The Principle of Teaching Reading

works best, because those can lead to more effective reading instruction in the classroom. 35

B. Narrative Text

1. The Definition of Narrative Text

Narrative text is close to everyday experiences as it usually based on real events in life and practically do by people on daily basic. Narrative text can be a fiction, non-fiction or a combination of both which comes from the writer’s real experience or imagination. According to Anderson, a narrative text is a text that tells a story and, in doing so, entertains the audience. 36 By reading a narrative text, the readers will get an experience that somehow connected to their prior knowledge and build an interpretation which is entertaining. Narrative text is a type of texts which the events are given in chronological order. As National Assessment Program NAP stated that narrative text is a time- ordered text that is used to tell a story and entertain the reader. 37 Regarding to narrative text and time sequences, Abbott added that narrative text allows the events to create the order of time. 38 The order of time which is formed on a narrative text is interrelated to each other and makes the story understandable for the readers. According to Coffman and Reed, narrative text is described as having several common components including a setting, plot series of episodes based on goals, attempt, outcomes, resolution or story ending. 39 These components form the basic aspect of a narrative text. Related to these components, early researchers 35 Nunan, op. cit., p. 77. 36 Mark Anderson and Kathy Anderson, Text Types in English 3, South Yarra: Macmillan Education Australia, 1998, p. 3. 37 National Assessment Program —Literacy and Numeracy, Narrative Marking Guide, 2014, http:www.nap.edu.au, p. 4. 38 H. Porter Abbott, The Cambridge Introduction to Narrative, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2002, pp. 3 —4. 39 Gerry A. Coffman and Melissa D. Reed, the True Story of Narrative Text: from Theory to Practice, Kansas: The Reading Professor vol. 32 no. 1, 2010, p. 5. found these terms to be representative of the text-based information in retellings and that the information recalled was consistent in order. 40 What makes narrative text as a narrative is the events provided on the text. Because, narrative text is the representation of an event or a series of events which event is used as the key word and it cannot be said as a narrative without it. 41 It means that events are the characteristic that define narrative text from other kind of texts. Without events or action, a text can be description, argument, exposition or even combination of those texts. In narrative text, the stories set up one or more problems which must eventually find a way to be resolved. Aviv said that narrative text is a kind of text which contains a story and problem which ended by a resolution —happy or sad ending. 42 The writer concluded that a narrative text is a story presented in chronological order that consists of some components including problem and problem solving which the purpose is to entertain the reader.

2. The Purpose of Narrative Text

Narrative text has several purpose in reading activity. Narrative text is aimed to tell a story. 43 Based on The Student Writer book by Clouse, there are some purposes of narrative text, mentioned as follow: a. To entertain the reader. b. To express the reader’s feeling. c. To relate experience. d. To inform. e. To teach a lesson. f. To persuade. 44 40 Jean M. Mandler and Nancy S. Johnson, Remembrance of Things Parsed: Story Structure and Recall, San Diego: Academic Press, 1977, p. 132. 41 Abbott, op. cit., p. 13. 42 Aviv, Module Pembelajaran Narrative Text SMA Kelas 11 Semester 2, Kebumen: SPEC and Academic Pare, 2013, p. 5. 43 Abbott, loc.cit., p. 2. 44 Barbara Fine Clouse, the Student Writer, New York: The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2006, p. 186. Although the basic purpose of narrative text is to tell a story, the detailed purpose may vary according to the genre. 45 Cavanagh stated that it can be to entertain, create, stimulate emotions, motivate, guide or teach through story. 46 Narrative text on a personal level is aimed to describe about who we are, where we have been, and where we are going to ourselves and to other people which can be told to others in different ways, in different situations to different people. 47 In other words, the purpose of narrative text is also to tell and retell a story. The writer concluded that narrative text is aimed to be told and retold and may entertain the readers, inform them about a particular event, or even teach them about a lesson by the end of the reading process of narrative text.

3. Elements of Narrative Text

There are four elements included in a narrative text: point of view, characters, action conflict, and dialogue. 48 The four elements are described in detail as follow: a. Point of View Point of view can be first-person, second-person, or third-person. It is the perspective from which something is observed and recounted in the story. 49 First-person point of view is used for personal narratives with I as the main character while the third-person point of view is used for narrative about someone else. b. Characters Characters takes part in every story, in other words all stories have them. Characters can be people, animal, spirits, furnitures, and other animated 45 National Literacy Trust, A Guide to Text Types: Narrative, Non-fiction, and Poetry, 2014, http:www.literacytrust.org.uk. 46 Jane Cavanagh, Text Types, New South Wales: Country Areas Program CAP of Dubbo School of Distance Education, p. 8. 47 Paul Hazel, Narrative: an Introduction, Mount Pleasant, US: Swansea Institute of Higher Education, 2007, p. 5. 48 Katherine M. Ploeger, Simplified Paragraph Skills, London: McGraw-Hill Education, 1999, pp. 261 —262. 49 Hallett, Elements of Fiction--NarratorNarrative Voice, Tampa, Florida: Carrollwood Day School, 2014, p. 1. object which is defined as mental, emotional, and social qualities to distinguish one entitiy to another. 50 Narrative text usually uses real people in real conflicts, with real feelings, needs, and characteristic which are used to make the story more real and exciting for the reader. But, often the characters are made up based on the author’s imagination. c. Action or Conflict Every narrative text has one major action or event —sometimes involves conflict —that leads up to the final, climatic scene, the final explosion or insight. 51 All good stories usually have some kind of conflict. The purpose is to make the story more interesting and keep the readers interest to finish the story. Action, according to Amer is something that happen in the story or something that characters do as a result of a problem which is made up of events that lead to the resolution. 52 In other words, it is a response of something that happen in the story. It can be characters attitude toward an event, thoughts, dialogues, or statements. d. Dialogue Dialogue in narrative is an action when the character talks between characters or when the character talks to himself or herself which brings the story alive for the reader. 53 In other words, it is verbal exchanges between characters. In narrative text, the dialogue used is usually everyday conversation.

4. The Generic Structure of Narrative Text