IMPROVING ENGLISH VOCABULARY OF ACTION VERBS THROUGH TOTAL PHYSICAL RESPONSE (TPR) PROCEDURE AT FOURTH GRADE OF SDN 3 NUNGGALREJO LAMPUNG TENGAH

ABSTRACT

IMPROVING ENGLISH VOCABULARY OF ACTION VERBS THROUGH TOTAL PHYSICAL RESPONSE (TPR) PROCEDURE AT

FOURTH GRADE OF SDN 3 NUNGGALREJO LAMPUNG TENGAH

By

Ervin Nurmawati

This research was conducted based on the problems faced by the fourth grade students of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo. The problems are the low vocabulary

achievement, the students’ participation during the teaching learning process, and the teacher’s teaching performance in that school. The students’ low vocabulary achievement is caused by some problems, one of them is the unsuitable teaching method used by the teacher to teach vocabulary. The teaching method used by the teacher also made the students’ activities low. So, the writer did a research which covered not only the students’ vocabulary achievement and the students’

participation but also the teacher’s teaching performance. The objectives of the research were to find out whether the TPR procedure was applicable to improve the students’ vocabulary achievement especially in written scores of the action verbs, to increase the quality of the teacher’s teaching performance and to increase the students’ participation during the teaching learning process while TPR

procedure was implemented. The research was conducted at SDN 3 Nunggalrejo. The subject of the research was students of fourth grade in academic year 2009/ 2010 which consisted of 14 students.

This Classroom Action Research was conducted in three cycles. Each cycle consisted of planning, action, observation and interpretation, analysis and

reflection. The researcher used indicators dealing with the learning product which covered the students’ score and learning process which covered the students’ participation during the teaching learning process and the teacher’s teaching performance. Moreover, those indicators were achieved if the students’ score had reached 60, 70 for teacher’s teaching performance and 75% for the students’ participation. To collect the data of the learning process and learning product, the writer used vocabulary test and observation as the instruments.

The result of learning product showed that TPR procedure was applicable to increase students’ vocabulary achievementespecially in students’ written score. To measure students’ vocabulary achievement, the researcher used written test. In the students’ written scores in cycle 1, only 7 students (50%) could get the score of ≥ 60. Meanwhile, after cycle 2 had been conducted, 11 students (78.57%) passed the KKM. This condition made the third cycle was conducted.

Surprisingly, 92.86% of the students could get the score of ≥ 60 and passed KKM in the cycle 3.

For the learning process, that is, the students’ participation during the teaching learning process, all of the students always do ≥80% from the first until the third cycle. Meanwhile, for the teacher’s teaching performance, the teacher got score of 60 in cycle 1, and then she got 70 in cycle 2. The teacher’s teaching performance was much better in the third cycle with the score of 80.

Referring to the result of the research above, it could be concluded that the TPR procedure was applicable to improve the students’ vocabulary mastery in understanding action verbs. TPR procedure not only improved the students’ written tests, but also improved the students’ participation during the teaching learning process and teacher’s teaching performance.

V. CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS

In reference to the result and discussion of the research, the researcher tried to give conclusion and suggestion as follows:

A. Conclusions

Based on the theoretical assumption above, the researcher formulates the following hypothesis:

1. TPR procedure is applicable to be used as a teaching technique to increase the teacher’s teaching performance. It can be seen from the National Education Department’s observation sheet of teacher’s performance, the teacher made an improvement on her teaching performance after TPR procedure has been implemented to teach action verbs. She was able to analyze her weaknesses on teaching action verbs.

2. TPR procedure is applicable to be used as a teaching technique to increase the students’ participation during the teaching learning process. Based on the observation sheet of students’ activities, which was filled in every cycle, the students have done more than 80% of students’ activities in every cycle. Moreover, the students also enjoyed their learning process. It can be seen from their face and activities in every cycle. It also improves the students’ concentration in studying the lesson.

