in order to avoid invalid and unreliable data. Further, the writer also used 20 items descriptive reading test in

order to get students’ English descriptive reading comprehension score.

Moreover, the writer conducted the research using questionnaire and English descriptive reading comprehension test in VIII-1 that consists of 40 students. Before the writer did her research, she did the validation of questionnaire and test in VIII-5 that only consists of 35 students at that time. Then, the writer analyzed the data using Pearson Product Moment formula to know the relationship between variable X and Y.

1. The Data of Students’ Anxiety Score and Students’ English Descriptive

Reading Comprehension Score

The statistical calculation of 40 students’ anxiety score and their English reading comprehension were calculated. The total students’ anxiety score is 2264

(see appendix) and the students’ English reading comprehension got the total score 3085 (see appendix). The result of anxiety score and English reading comprehension score can be seen as follow:

a. The Highest Scores:


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31

2) English Reading Comprehension Score : 95 b. The Lowest Scores :

1) Anxiety Scores : 40

2) English Reading Comprehension Score : 50

Furthermore, the mean score of anxiety score is 56.60 with the standard deviation is 7.655. Meanwhile the mean score of English descriptive reading comprehension is 77.13 with 10.615 standard deviation.

By using SPSS, the writer got the summary as follows:

Table. 4.1

The Summary Score of Anxiety (X) and Reading Comprehension (Y)

Parameter X Y

Minimum Score 40 50

Maximum Score 70 95

Std Deviation 7.655 10.615

Mean 56.60 77.13

Median 58.00 80.00

Mode 59 85

Sum 2264 3085

2. The Relationship between Students’ Anxiety and Their English

Descriptive Reading Comprehension Score

To see how significance is the relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension, it is calculated through Pearson Product moment formula. Before calculating the data, here are the result of X and Y scores:

N = 40

∑X = 2264


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∑XY =174755

∑X2

= 130428

∑Y2

=242325

After the calculation of whole data from X and Y variables, the next step is to insert the data from the table into the Pearson Product moment formula to find the correlation between X and Y variables as follow:

∑ ∑ ∑

√ ∑ ∑ ∑ ∑

= 0,045

B. The Analysis of the Data

To get the result of the relationship between students’ anxiety score and their

English descriptive reading comprehension score, the writer calculated the data through SPSS. 20. The result from the program is below:


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1. The Frequency of the Data

Table 4.2

The frequency of Anxiety Score

Anxiety Score

Frequency Percent Valid Percent Cumulative Percent

Valid

40 1 2,5 2,5 2,5

42 1 2,5 2,5 5,0

46 1 2,5 2,5 7,5

47 1 2,5 2,5 10,0

49 4 10,0 10,0 20,0

50 3 7,5 7,5 27,5

51 1 2,5 2,5 30,0

52 3 7,5 7,5 37,5

53 1 2,5 2,5 40,0

55 1 2,5 2,5 42,5

56 2 5,0 5,0 47,5

58 3 7,5 7,5 55,0

59 5 12,5 12,5 67,5

60 1 2,5 2,5 70,0

61 2 5,0 5,0 75,0

62 1 2,5 2,5 77,5

64 1 2,5 2,5 80,0

65 1 2,5 2,5 82,5

66 2 5,0 5,0 87,5

67 2 5,0 5,0 92,5

69 2 5,0 5,0 97,5

70 1 2,5 2,5 100,0


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Table 4.3

The Frequency of English Descriptive Reading Comprehension Score

Reading Comprehension Score

Frequency Percent Valid Percent Cumulative Percent

Valid

50 1 2,5 2,5 2,5

55 1 2,5 2,5 5,0

60 1 2,5 2,5 7,5

65 4 10,0 10,0 17,5

70 7 17,5 17,5 35,0

75 5 12,5 12,5 47,5

80 6 15,0 15,0 62,5

85 9 22,5 22,5 85,0

90 4 10,0 10,0 95,0

95 2 5,0 5,0 100,0

Total 40 100,0 100,0

2. The Histogram

Through histogram, the writer can see how the distribution of data is distributed as below:

Figure 4.1 The Anxiety Score


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35

Figure 4.2

The English Reading Comprehension Score

3. The Normality Test

The writer used SPSS Statistic 20 to count the normality of each instruments. The instruments would be normal distribution if the result of calculation from SPSS Statistic 20 showed less than the result from Shapiro-Wilk table with the number of sample (n) is 40.

