Identification of the Problem

3 and learning process of reading in the eighth grade students of SMP Negeri 13 Yogyakarta. The problems that are related to the students’ reading skills can be influenced by some factors. Those factors can be from the teaching technique, the media used in teaching and learning processes and the students’ reading comprehension ability. The first problem which is found is the teaching technique. The teaching technique that was used in the classroom was monotonous. The teacher read a text loudly and students must repeat their teacher’s words. After that, the students are expected to answer the questions related to the text individually. The reading lesson is also a teacher-centered lesson. Lack of media is also one of the problems of the English teaching and learning process in SMP Negeri 13 Yogyakarta. There are no many media can be used for the teaching and learning process. The teacher usually uses a text and whiteboards. Media has an important role to the teaching and learning process. The media is useful in scaffolding the students in reading lesson. It can help a teacher in building the student’s background knowledge of the text. Students can relate their background knowledge in understanding a text. Besides the general problem above, another problem comes from the students. Their reading comprehension skill was low. Almost all students are very weak at voabulary mastery. Most of them said that they could not understand the text because it has a lot of unfamiliar words. If they find unfamiliar words, they rely on finding the word in dictionary or asking their friends. They rarely try to guess the meaning of the word. Furthermore, it seems that students have difficulty 4 at the sentence level. A lot of them still confuse in bringing words together to make an understandable sentence. Finally, the students are also lack of reading subskill which is finding the main idea of a paragraph. This reading subskill is important in understanding a paragraph and a text. As mentioned above, those several factors affect the English teaching and learning process in SMP Negeri 13 Yogyakarta. Each factor should be considered so that the solution can be right to improve students’ reading comprehension.

C. Delimitation of the Problem

In reference to the background of the study and identification of the problem, there are some factors affecting the teaching and learning process, especially students’ reading comprehension skill. Students have low reading comprehension ability. Therefore, this study will discuss the methods which can be used to improve the students’ reading comprehension. The eighth grade students of SMP Negeri 13 Yogyakarta’s weaknesses in reading comprehension can be improved by using the Multiple Intelligences-based techniques because the Multiple Intelligences-based techniques can overcome the problems of reading comprehension vocabulary, sentence processing, comprehending the text as well as problems related to the teaching technique and the media.

D. Formulation of the Problem

In reference to the limitation of the problems above, the researcher formulates the research problems as “How can the implementation of the Multiple Intelligences- based techniques to improve the reading comprehension of grade VIII students of SMP Negeri 13 Yogyakarta?” 5

E. Research Objectives

The objective of this study is to improve the reading comprehension of grade VIII students of SMP Negeri 13 Yogyakarta through the use of the Multiple Intelligences-based techniques.

F. Significance of the Research Study

The writer expects that the research will give some theoretical and practical significance to some readers, such as the English teacher and the school in which the research was conducted. Besides, the researcher should also take the advantages of conducting the research. 1. Theoretical Significance This research may contribute for further understanding of the role of the Multiple Intelligences-based techniques in improving reading comprehension ability especially in the junior high school. 2. Practical Significance a. Teachers can make use of the research findings to enrich their teaching methods and techniques. b. The researcher can make use the experience for her future as a professional teacher. c. Through this study, it is expected that Grade VIII students of SMP Negeri 13 Yogyakarta can improve their reading comprehension.