3. TPR procedure is applicable to be used as a teaching technique to increase the students’ vocabulary achievements. It can be seen from the students’ score after TPR has been applied in the third cycle that 92.86% of the students have passed KKM.

B. Suggestions

1. For the teacher, it is suggested to use TPR procedure that can attract the students’ participation in learning English. Besides that, it is suggested before teaching, the teacher should study the way of pronouncing English words correctly.

2. For the teacher, it is suggested to make variation of teaching style by applying other techniques to teach other English materials in the class such as CLL or CLT.

3. For future researchers, they can use this research as a literature to guide them when they are going to do the similar research. It is also suggested to do research with more than 14 students in order to see whether TPR is applicable to be used in a big class.

I. INTRODUCTION

A. Background of the Problem

English is taught as a compulsory subject at elementary school in Indonesia. This is so because the aim of KTSP is to enable students to be high potential human resources to encounter the era of information and technology. According to KTSP (Educational Unit Level Curriculum) in Aminudin (2009), English has been taught in Indonesia at Elementary school as one of the local content subjects. It is hoped that the students will learn and comprehend English as early as possible and can practice simple conversation. In KTSP, the students in fourth grade of elementary school must be able to master four skills. Those are listening, speaking, reading and writing. Of course, before being able to master the skills, the students must have vocabulary as the basic to master the skills. However, after interviewing the English teacher of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo, the vocabulary of the fourth grade students were still limited and far from score 6.0 as KKM (Kriteria Ketuntasan Minimal) that the students had to achieve. The causes of the problem, that the students were still far from the expectation, might be from the students and the teacher.

The fact above is also supported by the result of the pre observation done by the researcher when the students were in the first semester of the fourth grade. At that

time, after explaining daily activity verbs through translation technique with a little gesture, the teacher tested the students to circle the correct answers in a multiple choice test after the material has been taught. At first, the researcher assumed that the students will get score of at least 60. But, unfortunately, the students who got score more than 60 are only 18,75% students (3 of 14 students). Most of the students chose the wrong answers in the daily activity verbs test. And then, the teacher tested the students again by asking orally what the English words of the words hapus, tulis, baca etc. in Bahasa. And as the result, the students who can answer the questions were only 2 or 3 students. The rest of students were only kept silent and were sleepy, drew pictures on their books and tables, chatted to their friends and walked or ran among their friends chairs.

Due to the problems faced by the students, that was the low vocabulary

achievements in comprehending action verbs, while doing pre observation, the researcher tried to find out the causes of the problem. From the pre observation, the researcher discussed the problems with the English teacher and concluded that the problems are the stress, boredom, and frustration of the students and the inappropriateness of the teaching method used by the teacher in teaching vocabulary.

During the teaching learning process, the teacher only translated the English vocabulary into Bahasa with a little gesture twice or three times and wrote the words on the whiteboard. Of course, this teaching learning process made the students bored and paid less attention to what the teacher taught. By seeing the fact that the students lacked of vocabulary, the researcher thought that the teacher

had to create fun atmosphere in the class and provide an activity that would make all students enjoy the activity that stimulate the students to memorize more vocabulary in the teaching and learning process.

Before looking for the solution of the problems happened in the fourth grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo, the way children acquiring their foreign language the age 9-11 a must be known first. According to Paul (2003:9-11), the children notice new words or patterns while they are playing or doing something physically. We do not “teach” these words or patterns, we just include them in activities and let the children notice them. They will suddenly come across us and think, huh? What’s that? So, by playing or doing something physically, fun atmosphere is created and the children will automatically acquire their foreign language. And then, when teaching new vocabulary to children, the teacher should repeat the new

vocabulary and do a lot of exposure of the foreign language. As Paul (2003:37) says that children need to repeat the same words or patterns over and over again. EFL learners with little natural exposure to English outside the classroom certainly do need to repeat words and patterns many times. So, repetition is needed and very important while teaching foreign language to children.