These tests are valued using SPSS Statistic 20. The normality Using One-Sample Shapiro-Wilk test results can be seen as bellow:

Table 4.4

The Normality Data of variable X and Y

Tests of Normality

Kolmogorov-Smirnova Shapiro-Wilk Statistic df Sig. Statistic df Sig.

Anxiety Scores ,101 40 ,200* ,971 40 ,378

Reading Comprehension

Score ,146 40 ,032 ,957 40 ,137

*. This is a lower bound of the true significance. a. Lilliefors Significance Correction

From the result above, it can be seen that both anxiety score and English descriptive reading comprehension score data are categorized normally distributed because the value of significant are higher than 0.05. The significant value of X is


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0.378, which means that 0.378 > 0.05 and the significant value of Y is 0.137, which means that 0.137 > 0.05. Hence, it can be concluded that all the data are normally distributed. As supported by Syofian Siregar statement about the degree of normality test:

Hypothesis:

Ho : Population are normally distributed

H1 : Population are not normally distributed (randomly distributed)

Criteria of normality test are:

Ho is rejected if probability of significant value < 0.05

H0 is accepted if probability of significant value > 0.051

Additionally, to visualize the normality of data, the writer use Q-Q plot in SPSS 20 as the description. The normality result presented in the picture below:

Figure 4.3

The Normal Q-Q Plot of Anxiety Score

1


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37

Figure 4.4

The Normal Q-Q Plot of English Descriptive Reading Comprehension Score

4. The Correlational Result

Table 4.5

The Result of Correlation Calculation

Correlations

Anxiety Scores Reading Comprehension Score

Anxiety Scores

Pearson Correlation 1 ,045

Sig. (2-tailed) ,781

N 40 40

Reading Comprehension Score

Pearson Correlation ,045 1

Sig. (2-tailed) ,781

N 40 40

From the table, the writer describes that r coefficient is 0.045 and the sig, (2-tailed) is 0.781. Then the writer looked at r table as mentioned in chapter III.

From the table, rresult is included in the first category (0.00-0.199) that describes there is very low correlation between X variable and Y variable. The result showed rxy < rtable = 0.045 < 0.312. Further, based on the ttest result, with the significance value 0.05, the writer got tresult < ttable= 0.278 < 2.024 and it proves insignificant correlation. It means that Ho is accepted and Ha is rejected. It can be


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concluded that the higher students’ anxiety does not guarantee the lower students’ English descriptive reading comprehension or else it can be stated that there is no

significant relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension.

C. The Interpretation of the Data

Based on the analysis above, there is no significant relationship between

students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension. In the data analysis, the result of normality test both questionnaire and English descriptive reading comprehension test showed that the data are normally distributed. After that, Pearson Product Moment formula was conducted to know the result of hypotheses. Then, the result showed rtable > rresult, it means that Ho is accepted. Therefore, it can be stated that there is no significant relationship between

students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension.

Moreover, in the analysis of the students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension showed rxy < rtable = 0.045 < 0.312. Thus, it means that there is very low correlation as compared with the level of correlation. The score 0.045 is included in range 0.00-0.199 which means that there is very low correlation between X and Y variable. Hence, the higher students’ anxiety does not guarantee the lower students’ English descriptive reading comprehension

or else it can be stated that there is no significant relationship between students’

anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension. D. The Discussion of the Data

The finding of the data analysis show that there is very low correlation between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension or it can be stated that there is no significant relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension.

The result which indicates that there is no significant relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension gained some assumption that there are some possible factors that influence their English descriptive reading comprehension. As mentioned by Cabansag “motivation, attitudes, anxiety, learning achievement, aptitudes, intelligence, age personalities


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39

are identified as several factors that influence students to learn foreign language.”2 Further, DeBoer and Dallmann state some causes that makes students get difficulties in comprehending reading text, those are:

1. Limited Intelligence

2. Undesirable Physical Factors

3. Overemphasis On Word Recognition 4. Overemphasis On Oral Reading

5. Insufficient Background for Reading A Selection

6. Failure to adjust reading technique to reading purpose and type of reading material.

7. Lack of appropriate teacher guidance.3

From the statement above, the writer sums up that anxiety is not the only

factor that influence students’ English descriptive reading comprehension at the eighth grade students of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat. Nevertheless, the teacher should not ignore anxiety in the classroom. Henry Clay Lindgren states that “The task of the teacher, he suggests, is that creating the necessary degree of anxiety. The problem of how much anxiety is a difficult one, because too much anxiety will create a need to avoid the learning situation and too little anxiety will result in a

lack of attention.”4

Thus, although in this study anxiety does not have any significant relationship in affecting students’ English descriptive reading comprehension, anxiety still believed being an important thing in the classroom environment. Anxiety not only has negative influence towards students but also it has positive influence such as students become more aware to the task that they are going to face by study hard or practice more. Nevertheless, too much anxiety also will make the students failed to do the task. Thus, by having aware of some psychological factors such as anxiety is important. The teacher may facilitate the students to overcome their difficulties in comprehending reading text. On the other hand, the students themselves could also gained their chance to exercise in

2

John N. Cabansag, Ph.D, English Language Reading Anxiety and Reading

Comprehension Performance of College Students in a State University, Journal of Arts, Science, and Commerce, IV, 2013, P. 21

3

John J. DeBoer & Martha Dallmann, The Teaching Reading, (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc, 1960), P. 132-134

4

Henry Clay Lindgren, Educational Psychology in the Classroom, (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1967), Third Edition, P. 306


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managing and handling some psychological factors that can affect their comprehension.

In summary, from the discussion of the study above, it is implied that anxiety

has insignificant relationship with students’ English descriptive reading comprehension. It is assumed that another possible factors did. Thus, the teacher must find out appropriate teaching strategies in order to facilitate the students to comprehend their reading comprehension more.

E. The Hypotheses Test

As described in previous chapter, if rxy > rtable means there is significant relationship between X variable and Y variable, Ha is accepted and Ho is rejected.

Then if rxy< rtable means there is no significant relationship between X variable and Y variable, Ho is accepted and Ha is rejected. From the result above, the writer got

rxy< rtable : 0.045 < 0.312 which means that Ho is accepted and Ha is rejected. In

another words, there is no significant relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension.


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41

CHAPTER V

CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION

A. Conclusion

Based on the research findings, the writer concludes that the null hypothesis (Ho) is accepted and the alternative hypothesis (Ha) is rejected. It can be seen from the result of r is 0.04, meanwhile the result from rtable in 5% significance level is 0.312. Thus, rxy is lower than rtableor it can be stated that rxy< rtable : 0.045 < 0.312. The result means that there is no significant relationship between students’ anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension at the eighth grade students of SMP Islamiyah Ciputat in the academic year 2014/2015. The conclusion shows that the higher students’ anxiety does not guarantee the lower students’ English descriptive reading comprehension.

B. Suggestion

Based on the previous conclusion, the teachers and the students do not pay much attention to anxiety in affecting the students’ English descriptive reading comprehension score because of considering the insignificant relationship between anxiety and their English descriptive reading comprehension. However, it should not be simply ignored. As already stated earlier that anxiety is one of the factors that influencing students reading comprehension. It is important for teacher to recognize students’ anxiety in order to avoid students get difficulties in comprehending reading text.

Therefore, it also suggested that the teachers have to encourage the students to read the books as frequently as possible, thus it can help them to increase their ability to comprehend reading text.


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REFERENCES

Anderson, Mark and Kathy Anderson, Text Type 3, South Yarra: McMillan, 1998. Brown, H. Douglas. Principles of Language Learning. New York: Pearson

Education. 2007.

Cabansag, John N., English Language Anxiety and Reading Comprehension Performance of College Students in a State University, Journal of Arts, Science, and Commerce, IV, 2013.

Caldwell, Joanne Schudt, Comprehension Assessment: A Classroom Guide, New York: The Guilford Press, 2008.

Clouse, Barbara Fine, The Student Writer, New York: McGraw Hill, 2004.

Cui, Jingjing, Research on High School Students’ English Learning Anxiety, Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 2, 2011.

DeBoer, John J. and Martha Dallmann, The Teaching Reading, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc, 1960.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ , The Teaching of Reading Revised Edition, New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, Inc, 1964.

Flynn, Naomy and Rhona Stainthorp, The Learning and Teaching of Reading and Writing, West Sussex: Whurr Publishers, 2006.

Ghaemi, Farid and Naeemeh Kharaghani, A Case Study of a Foreign Language Learner with Severe Learning Problem: The Role of Anxiety, Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 1, 2011.

Grabe, William and Fredericka L Stoller, Teaching and Researching Reading, Harlow: Pearson Education, 2002.

Grellet, Francoise, Developing Reading Skill, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981.