After knowing that creating fun by playing and doing something physically can make the students easily acquire their second language, the teacher can do a better result of students for gaining new English vocabulary by doing repetition, doing a lot of English exposure and solve the problems happened in the school. In order to solve the problems happened to the 4th grade students of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo which are caused by the inappropriateness of teaching method used by the

teacher; the researcher together with the English teacher of that school agreed to conduct a classroom action research in which TPR procedure would be

implemented to increase the students’ vocabulary.

TPR procedure was chosen in this research because the students in the fourth grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo were very active physically and TPR procedure provides physical activities while learning the second language. Moreover, after applying TPR procedure in that class, fun atmosphere from the physical activities will be created. As Larsen-Freeman in Setiyadi (2006: 128) says that physical activities are meant to reduce stress that people feel when studying foreign language. If fun atmosphere has been created in the class, automatically the students will feel happy, enjoy the teaching learning process and want to learn the foreign language. If this condition has happened, as the result, vocabulary taught will retain longer. The reason why vocabulary will retain longer is that TPR procedure involves all their abilities to get the second language. As Larsen-Freeman in Setiyadi (2006:130) says that the use of multiple modalities (aural, visual, kinesthetic, and spatial) assists in forming long term memories. This statement is also supported by Artika (2005:39) in her research that based on TPR procedure; the students should respond the teacher’s command by performing the command. In other words, the students would not respond the teacher’s command unless they know the meaning of the words. The students repeated what the teacher read. It is not just parroting but expression toward the new language or result of acquisition because they have understood what they read by observing and performing the commands. From this additional information about TPR procedure research, the researcher thinks that applying TPR procedure could be

effective in solving the problems happened in the fourth grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo.

Considering to the previous statements, it is important to apply a more interesting teaching activity to motivate the students to be eager to study in the class and retain verbs longer. Because of this reason, the reseacher, as a teacher to be in the future, wants to focus on classroom action reseach (CAR) of teaching action verbs in the form of imperative mood using TPR procedure. And then the researcher entitles this research as “Teaching English Vocabulary of Action Verbs through Total Physical Response (TPR) Procedure at Fourth Grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo. The use of TPR procedure hopefully can overcome the problems happened in the fourth grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo and will bring improvement not only for the teacher’s teaching performance and students’ activities in the classroom but also students’ vocabulary achievement.

B. Formulation of the Problem

The problems of this research are formulated as follow:

1. Can TPR procedure increase the quality of the teacher’s teaching performance?

2. Can teaching action verbs in the form of imperative mood through TPR procedure increase students’ participation during the teaching learning process?

C. Objectives of the Research

In relation to the formulation of the problems above, the objectives of the

classrooms action research are to find out the ability of TPR procedure to increase the quality of the teacher’s teaching performance, to increase the students’

participation and to increase student’s vocabulary achievement.

D. Uses of the Research.

This research will be useful both practically and theoretically. 1. Practically

This research will be useful for the English teacher, students, and also school. a. The teacher

Through this research, the teacher can apply TPR as one of the teaching learning activities that can improve students’ vocabulary and also improve the teacher’s teaching performance.

b. The students

Teaching action verbs through TPR can increase the students’ vocabulary achievements in this classroom action research.

c. The school

The result of the research can be used as the consideration technique to the development of teaching English or teaching other subjects.

2. Theoretically

The result of this Classroom Action Research will support the theory about the use of TPR procedure to increase the students’ vocabulary achievements.

E. Scope of The Research

This Classroom Action Research was conducted in SDN 3 Nunggalrejo. The class that becomes the subject of this research was the 4th grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo consisting of 14 students and 11 students of them got low average score in the mid semester test. The school only has such a number of the students because the location of the school is not strategic. The school’s location is in the border between Lampung Tengah and Metro and people need a mile to walk to reach the school. The focus of this study is on teaching vocabulary through TPR procedure to improve the quality of the teacher’s teaching performance, the activity of the students in the teaching learning process and to increase students’ vocabulary achievement.