Harris, Larry A. and Carl B. Smith, Reading Instruction, Diagnostic Teaching in the Classroom, New York: Richard C. Owen Publishers, Inc, 1980.

Harmer, Jeremy, The Practice of English Language Teaching, New York: Longman, New Edition, 1991.

_ _ _ _ _ _ , How to Teach English, Oxford: Pearson Education Limited, New Editio, 2007.


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43

Huberty, Thomas J., Test and Performance Anxiety, Student Services, 2009. Israel, Susan E. And Gerald G. Duffy (eds.), Handbook of Research on Reading

Comprehension, New York: Routledge, 2009.

Lindgren, Henry Clay, Educational Psychology in the Classroom, New York: John Wiley & Sons, Third Edition, 1967.

Liu, Yu-Hsiu and Samimy, Keiko K., Survey on Anxiety in Reading Chinese-English Syntactic Differences: A Case of Chinese-English Reading Anxiety in Taiwanese University Students, Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 2, 2012.

Mather, Peter and Rita McCarthy, Reading and All that Jazz, Boston: Mc Graw Hill, 2007.

McDonough, Jo and Christopher Shaw, Materials and Methods in ELT: A

Teachers’ Guide, Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1993.

Mish, Frederick C. Webster’s Ninth Collegiate Dictionary, Springfield: Merriam Webster Inc. 1998.

Nation, I. S. P., Teaching ESL/EFL Reading and Writing, New York: Routledge, 2009.

Neneng Suryati, The Correlation between Students’ Anxiety and Their Achievement in Reading Comprehension, Skripsi SI Fakultas Ilmu Tarbiyah dan Keguruan Universitas Islam Negeri Jakarta, 2009, Unpublished.

Nevid, Jeffrey S., et al., Psikologi Abnormal, Jakarta: PT Erlangga, Edisi ke-5, 2005.

Nunan, David (ed.), Practical Language Teaching: Young Learners, New York: McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2006.

Ormrod, Jeanne Ellis, Educational Psychology: Developing Learners, Boston: Pearson, Seventh Edition, 2011.

Passer, Michael and Ronald E. Smith, Psychology: The Science of Mind and Behaviour, New York: McGraw Hill Companies Inc., 2nd Edition, 2004. Richard, Jack C. and Willy A. Renandya , Methodology in Language Teaching,


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Savage, John F. and Jean F. Mooney, Teaching Reading to Children with Special Needs, Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc, 1997.

Scanlon, Dona M. et al., Early Intervention for Reading Difficulties, New York: The Gulford Press, 2010.

Schunk, Dale H., et al., Motivation in Education: Theory, Research, and Applications, New Jersey: PEARSON Merrill Prentice Hall, 2008.

Siregar, Syofian, Statistika Deskriptif untuk Penelitian, Jakarta: Rajawali Press, 2011.

Sugiyono, Metode Penelitian Pendididkan (Pendekatan Kuantitatif, Kualitatif dan (R&D), Bandung: Alfabeta, 2013.

Susetyo, Budi, Statistika untuk Analisis Data Penelitian, Bandung: PT Refika Aditama, 2010.

Wishon, George E. and Julia M. Burks, Let’s Write English, Canada: Atlantis Publisher, 1980.

Zeidner, Moshe, Test Anxiety, The State of the Art, New York: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1998.


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45


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A 49

B 49

C 49

D 50

E 42

F 46

G 49

H 65

I 61

J 47

K 56

L 58

M 50

N 56

O 51

P 58

Q 52

R 66

S 50

T 67

U 58

V 67

W 70

X 66

Y 53

Z 55

AA 69


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AC 64

AD 59

AE 59

AF 52

AG 60

AH 40

AI 62

AJ 52

AK 59

AL 59

AM 61

AN 59


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N Reading Comprehension Score