The material was about action verbs containing verbs that they usually use in the class. It was taken from the students’ text book and other sources that are relevant to KTSP. Moreover, there are three kind of grammatical moods to show the emotions while teaching action verbs; those are indicative mood, imperative mood and subjunctive mood. Imperative mood was chosen in this research because this mood is the most suitable with TPR procedure to be implemented in SDN 3 Nunggalrejo.

In addition, in order to know the increase of the students’ vocabulary

achievements, there would be vocabulary test for them. The vocabulary test would be about action verbs and the vocabulary achievement would be measured by having the students choose the correct answers in multiple choice items for the vocabulary test. To see details information about multiple choice tests of the

action verbs, there is only one aspect, the ability to differentiate the action verbs after the students have been taught daily activity verbs, to be measured as the students’ vocabulary in this research.

In this research, the researcher held three cycles because in the third cycle, all indicators of the research had already been achieved. The first cycle was done based on the problems of the research and the second cycle was done based on the analysis and reflection from the first cycle. The third cycle was done based on the analysis and reflection based on the second cycle.

The focus of this research is on increasing the students’ vocabulary achievements of action verbs as the learning product. Moreover, the researcher also observed the students’ activities and the teacher’s performance as the learning process while TPR procedure was conducted to teach action verbs in the form of imperative mood in the class. The researcher decided to observe those three aspects because the researcher assumed that the result of the learning product, that is the students’ vocabulary achievements is also determined by the learning process occurred in the class which covers the students’ learning activities and the teacher’s

had to create fun atmosphere in the class and provide an activity that would make all students enjoy the activity that stimulate the students to memorize more vocabulary in the teaching and learning process.

Before looking for the solution of the problems happened in the fourth grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo, the way children acquiring their foreign language the age 9-11 a must be known first. According to Paul (2003:9-11), the children notice new words or patterns while they are playing or doing something physically. We do not “teach” these words or patterns, we just include them in activities and let the children notice them. They will suddenly come across us and think, huh? What’s that? So, by playing or doing something physically, fun atmosphere is created and the children will automatically acquire their foreign language. And then, when teaching new vocabulary to children, the teacher should repeat the new

vocabulary and do a lot of exposure of the foreign language. As Paul (2003:37) says that children need to repeat the same words or patterns over and over again. EFL learners with little natural exposure to English outside the classroom certainly do need to repeat words and patterns many times. So, repetition is needed and very important while teaching foreign language to children.

After knowing that creating fun by playing and doing something physically can make the students easily acquire their second language, the teacher can do a better result of students for gaining new English vocabulary by doing repetition, doing a lot of English exposure and solve the problems happened in the school. In order to solve the problems happened to the 4th grade students of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo which are caused by the inappropriateness of teaching method used by the

teacher; the researcher together with the English teacher of that school agreed to conduct a classroom action research in which TPR procedure would be

implemented to increase the students’ vocabulary.

TPR procedure was chosen in this research because the students in the fourth grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo were very active physically and TPR procedure provides physical activities while learning the second language. Moreover, after applying TPR procedure in that class, fun atmosphere from the physical activities will be created. As Larsen-Freeman in Setiyadi (2006: 128) says that physical activities are meant to reduce stress that people feel when studying foreign language. If fun atmosphere has been created in the class, automatically the students will feel happy, enjoy the teaching learning process and want to learn the foreign language. If this condition has happened, as the result, vocabulary taught will retain longer. The reason why vocabulary will retain longer is that TPR procedure involves all their abilities to get the second language. As Larsen-Freeman in Setiyadi (2006:130) says that the use of multiple modalities (aural, visual, kinesthetic, and spatial) assists in forming long term memories. This statement is also supported by Artika (2005:39) in her research that based on TPR procedure; the students should respond the teacher’s command by performing the command. In other words, the students would not respond the teacher’s command unless they know the meaning of the words. The students repeated what the teacher read. It is not just parroting but expression toward the new language or result of acquisition because they have understood what they read by observing and performing the commands. From this additional information about TPR procedure research, the researcher thinks that applying TPR procedure could be

effective in solving the problems happened in the fourth grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo.