A 85

B 95

C 60

D 80

E 55

F 65

G 90

H 70

I 70

J 85

K 85

L 85

M 70

N 75

O 70

P 85

Q 85

R 80

S 75

T 75

U 70

V 90

W 65

X 65

Y 85

Z 80

AA 75


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AC 50

AD 80

AE 70

AF 70

AG 65

AH 75

AI 70

AJ 80

AK 80

AL 90

AM 85

AN 80


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N X Y XY X2 Y2

A 49 85 4165 2401 7225

B 49 95 4655 2401 9025

C 49 60 2940 2401 3600

D 50 80 4000 2500 6400

E 42 55 2310 1764 3025

F 46 65 2990 2116 4225

G 49 90 4410 2401 8100

H 65 70 4550 4225 4900

I 61 90 5490 3721 8100

J 47 85 3995 2209 7225

K 56 85 4760 3136 7225

L 58 85 4930 3364 7225

M 50 70 3500 2500 4900

N 56 75 4200 3136 5625

O 51 70 3570 2601 4900

P 58 85 4930 3364 7225

Q 52 85 4420 2704 7225

R 66 80 5280 4356 6400

S 50 75 3750 2500 5625

T 67 75 5025 4489 5625

U 58 70 4060 3364 4900

V 67 90 6030 4489 8100

W 70 65 4550 4900 4225

X 66 65 4290 4356 4225

Y 53 85 4505 2809 7225

Z 55 80 4400 3025 6400


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AB 69 95 6555 4761 9025

AC 64 50 3200 4096 2500

AD 59 80 4720 3481 6400

AE 59 70 4130 3481 4900

AF 52 70 3640 2704 4900

AG 60 65 3900 3600 4225

AH 40 75 3000 1600 5625

AI 62 70 4340 3844 4900

AJ 52 80 4160 2704 6400

AK 59 80 4720 3481 6400

AL 59 90 5310 3481 8100

AM 61 85 5185 3721 7225

AN 59 85 5015 3481 7225


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ANGKET PERTANYAAN (QUESTIONNAIRE)

A. Petunjuk Umum

1. Angket ini bersifat ilmiah, tidak ada tujuan lain. 2. Jawablah Pertanyaan ini dengan jujur.

3. Berilah tanda checklist (√) pada jawaban anda. B. Biodata responden (penjawab pertanyaan)

1. Nama :

2. Kelas :

3. Nama Sekolah : C. Keterangan

1. SS = Sangat Setuju 2. S = Setuju

3. N = Netral 4. TS = Tidak Setuju

5. STS = Sangat Tidak Setuju

No. Pertanyaan SS S N TS STS

1. Saya bingung ketika saya tidak yakin apakah saya memahami teks bahasa Inggris yang saya baca

2. Ketika membaca teks bahasa Inggris, saya dapat mengetahui arti setiap kosakatanya, namun saya kesulitan dalam memahami maksud penulis

3. Saya merasa bingung ketika membaca teks bahasa Inggris dan saya tidak mengingat apa yang saya baca

4. Saya merasa takut ketika menghadapi teks berbahasa Inggris

5. Ketika membaca teks berbahasa Inggris, saya merasa grogi dan bingung pada saat saya tidak memahami atau mengetahui satu katapun

6. Saya merasa percaya diri ketika saya membaca teks berbahasa Inggris

7. Membaca teks berbahasa Inggris tidaklah sulit ketika sudah mulai terbiasa

8. Bagian tersulit dalam belajar bahasa Inggris adalah membaca.


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Z 3 3 2 2 4 3 2 2 2 4 3 3 2 2 2 3 3 3 2 5 55

AA 3 3 3 4 4 2 3 4 4 5 5 2 3 2 3 3 5 5 1 5 69

AB 3 3 3 4 4 2 3 4 4 5 5 2 3 2 3 3 5 5 1 5 69

AC 3 3 3 2 4 2 2 4 2 3 3 2 4 3 4 5 4 4 2 5 64

AD 3 4 2 2 2 3 2 4 4 2 2 2 3 2 4 2 4 4 4 4 59

AE 3 4 2 2 2 2 2 3 2 3 3 3 4 2 4 2 4 4 4 4 59

AF 3 4 2 2 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 2 4 2 4 4 4 4 52

AG 3 3 1 1 1 1 3 4 5 5 1 2 3 3 5 5 5 4 2 3 60

AH 4 2 1 1 2 2 1 2 1 2 2 1 2 2 2 2 3 4 2 2 40

AI 3 5 5 3 4 2 1 3 2 2 4 3 2 2 3 3 5 3 2 5 62

AJ 3 4 4 2 3 1 1 1 4 3 3 2 3 1 3 2 3 3 3 3 52

AK 3 5 3 3 4 3 1 2 3 2 4 2 3 3 3 4 2 4 1 4 59

AL 3 3 2 2 4 2 1 2 4 4 4 3 3 2 4 3 3 2 3 5 59

AM 3 3 4 2 3 1 1 3 2 4 3 4 2 2 4 4 4 4 4 4 61

AN 3 3 2 2 4 2 1 2 4 4 4 3 3 2 4 3 3 2 3 5 59


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