Considering to the previous statements, it is important to apply a more interesting teaching activity to motivate the students to be eager to study in the class and retain verbs longer. Because of this reason, the reseacher, as a teacher to be in the future, wants to focus on classroom action reseach (CAR) of teaching action verbs in the form of imperative mood using TPR procedure. And then the researcher entitles this research as “Teaching English Vocabulary of Action Verbs through Total Physical Response (TPR) Procedure at Fourth Grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo. The use of TPR procedure hopefully can overcome the problems happened in the fourth grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo and will bring improvement not only for the teacher’s teaching performance and students’ activities in the classroom but also students’ vocabulary achievement.

B. Formulation of the Problem

The problems of this research are formulated as follow:

1. Can TPR procedure increase the quality of the teacher’s teaching performance?

2. Can teaching action verbs in the form of imperative mood through TPR procedure increase students’ participation during the teaching learning process?

C. Objectives of the Research

In relation to the formulation of the problems above, the objectives of the

classrooms action research are to find out the ability of TPR procedure to increase the quality of the teacher’s teaching performance, to increase the students’

participation and to increase student’s vocabulary achievement.

D. Uses of the Research.

This research will be useful both practically and theoretically. 1. Practically

This research will be useful for the English teacher, students, and also school. a. The teacher

Through this research, the teacher can apply TPR as one of the teaching learning activities that can improve students’ vocabulary and also improve the teacher’s teaching performance.

b. The students

Teaching action verbs through TPR can increase the students’ vocabulary achievements in this classroom action research.

c. The school

The result of the research can be used as the consideration technique to the development of teaching English or teaching other subjects.

2. Theoretically

The result of this Classroom Action Research will support the theory about the use of TPR procedure to increase the students’ vocabulary achievements.

E. Scope of The Research

This Classroom Action Research was conducted in SDN 3 Nunggalrejo. The class that becomes the subject of this research was the 4th grade of SDN 3 Nunggalrejo consisting of 14 students and 11 students of them got low average score in the mid semester test. The school only has such a number of the students because the location of the school is not strategic. The school’s location is in the border between Lampung Tengah and Metro and people need a mile to walk to reach the school. The focus of this study is on teaching vocabulary through TPR procedure to improve the quality of the teacher’s teaching performance, the activity of the students in the teaching learning process and to increase students’ vocabulary achievement.

The material was about action verbs containing verbs that they usually use in the class. It was taken from the students’ text book and other sources that are relevant to KTSP. Moreover, there are three kind of grammatical moods to show the emotions while teaching action verbs; those are indicative mood, imperative mood and subjunctive mood. Imperative mood was chosen in this research because this mood is the most suitable with TPR procedure to be implemented in SDN 3 Nunggalrejo.

In addition, in order to know the increase of the students’ vocabulary

achievements, there would be vocabulary test for them. The vocabulary test would be about action verbs and the vocabulary achievement would be measured by having the students choose the correct answers in multiple choice items for the vocabulary test. To see details information about multiple choice tests of the

action verbs, there is only one aspect, the ability to differentiate the action verbs after the students have been taught daily activity verbs, to be measured as the students’ vocabulary in this research.

In this research, the researcher held three cycles because in the third cycle, all indicators of the research had already been achieved. The first cycle was done based on the problems of the research and the second cycle was done based on the analysis and reflection from the first cycle. The third cycle was done based on the analysis and reflection based on the second cycle.

The focus of this research is on increasing the students’ vocabulary achievements of action verbs as the learning product. Moreover, the researcher also observed the students’ activities and the teacher’s performance as the learning process while TPR procedure was conducted to teach action verbs in the form of imperative mood in the class. The researcher decided to observe those three aspects because the researcher assumed that the result of the learning product, that is the students’ vocabulary achievements is also determined by the learning process occurred in the class which covers the students’ learning activities and the teacher’s